Philae is taking a well deserved break after transmitting its data – La Rioja

The space probe ‘Philae’ travels inactive since early this morning at the surface of comet 67P / Churyumov-Gerasimenko. As feared those responsible for the mission, its batteries ran without maneuvers ordered late from Earth succeed in the ‘miracle’ to place it in an area most exposed to sunlight. However, the balance of the work he has done is “magnificent”.

Before ‘off’ managed to send to the headquarters of the European Space Agency (ESA) in Germany all scientific data collected in the 60 hours that has been operating in the comet. “It has worked very well in harsh conditions,” said Stephan Ulamec yesterday, the head of the robot.

‘Philae’ spent his last load of energy to successfully transmit information relating to the drilling of the comet he had done in the past hours. At eleven pm (CET Spanish) came last signal from the robot. While it was very weak, downloading data was no apparent problems. “We have received under as planned. Everything has gone exactly as expected, “said the scientist in charge of the project, Jean-Pierre Bibring.

The data downloaded during the night were greeted with enthusiasm. Operators and scientists were more than satisfied by the perfect performance of the drill, which has been sampled to analyze in situ soil. “The information is being processed and the atmosphere here is fantastic,” said Lawrence O’Rourke, senior systems engineer at ESA. If all goes according to plan designed, the first scientific results will be published in the coming weeks.

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Despite the blackout ‘Philae’, responsible for the European Space Agency did not throw in the towel. The module is at rest to conserve energy, and continue clinging to kite with three legs. His condition is similar to that of a mobile phone is out of battery: does not work but it is not dead.

The mission managers stress that landing ‘Philae’ has only been a part of a project that will last until late 2015 or early 2016, months that is expected to ‘Rosetta’ ( the ship that transported the robot) follow the trail of the comet on its path towards the sun. “The important thing now is that the probe can survive until better times,” Bibring said. No wonder, engineers and scientists do not lose hope and have faith that when the comet approaches the sun, the solar panels are exposed to direct sunlight and so the batteries will be recharged enough so that ‘Philae’ can resume its activity.

80% of the robot has been done, “he said last night Marc Pircher, Director of CNES, the French space agency. The goal was simply to find organic molecules that might have played a role in the emergence of life on Earth, leveraging that comets are the oldest solar system bodies.

‘Philae’ has had time to radiograph inside the comet, studying magnetism and analyze complex molecules ejected from the surface. And the mothership ‘Rosetta’, with more than 6,500 million kilometers on the counter since its launch in 2004 the space is in an orbit around the comet 30km. It is expected that further approaches, 20 kilometers from the star, Dec. 6, to pursue his studies. In subsequent months, the spacecraft will fly over the area and is expected to reach up to 8 miles from the center of the core.

80% of the scientific program of the mission rests on his shoulders and 20% over those of ‘Philae’. The August 13 is the day that the comet is found closer to the sun, although still a mission more months until December 2015.