Happy 20th anniversary to NASA’s Genesis sample return mission!
On September 8, 2004, the Genesis Solar Wind sample return mission delivered captured solar wind particles to Earth. The landing was unexpectedly spectacular because an arrow on the design for the return capsule was drawn backwards; the pressure sensor never registered Earth’s atmosphere, and the capsule’s parachute never deployed.
That crash changed the course of the career of Center Emeritus Assistant Research Professor Amy Jurewicz, then NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s (JPL) Project Scientist for the Genesis mission. While she was intending to leave JPL for ASU and move on to new projects, Jurewicz instead found herself continuing her work on Genesis at ASU, helping the mission’s Principal Investigator Don Burnett and others to literally pick up the pieces and make Genesis a science success.
Image: The Genesis sample-return capsule after landing at Utah Test and Training Range. Photo © NASA.
The team’s persistence ultimately paid off, as the information acquired from Genesis has so far been of great importance to the science of meteoritics.
Thanks to Genesis, we learned that
- The oxygen isotopic composition of many calcium- and aluminum-rich inclusions (CAIs) in meteorites reflects that of the Sun.
- Jupiter has a nitrogen isotope composition similar to that of the Sun, but for the most part, neither the Sun nor Jupiter has nitrogen isotope signatures resembling meteoritic components or those of the inner Solar System.
- The neon isotopes in lunar soils reflect weathering processes and are not implants of solar energetic particles.
- The differences observed between spectroscopic measurements of the solar photosphere and the composition of CI chondrites are correct, and a function of condensation temperature.
In addition, the Genesis mission provided invaluable data on space weather, space weathering, mass fractionation of isotopes and elements during solar wind formation, and new analytical techniques.
Image: Genesis sample return capsule. L to R, Amy Jurewicz, Don Seville, Judy Allton, and Eileen Stansbery. Photo © AP.
