PLANETARY SCIENCE at RAL

Our Program

Our planetary science program is based on a strong program of space mission instrument development, and the unique opportunities offered by the important data sets for curent and upcoming missions which this gives access to. This is reinforced by data analysis, ground-based observing and theoretical studies. Each complements the others. We have a wide range of interests, in a number of the planets, in the interplanetary dust, and in extrasolar planets.

• We want to understand the processes controlling the origins, entry, acceleration and loss of plasma in the neighbourhood of the Earth's and other Solar System planets, such as such as Mars, Mercury , and Saturn , Jupiter and their moons.
• The Cassini mission due to arrive soon at Saturn is an important step. At Saturn, we are also actively interested in dust distribution, dusty plasmas, and the surface of Titan itself.
• A recent highlight is our leadership of the D-CIXS experiment on the ESA SMART-1 mission to the Moon. This X-ray flourescent spectrometer will investigate the fundamental geophysical history of the Moon, and hence the origin of the Earth-Moon system.
• We are also involved in the ASPERA3 experiment on Mars Express, which will probe the interaction of (and erosion by) the Solar Wind and atmosphere, and hence address the question of water loss on Mars.
• Following on from this, we will repeat the task of detector provision for ASPERA4 experiment on ESA's Venus Express, where it will investigate the interaction of the Solar Wind aWith the Venus ionosphere.
• Our laboratory facilities have been used to give empirical calibration data for atmospheric and structure studies of Jupiter.
• We have a profound interest in the emerging ares of exobiology, planetary formation and the discovery of earthlike Extrasolar Planets. The ASPERA investigations of Water loss on Mars, the SMART-1 study of Earth-Moon system formation, preparations for Beagle, and our vigorous involvement in Darwin and the exobiology forum are all part of this objective.

Current Planetary Interests

	Active Instrument involvement on Missions	Magnetosphere, plasma environment and Solar Wind Interaction	Atmosphere	Composition	Dynamics and Distribution	Dust	Exobiology
Moon	SMART-1 Selene
Mercury	Future ESA or other mission
Mars	Mars Express Aspera 3 Planet-B
Venus	VenusExpress
Saturn	Cassini Huygens
Titan	Cassini Huygens
Comets	Rosetta Giotto ROSAT
Interplanetary Dust	Cassini Huygens
Extrasolar Planets	Corot Darwin Groundbased

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