A Plasma Aerocapture and Entry System for Manned Missions and Planetary Deep Space Orbiters: Phase I Final Report

A plasma Magnetoshell can enable a wealth of large scale inner planetary missions and deep space planetary orbiters. Aerocapture and aerobraking use aerodynamic drag in a planetary atmosphere in order to decelerate and shed velocity from a planetary transfer orbit. Aerobraking systems have been shown to dramatically reduce the mass and cost of interplanetary orbiters. Aerocapture systems use a high temperature ceramic Aeroshell and thermal protection system (TPS) to extend those benefits to allow not only orbit lowering, but injection orbit capture as well. Mission studies have shown the Aerocapture is a dramatically enabling technology for interplanetary science and manned missions and critical for the future of NASA space travel.