Launch Opportunities for Jupiter Missions Using the Gravity Assist

Abstract

Interplanetary trajectories using the gravity assists are studied for future Korean interplanetary missions. Verifications of the developed softwares and results were performed by comparing data from ESA's Mars Express mission and previous results. Among the Jupiter exploration mission scenarios, multi-planet gravity assist mission to Jupiter (Earth-Mars-Earth-Jupiter Gravity Assist, EMEJGA trajectory) requires minimum launch energy (C3) of 29.231 km2/s2 with 4.6 years flight times. Others, such as direct mission and single-planet(Mars) gravity assist mission, requires launch energy (C3) of 75.656 km^2/s^2 with 2.98 years flight times and 63.590 km2/s2 with 2.33 years flight times, respectively. These results show that the planetary gravity assists can reduce launch energy, while EMEJGA trajectory requires the longer flight time than the other missions.

Keywords

• Jupiter
• interplanetary trajectory design
• gravity assist