Rosetta
Rosetta, European Space Agency spacecraft that carried Philae, the first space probe to land on a comet. Rosetta was launched on March 2, 2004, by an Ariane 5 rocket from Kourou, French Guiana, on a 10-year mission to Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The expectation was that, like the Rosetta Stone, the craft would help decode ancient history—in this case, the history of the solar system.
Rosetta’s 654-million-km (406-million-mile) cruise involved three gravity-assisted flybys of Earth (in 2005, 2007, and 2009) and one of Mars (in 2007), as well as flybys of the asteroids Steins (in 2008) and Lutetia (in 2010). It entered orbit around the comet on August 6, 2014, and then deployed the 100-kg (220-pound) probe Philae (named after a Nile River island on which was found an obelisk that helped in the deciphering of the Rosetta Stone) on November 12.
Philae took seven hours to descend to the comet’s surface. The lander was to fire two harpoons and use three ice screws in its legs to anchor itself to the surface of the comet. However, the harpoons did not fire. Philae bounced off the comet to a height of 1 km (0.6 mile) and bounced again (but not as high) before settling into a precarious position, tipped almost sideways on a cliff face with only two legs on the surface. The lander was also in shadow for nearly 11 hours of the comet’s 12.4-hour rotation period, so it was initially unable to recharge its batteries from its solar panels. Scientists were initially reluctant to use a drill, designed to extract samples for chemical analysis, and other moving instruments, in case doing so would turn Philae upside down. Nevertheless, Philae’s six panoramic cameras and other instruments, including the drill (which detected organic molecules), were able to return some data to Earth before the lander’s batteries drained. Philae revived in June 2015, but communication was sporadic until contact was lost in July 2015.
Rosetta orbited Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko for more than two years until its mission ended with a controlled crash into the comet on September 30, 2016. Many features of the comet that Rosetta discovered surprised scientists. The comet had a double-lobed, “rubber-duck”-like structure that was the result of the collision and subsequent joining of two smaller comets. Rosetta also made the first detection of molecular oxygen at a comet; molecular oxygen is strongly reactive but nevertheless was likely part of the comet when it formed. Rosetta also discovered several organic molecules, including the amino acid glycine.