Technical Seminar 3: Advanced Technology Development for Planetary Entry, Descent, and Landing

Summary: The current state-of-the-art in planetary entry, decent, and landing (EDL) systems is derived primarily from a 30 year old technology set developed for the Mars Viking Program, including the heritage spherically blunted conical aeroshell geometry, ablative thermal protection system material, and the supersonic disc-gap-band parachute. Optimistic estimates predict that the current Viking derived EDL architecture, which relies primarily on the technologies developed in the 1960s and '70s, may be extensible to allow landed masses up to a maximum of on the order of two metric tons as parachute diameters and ballistic entry masses increase to limiting values.