AMBITION – comet nucleus cryogenic sample return

D. Bockelée-Morvan (1) , Gianrico Filacchione (2) , Kathrin Altwegg (3) , Eleonora Bianchi (4) , Martin Bizzarro (5, 6) , Jürgen Blum (7) , Lydie Bonal (4) , Fabrizio Capaccioni (2) , Mathieu Choukroun (8) , Claudio Codella (4, 9) , Hervé Cottin (10) , Björn Davidsson (8) , Maria Cristina de Sanctis (2) , Maria Drozdovskaya (11) , Cécile Engrand (12) , Marina Galand (13) , Carsten Güttler (14) , Pierre Henri (15, 16) , Alain Herique (4) , Stavro Ivanoski (17) , Rosita Kokotanekova (18) , Anny Chantal Levasseur-Regourd (19) , Kelly E. Miller (20) , Alessandra Rotundi (2, 21) , Maria Schönbächler (22) , Colin Snodgrass (23) , Nicolas Thomas (3) , Cecilia Tubiana (14, 2) , Stefan Ulamec (24) , Jean-Baptiste Vincent (25)

1 LESIA - Laboratoire d'études spatiales et d'instrumentation en astrophysique = Laboratory of Space Studies and Instrumentation in Astrophysics
2 IAPS - Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziali - INAF
3 Physikalisches Institut [Bern]
4 IPAG - Institut de Planétologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble
5 STARPLAN - Centre for Star and Planet Formation
6 Natural History Museum of Denmark
7 IGEP - Institut für Geophysik und Extraterrestrische Physik [Braunschweig]
8 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
9 OAA - INAF - Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri
10 LISA (UMR_7583) - Laboratoire Interuniversitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques
11 CSH - Center for Space and Habitability
12 IJCLab - Laboratoire de Physique des 2 Infinis Irène Joliot-Curie
13 Department of Physics [Imperial College London]
14 MPS - Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung
15 LPC2E - Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace
16 LAGRANGE - Joseph Louis LAGRANGE
17 OAT - INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste
18 ESO - European Southern Observatory
19 PLANETO - LATMOS
20 SwRI - Southwest Research Institute [San Antonio]
21 DIST - Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie [Napoli]
22 D-ERDW - Department of Earth Sciences [Swiss Federal Institute of Technology - ETH Zürich]
23 IfA - Institute for Astronomy [Edinburgh]
24 DLR - German Aerospace Center
25 DLR Institut für Planetenforschung

We describe the AMBITION project, a mission to return the first-ever cryogenically- stored sample of a cometary nucleus, that has been proposed for the ESA Science Programme Voyage 2050. Comets are the leftover building blocks of giant planet cores and other planetary bodies, and fingerprints of Solar System’s formation pro- cesses. We summarise some of the most important questions still open in cometary science and Solar System formation after the successful Rosetta mission. We show that many of these scientific questions require sample analysis using techniques that are only possible in laboratories on Earth. We summarize measurements, instrumen- tation and mission scenarios that can address these questions. We emphasize the need for returning a sample collected at depth or, still more challenging, at cryogenic tem- peratures while preserving the stratigraphy of the comet nucleus surface layers. We provide requirements for the next generation of landers, for cryogenic sample acqui- sition and storage during the return to Earth. Rendezvous missions to the main belt comets and Centaurs, expanding our knowledge by exploring new classes of comets, are also discussed. The AMBITION project is discussed in the international context of comet and asteroid space exploration.

Keywords: Space missions; Solar system; Comets

Domains: Sciences of the Universe [physics]

D. Bockelée-Morvan, Gianrico Filacchione, Kathrin Altwegg, Eleonora Bianchi, Martin Bizzarro, et al.. AMBITION – comet nucleus cryogenic sample return. Experimental Astronomy, 2022, 54, pp.1077-1128. ⟨10.1007/s10686-021-09770-4⟩. ⟨insu-03298830v3⟩