NASA's Stardust-NExT spacecraft made a Valentine's Day deep-space rendezvous with an object it had been seeking for the past four-and-a-half years. The Lockheed Martin-built spacecraft flawlessly executed its mission and performed a flyby of comet Tempel 1 at 9:39 p.m. MT yesterday.

Stardust made its closest approach of the nucleus of the comet at a distance of 111 miles (178 km) and was traveling a relative speed of 24,300 mph (10.9 km per second). During the encounter, the NavCam instrument took 72 images of the comet. The closest images can be viewed online. In addition, two other instruments aboard the spacecraft collected data on the composition, size distribution and flux of dust emitted into the coma-the cloud of dust and debris surrounding the comet.

"This little spacecraft has really been around the block. Even through the odometer is high and the fuel is low, it did everything we asked of it and the results are visually amazing," said Allan Cheuvront, Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company program manager for Stardust-NExT. "Most of our team has been working with the spacecraft since launch and their dedication to this project was clearly evident today."

During yesterday's encounter, and for the previous 12 years, Lockheed Martin provided mission flight operations for the spacecraft. At its Mission Support Area (MSA) near Denver, engineers monitor the health and safety of the spacecraft, develop, test and send commands via the Deep Space Network, and plan mission activities. Spacecraft navigation and project management are handled by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

"The NExT mission is a shining example of an innovative and affordable solution that is bringing us outstanding science," said Jim Crocker, vice president of Sensing and Exploration Systems at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company. "The team was able to fly Stardust through deep space and send back amazing images and science data, all at a small fraction of the cost of a new, ground-up mission."

On Feb. 16, the project moves into the departure phase where the NavCam will take an image of Tempel every five minutes for five days and then every 12 minutes for the following six days as the comet recedes into the distance. Several weeks after the flyby, the Stardust spacecraft will be decommissioned.

earlier related report
Purdue Scientists Part Of NASA Return Mission To Comet
West Lafayette IN (SPX) Feb 14 - Two Purdue University professors and a student are part of the NASA science team returning to the comet Tempel 1 to study changes that occur as a comet approaches the sun and to potentially examine an impact crater created during an earlier mission.

Purdue professors Jay Melosh and Jim Richardson and graduate student Tim Bowling are part of the science team for NASA's Stardust New Exploration of Tempel 1, or Stardust-NExT, mission that flew within about 112 miles of the comet at 11:39 p.m. on Monday (Feb. 14). Images captured by the spacecraft will be downloaded over the next few days.

This is the second look at Tempel 1 for Melosh and Richardson, both of whom were part of the 2005 Deep Impact mission that launched a probe into the comet, creating an impact crater on its surface.

Melosh, a distinguished professor of earth and atmospheric sciences and physics and an expert in impact cratering, said this would be the scientists' first look at the crater. Dust resulting from the impact in 2005 had blocked the view of the newly formed crater.

"We hope that the crater will reveal something about the interiors of comets," Melosh said. "The size and shape of the crater can tell us about strength and structure of the material. For instance, if the crater is much deeper than fresh craters on the moon, then it tells us that the comet has a porous interior. If the crater is flat, it tells us that the cometary interior flowed like a fluid just after the impact; and if the crater has a small cliff around its rim, then it means there is a hard surface layer on the comet. Until we get a look at it, we will not know if our prediction and, thus, our theories of how craters form on comets is correct."

Melosh and Bowling have been working on simulations of the collision between the Deep Impact probe and Tempel 1 and the resulting impact crater. The team predicts that the crater will be about 100 meters in diameter, which would be expected for a porous and weak material.

This mission also is the first to revisit a comet and compare observations before and after a single orbit around the sun, Melosh said.

"We hope to see part of the comet that we were unable to image in 2005 because it was in darkness," he said. "By comparing the terrain we saw in 2005 to what we will observe on this encounter, we will better understand how a comet's surface changes during its excursions into the inner solar system."

Richardson, an assistant research professor of earth and atmospheric sciences, said the extent and visibility of the debris produced when the crater was formed - called the ejecta blanket - will give important clues as to the nature of the comet and its environment.

The debris ejected from the Deep Impact collision was composed of extremely tiny particles consisting of a combination of water ice and silicate dust, he said. Some of these particles were ejected at speeds high enough to cause them to escape the comet forever, forming the plume that was visible from Earth-based telescopes.

However some were ejected at slower speeds and landed back on the comet's surface. While the ice component of these particles has long since been lost due to heating and vaporization as the comet orbited the sun, their silicate dust component should have left behind a blanket of material on the surface that is thickest closest to the impact crater and becoming thinner with distance from the impact site.

Richardson has been working on simulations of the ejecta plume and blanket from the Deep Impact mission.

"It was thrilling to have performed an impact experiment of this magnitude in the first place, but to be able to go back and re-examine the results of that experiment after the 'dust has cleared' is wonderful," Richardson said. "Through the crater, ejecta blanket and other changes in the comet's surface, we will be able to glean further information about the comet's structure and composition and the near-surface environment, which are very different from what we are familiar with here on Earth."

Melosh, Richardson and Bowling are at mission control at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.