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Quietly, without much press as NASA, JAXA is doing amazing things. Sample return missions are rare and high end of space exploration. Last one was NASA Startdus
by auslander 8y ago
Quietly, without much press as NASA, JAXA is doing amazing things. Sample return missions are rare and high end of space exploration. Last one was NASA Startdust 12 years ago.
Another interesting thing JAXA does is smallest rocket for orbital launches. SS-520-5 is 10 meter long, 50cm in diameter, 4kg to LEO and it successfully launched a 3U cubesat in orbit few months ago.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-Series_(rocket_family)#SS-520-5
Closest competitor is Rocket Lab's Electron, 17m length, 1.2m diameter, 225kg to LEO
www.spaceflight101.com/spacerockets/electron/
- robin_reala 8y agoThe last Nasa sample return mission maybe, but JAXA’s first Hayabusa returned samples in 2010.
- auslander 8y agoTrue, my bad, so yes, last sample return mission was JAXA's Hayabusa in 2010. They did have some problems though: "... safe descent mode. This mode did not permit a sample to be taken, but there is a high probability that some dust may have whirled up into the sampling horn when it touched the asteroid". 1500 extraterrestrial grains had been recovered, comprising the minerals olivine, pyroxene, plagioclase and iron sulphide. The grains were about 10 micrometers in size.
- azernik 8y agoPlus their lander totally flopped. Luckily, this is an incremental upgrade to the previous probe, so it's hopefully less buggy.
- jgh 8y agoWhy was there a 17 year delay between the 2nd launch and 3rd launch?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- greglindahl 8y agoPeople became less interested in the smallsat launch market for a long time.
- rory096 8y agoThose earlier launches were as a two-stage sounding rocket. The three-stage variant capable of putting a payload in orbit first launched in 2017; it made orbit on its second flight earlier this year. SS-520 is a one-off experimental project, not something they intend to put into regular commercial service.
- auslander 8y agoWhy not? I bet the'll have success with cubesats.