Rosetta Blog | September 2010

General , Operations 22 September, 2010 20:28

ESA’s Rosetta comet-chaser goes LEGO®

What does a scientist do to visualise a space journey? Build a model, of course. A model of Europe’s Rosetta comet-chaser made out of LEGO® blocks started out in this small way and has grown into a high-fidelity Rosetta Lander Education Kit.

Full article in ESA website here. -- Daniel

Slideshow

Image taken by NAVCAM A on 2010/07/06 03:45:02 UTC. Lutetia is the bright object in the middle of the 5x5 deg FOV. At that time, the distance was roughly 5.8 million km.

First OSIRIS image acquired during Earth Swing-by No. 3 (2009).

The image shows the Moon as seen through the OSIRIS NAC (high-resolution narrow-angle camera) using the orange filter from a distance of 4.3 million kilometres at 8/11 03:10 UTC. Rosetta is flying towards the Earth coming in from the night side which is the reason for the very narrow illuminated crescent.

Credits: ESA ©2009 MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/RSSD/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA

Rosetta’s navigation camera (NAVCAM) took this shot of Earth right after Rosetta’s closest approach to our planet. The picture was taken at 22:56 CET on 13 November, as Rosetta’s second Earth swing-by concluded, while the spacecraft was flying at a height of about 6250 km from the surface.

Credits: ESA

This image was taken by Rosetta’s navigation camera (NAVCAM) right after Rosetta’s closest approach to Earth. The picture was taken at 21:56 CET on 13 November, as Rosetta’s second Earth swing-by concluded, while the spacecraft was flying at a height of about 5500 km from the surface.

Credits: ESA