NASA - Jupiter Icy Moons Orbitor ( JIMO ) cancelled 2005, Alien Life in Outer Space ?

The Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (JIMO) was a proposed spacecraft designed to explore the icy moons of Jupiter. The main target was Europa, the suspected ocean of which is one of the places where simple alien life is a possibility in our solar system. Ganymede and Callisto, which are now thought to have liquid, salty oceans beneath their icy surfaces, were also targets of interest for the probe.

JIMO was to have a large number of revolutionary features. Throughout its main voyage to the Jupiter moons, it was to be propelled by an ion propulsion system called HiPEP, and powered by a small fission reactor. A Brayton power conversion system would convert reactor heat into electricity. Providing a thousand times the electrical output of conventional solar or RTG based power system, the reactor was expected to open up opportunities like flying a full scale ice-penetrating radar system and providing a strong, high-bandwidth data transmitter.

Using electric propulsion (8 ion engines, plus Hall thrusters of varying sizes) would make it possible to go into and leave orbits around the moons of Jupiter, creating more thorough observation and mapping windows than exist for the current spacecraft, which must make short fly-by maneuvers because of limited fuel for maneuvering.

The design called for the reactor to be positioned in the tip of the spacecraft behind a strong radiation shield protecting sensitive spacecraft equipment. The reactor would only be powered up once the probe was well out of Earth orbit, so that the amount of radionuclides that must be launched into orbit is minimized. This configuration is thought to be less risky than the radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) used on previous missions to the outer solar system.

Northrop Grumman was selected on September 20, 2004 for a $400 million preliminary design contract, beating Lockheed Martin and Boeing IDS. The contract was to have run through to 2008. Separate contracts, covering construction and individual instruments, were to be awarded at a later date.

*****CANCELLED******

Due to a shift in priorities at NASA that favored manned space missions, the project lost funding in 2005, effectively cancelling the JIMO mission. Among other issues, the proposed nuclear technology was deemed too ambitious, as was the multiple-launch and in-orbit assembly mission architecture.[1] Engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory with JIMO were laid off or reassigned during the spring and summer of 2005.[citation needed]

As a result of the budget changes, NASA is instead considering a demonstration mission to a target closer to Earth to test out the reactor and heat rejection systems. The spacecraft would possibly be scaled down from its original size as well.[citation needed]

When it was cancelled, the JIMO mission was in its early planning stage and launch wasn't expected before 2017. It was to be the first proposed mission of NASA's Project Prometheus, a program for developing nuclear fission into a viable means of spacecraft propulsion.

Europa Jupiter System Mission is a currently planned NASA/ESA mission to Jupiter's moons.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• nasa
• europa
• jupiter
• outerspace
• outer
• space
• extraterrestrial
• life
• extraterrestrials
• spaceship
• spaceships
• ufo
• ufos
• flying
• saucer
• saucers

[KarbineKyle]

AWESOME! Why can't the human race just get along? Why can't we just drop religion and politics, and explore space, where the answers to our true existence might be found so soon? We've spent over $650 billion for this damn war, when we could put the money towards technology, such as nuclear power for space travel, orbiters, rovers, and telescopes! We could build huge telescopes and satellite antennas orbiting around the planets and placed on asteroids, so we could find even more worlds! COME ON!

[Nibielari]

maybe with the new direction that obama wants to take nasa they will consider this now

[gortijx]

@KarbineKyle

It's the monetary system, we need to look past money and profit. The monetary system is thousands of times more detrimental to the human evolution than religion ever was or is.

Sadly, people are so stupid that it'll never happen, and, like Stephen Hawking said, it will be very difficult for us to survive the next 100 years.

[lovelplants]

wow very interesting topic... wow it's jupiter.. lava, ice.. nice

[WatchmenDrManhattan]

I find it very curios that NASA is showing no interest in Europa even doe they say they are looking for life & liquid water on other planets. It is like looking for gold & not seeing the mountain of it right beside you. Al this decades & the billions of dollars they spend, they couldn't spare something for a simple probe.

NASA is either dumb or they know something & are not telling or they are dumb.

[chekdamize7]

@KarbineKyle

Islam is the true religion and the whole world is united to fighting it and making the rest of the people who are clueless to it believe their evil propaganda in an effort to destroy the truth and believers, islam....the complete surrender to the Creator of the universe and belief in all the messngers, worshipping Allah alone with no partners....read the Quran and look arond, never changed final revelation....

[Wolfsbane909]

I have a message here from the 2010 space computer HAL 9000 " Stay away from Europa!", let's not posion their planet too.

[boyceps]

Io... Volcanos, a moon of fire... Much the same as Earth was 10 billion (or so) years ago. Life in a few million? Fascinating!

[Tinhh]

Because we are human. We are flawed and petty creatures. Our evolution is not over.

[RedTailedTuna]

COOL!

[HNMpepper]

They cancelled it because manned missions, but now they've cancelled the manned missions! Screw things! We can't get along and actually get somewhere! Instead, we just waste money like parasites on grabbing oil from Libya. Oh, and don't tell me it was human rights, what about Zimbabwe! Or we waste money on that silly ISS! I reckon quite a lot of things they do on that thing, they could instead do on interplanetary missions! Let's get's some guts! I know I'm being lippy but this is out of order!

[perjanan]

water and volcanos