Sample Return from Hypothesized Surfaces – CHELIS-T

INSTITUTION

Oregon State University (OSU)

CLASS

Iridium Class (2024 – 2025)

STUDENT TEAM

ACADEMIC GUIDANCE

Professor Sarah Oman

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The project focuses on Psyche, a metal-rich celestial body located in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The Psyche spacecraft, launched in October 2023, will study Psyche from orbit and provide critical data. NASA’s possible objective is to obtain samples from Psyche’s surface for more detailed analysis. The project was built upon previous teams’ work on the space elevator concept. The first team introduced the space elevator idea, while the second team refined the overall system, focusing on transportation from the surface to the orbiter. Our team, the third in the sequence, is divided into two groups: Attachment – as how to lock anchor between Psyche and Spacecraft, and Delivery – as what will be the most effective method for collecting samples.

This work was created in partial fulfillment of the Oregon State University Capstone Course “MIME 497”. The work is a result of the Psyche Student Collaborations component of NASA’s Psyche Mission (https://psyche.ssl.berkeley.edu). “Psyche: A Journey to a Metal World” [Contract number NNM16AA09C] is part of the NASA Discovery Program mission to solar system targets. Trade names and trademarks of ASU and NASA are used in this work for identification only. Their usage does not constitute an official endorsement, either expressed or implied, by Arizona State University or National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of ASU or NASA.