Watch: NASA Interstellar Probe Mission with Prof. Ralph L. McNUtt, Jr.----International Space Science Institute

On Things to Come Webinar

NASA Interstellar Probe Mission

Speaker: Ralph L. McNutt, Jr.

(The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, USA)

Wednesday, 29 September 2021

9 am GMT+8

Watch the recording on Bilibili

BEIJING — On 29 September 2021, Prof. Ralph L. McNUtt, Jr. gave an online seminar on NASA Interstellar Probe mission. The lecture was organized in the context of the ISSI-BJ "On Things to Come" series that addresses ongoing as well as future space missions by inviting renowned scientists from different countries, institutes, and space agencies.

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About the webinar

What is now known as "Interstellar Probe" has matured as a concept for making new discoveries that can be made in no other way, by going places yet to be explored. "Near-future" propulsion capabilities have always been taken as the backdrop for defining the mission requirements, but the real issue is to unite compelling science with engineering and technical reality. With that perspective in mind, the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory has been tasked by the NASA Heliophysics Division to (re-)study the mission and provide a Technical Report to be delivered late 2021 for input to next Solar and Space Physics Decadal Survey.

This "pragmatic Interstellar Probe" of the study is a mission through the outer heliosphere and to the nearby "Very Local" interstellar medium(VLISM), uses today' s technology to take the first explicit step on the path of interstellar exploration, and can pave the way, scientifically, technically, and programmatically for more ambitious future journeys(and more ambitious science goals).

To enforce these goals the broadly-based engineering requirements include (1) be ready technically to launch no later than 1 January 2030; (2) be able to transmit useful scientific data from 1000 au; (3) require no more than 600W(electric) at the beginning of the mission and no more than half of that at mission 's end; and, (4) be capable by design of functioning for no less than 50 years. We provide a top-level summary of the current study status. “It isn't about where we are going. It's about the journey out there.”

About Prof. Ralph L. McNutt, Jr.

Ralph L. McNutt, Jr. is a Physicist, member of the Principal Professional Staff, and Science and Analysis Branch Chief Scientist for Space Science in the Space Exploration Sector of The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. He received his B.S. in Physics (summa cum laude) at Texas A&M University in 1975 and his Ph.D. in Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1980.

Dr. McNutt is a Co-Investigator on four current NASA missions. He is a Member and Trustee of the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) and Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Schedule

23 September 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Geraint Jones – ESA Comet Interceptor Mission [YouTube/Youku]
21 October 2020 8 pm (GMT+8)	Ralph Lorenz – NASA Dragonfly Mission [YouTube/Youku]
4 November 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Wang Chi – ESA SMILE Mission [YouTube/Youku]
25 November 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Heike Rauer – ESA PLATO Mission [YouTube/Youku]
9 December 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Takehiko Satoh – JAXA Akatsuki Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
18 December 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Olivier Witasse – ESA JUICE Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
21 December 2020 4 pm (GMT+8)	Tomohiro Usui – JAXA MMX Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
13 January 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Weiqun Gan – CAS ASO-S Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
27 January 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Giovanna Tinetti – ESA Ariel Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
24 February 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Johannes Benkhoff – ESA BepiColombo Mission I [YouTube/Bilibili]
10 March 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Gabriele Cremonese – ESA BepiColombo Mission II [YouTube/Bilibili]
24 March 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Go Murakami – ESA BepiColombo Mission III [YouTube/Bilibili]
7 April 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Yoshifumi Saito – ESA BepiColombo Mission IV [YouTube/Bilibili]
14 April 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Daniel Mueller – ESA Solar Orbiter Mission I [YouTube/Bilibili]
21 April 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Stefano Vitale – ESA LISA Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
6 May 2021 9 am (GMT+8)	Andy Cheng – NASA DART Mission [YouTube/Bilibili]
12 May 2021 9 am (GMT+8)	Robert Pappalardo – NASA Europa Clipper [YouTube/Bilibili]
19 May 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Saem Krucker – ESA Solar Orbiter Mission II Watch
25 May 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Sami Solanki – ESA Solar Orbiter Mission III Watch
2 June 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Athena Coustenis – ESA's ExoMars Missions Watch
9 June 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Yuan Weimin – CAS Einstein Probe Mission Watch
16 June 2021 10 am (GMT+8)	Evgenya Shkolnik – NASA SPARCS Mission Watch
30 June 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Ren Laurelijs – ESA EUCLID Mission Watch
7 July 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	ZHAN Hu – CMS Chinese Space Station Telescope Watch
14 July 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Tomoko Arai – JAXA DESTINY+ Mission Watch
21 July 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	Micheal K ppers – ESA HERA Mission Watch
25 August 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	LI Zhengqiang – CAS Gaofen-5 Watch
9 Sept. 2021 10 am (GMT+8)	Lindy Elkins-Tanton – NASA Psyche Mission Watch
15 Sept. 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	LIN Honglei – CAS Tianwen-1 Watch
22 Sept. 2021 9 am (GMT+8)	Hal Levison – NASA Lucy Mission Watch
29 Sept. 2021 9 am (GMT+8)	Ralph McNutt – NASA Interstellar Probe Watch
27 Oct. 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	FAN Yizhou – CAS DAMPE Mission Attend
10 Nov. 2021 4 pm (GMT+8)	ZHANG Peng – CAS Fengyun Mission

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