Drone built to soar over Saturn moon
JAN 04, 2012
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.025796
Daily Mail : A plutonium-powered pilotless aircraft, Aviatr, has been designed to fly around Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. It would take three-dimensional photos of the moon’s surface, which is hidden from Earth’s view by Titan’s cloudy atmosphere, and even try to land on it. Although a rival balloon project has also been proposed, Aviatr’s designers maintain that the plane would do the best job because its altitude could be controlled more precisely and its plutonium-powered generator could keep Aviatr on the day side of Titan to make the most of its photographing time. With a projected cost of $715 million, Aviatr did not make NASA’s last round of funding. However, Jason Barnes, a scientist at the University of Idaho and one of the craft’s designers, remains optimistic that it will make the next round.
© 2012 American Institute of Physics
