Indian Mangallana has a methane problem

Indian Mangallana has a methane problem

A methane detection device installed aboard an ISRO MOM spacecraft (Mars Orbiter Mission - Mangalyan) re-reviewed the results after NASA scientists discovered design flaws.

More than two years passed after the innovative Mangalyan reached the red planet, and the Indian space research organization still produces the long-awaited instrument for measuring atmospheric methane, a gas associated with the presence of life.

According to the latest information, the data does not pass due to a defect in the design of the sensor.

“They didn’t design it properly for it to work on Mars,” said Michael Mamma, senior scientist at the Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA.

In 2003, Mamma led a team that made the first final measurements of methane on Mars using an infrared telescope in Hawaii. Methane, manifested in the plumes of specific Martian regions, reached a maximum density of about 60 parts per billion.

“The MOM device looks attractive, but it is not suitable for this task. It has a different meaning, and, unfortunately, it will not be able to provide methane measurement at the levels required for the sample, even of the plumes we saw, ”said Mumma. The problem is related to how the instrument collects and processes the methane found in the atmosphere (the technique is called spectroscopy).

“Imagine looking at a hand and extending four fingers ... Suppose each of them represents a line of methane. They also have a spectrometer that can transfer their four fingers to a sample, and then they have a second instrument that captures the area between them. The trouble is that they did not send back the spectra. They only send two numbers — the sum of the fingers measured by the first channel and the sum of the gaps measured by the second. Then they take the difference of these numbers and think that it is a methane signal, ”said Mumma.

“The problem is that when you are surrounded by other spectral lines, such as carbon dioxide, which differ from each other with the temperature of their intensity, these two numbers do not represent only methane,” he said.

“This is really a failure, because they managed to place spacecraft into orbits so effectively, which was a great achievement for the first attempt,” he added. “But the reality is that we cannot use the sensor to find methane.” Mumma and his colleague Geronimo Villanueva analyzed the design of the MOM instrument as part of an expanding partnership between NASA and ISRO.

Their results were presented by the Indian Space Agency ISRO in February.

“I believe that the best solution would be the consent of the Indians to use their sensor for other purposes. So now they call the device “albedo cartographer” and a sunlight meter. And he is good at it, ”said Mamma.

“Engineers know how to build a good tool. The problem is different. They do not have the scientific guidance necessary to indicate what exactly they need to do, ”he said.

Sita Somasundaram from the ISRO Satellite Center, who developed the device, declined to comment.

Mumma and other scientists are now heading their hopes for a tool from the newly arrived Trace Gas Orbiter.

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