Biological contamination prevention for outer solar system moons of astrobiological interest: What do we need to know?
File(s)ast.2018.1996.pdf (1.02 MB)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
To ensure that scientific investments in space exploration are not compromised by terrestrial contamination of celestial bodies, special care needs to be taken to preserve planetary conditions for future astrobiological exploration. Significant effort has been made and is being taken to address planetary protection in the context of inner Solar System exploration. In particular for missions to Mars, detailed internationally accepted guidelines have been established. For missions to the icy moons in the outer Solar System, Europa and Enceladus, the planetary protection requirements are so far based on a probabilistic approach and a conservative estimate of poorly known parameters. One objective of the European Commission-funded project, Planetary Protection of Outer Solar System, was to assess the existing planetary protection approach, to identify inherent knowledge gaps, and to recommend scientific investigations necessary to update the requirements for missions to the icy moons.
Date Issued
2019-08-01
Date Acceptance
2019-01-08
Citation
Astrobiology, 2019, 19 (8)
ISSN
1531-1074
Publisher
Mary Ann Liebert
Journal / Book Title
Astrobiology
Volume
19
Issue
8
Copyright Statement
© 2019 Petra Rettberget al. ; Published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. This Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited.
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30762429
Subjects
Enceladus
Europa
Icy moons
Planetary protection
Requirements
Spacecraft
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
United States
Date Publish Online
2019-02-14