Ingenuity (helicopter)
Ingenuity, nicknamed Ginny, is a small robotic helicopter operating on Mars as part of NASA's Mars 2020 mission along with the "Perseverance" rover, which landed on February 18, 2021. Two months later, on April 19, "Ingenuity" successfully completed the first powered controlled extraterrestrial flight by an aircraft—taking off vertically, hovering, and landing, for a flight duration of 39.1 seconds. As of April 26, 2022, it has made 27 successful flights. "Ingenuity"'s 25th successful flight, which occurred on April 8, 2022, saw the helicopter set new records for highest speed and distance traveled during a single  flight. "Ingenuity" was designed and built by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), with contributions by NASA's Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center; AeroVironment, Inc.; SolAero; and Lockheed Martin Space. Its rotors measure , and its entire body is tall. Its fuselage measures , with four landing legs of each. It is operated by solar-charged batteries that power dual counter-rotating rotors mounted coaxial one above the other. During its 30-day technology demonstration, It was intended to fly up to five times at altitudes ranging from for up to 90 seconds each. The expected lateral range was exceeded  in the third flight, and the flight duration was exceeded in the fourth. The flights proved its ability to fly in the extremely thin atmosphere of Mars, over a hundred million miles from Earth, without direct human control. Because radio signals take between 5–20 minutes to travel between Earth and Mars—depending on planetary positions—"Ingenuity" must operate autonomously, performing maneuvers planned, scripted and transmitted to it by JPL. After the brief demonstration phase, JPL began more flights as operational demonstrations, to show how aerial scouting could benefit exploration of Mars and other worlds. In its operational role, "Ingenuity" is observing  areas of interest for possible examination by the "Perseverance" rover. The helicopter's performance and resilience greatly exceeded expectations, enabling it to make flights for the remainder of 2021 and into 2022. In March 2022, NASA announced that it would continue to fly "Ingenuity" through at least September. "Ingenuity" travelled to Mars attached to the underside of "Perseverance", which touched down at the Octavia E. Butler Landing site in the wide Jezero crater on February 18, 2021. The helicopter was deployed to the surface on April 3, 2021, and "Perseverance" drove approximately away to allow the drone a safe "buffer  zone" in which to make its first flight. Success was confirmed three hours later in a livestreaming TV feed from JPL Mission Control. On its fourth flight, on April 30, 2021, "Ingenuity" became the first interplanetary spacecraft whose sound was recorded by another interplanetary spacecraft, "Perseverance". "Ingenuity" carries a piece of fabric from the wing of the 1903 "Wright Flyer", the Wright Brothers' airplane used in the first controlled powered heavier-than-air flight on Earth. "Ingenuity"'s initial take-off and landing area is named Wright Brothers Field as a tribute. Before "Ingenuity", the first flight of any kind  on a planet beyond Earth was an unpowered balloon flight on Venus by the Soviet Vega 1 spacecraft in 1985. Design. The lower gravity of Mars (about a third of Earth's) only partially offsets the thinness of the 95% carbon dioxide atmosphere of Mars, making it much harder for an aircraft to generate adequate lift. The planet's atmospheric density is about that of Earth's at sea level, or about the same as , an altitude never reached by existing helicopters. To keep "Ingenuity" aloft, its specially shaped blades of enlarged size must rotate between 2400 and 2900 rpm , or about 10 times faster than what is needed on Earth. The helicopter uses contra-rotating coaxial rotors about in diameter, each controlled by a separate swashplate that can affect both collective and cyclic pitch. "Ingenuity" has two cameras: a downward-looking black-and-white navigation camera (NAV), and a color camera, for terrain images for return to Earth (RTE). Although it is an aircraft, it was constructed to spacecraft specifications to endure the acceleration and vibrations during launch. It also includes radiation-resistant systems capable of operating in Mars's environment. Mars's magnetic field precludes the use of  a compass for navigation, so "Ingenuity" relies on different sensors grouped in two assemblies. All sensors are commercial off-the-shelf units. The "Upper Sensor Assembly," with associated vibration isolation elements, is mounted on the mast close to the vehicle's center-of-mass to minimize the effects of angular rates and accelerations. It consists of a cellphone-grade Bosch BMI-160 Inertial measurement unit ("IMU"); and an inclinometer (Murata SCA100T-D02), which is used only on the ground prior to flight to calibrate the IMU accelerometers biases. The "Lower Sensor Assembly" consists of an altimeter (Garmin LIDAR Lite v3), both  cameras, and a secondary IMU, all mounted directly on the Electronics Core Module (not on the mast). The down-facing Omnivision OV7251 camera supports visual odometry, where images are processed to produce navigation solutions that calculate the helicopter's position, velocity, attitude, and other variables. "Ingenuity" uses solar panels to recharge its batteries, which are six Sony Li-ion cells with of energy capacity (nameplate capacity of 2 Ah). Flight duration is not constrained by the available power, but by the motors heating up 1 °C every second. The helicopter uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor with a Linux  operating system. Among other functions, it controls the visual navigation algorithm via a velocity estimate derived from terrain features tracked with the navigation camera. The Qualcomm processor is connected to two flight-control microcontroller units (MCUs) to perform necessary flight-control functions. The telecommunication system consists of two identical radios with monopole antennae for data exchange between the helicopter and rover. The radio link utilizes the low-power Zigbee communication protocols, implemented via 914 MHz SiFlex 02 chipsets mounted in both vehicles. The communication system is designed to relay data at 250 kbit/s over distances of up to . The  antenna on the helicopter's solar panel weighs 4 grams and can communicate equally in all directions. The team. The history of the Mars Helicopter team dates back to 2012, when MiMi Aung was leading then JPL director Charles Elachi on a tour of the Autonomous Systems Division. Looking at the drones demonstrating onboard navigation algorithms in one of the labs, Elachi asked, "Hey, why don't we do that on Mars?" Engineer Bob Balaram briefed Elachi about feasibility, and a week later Elachi told him, "Okay, I've got some study money for you". By January 2015 NASA agreed  to fund the development of a full-size model, which came to be known as the "risk reduction" vehicle. As project manager, Aung assembled a multidisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, and technicians leveraging all of NASA's expertise. The JPL team was never larger than 65 full-time-equivalent employees, but program workers at AeroVironment and NASA AMES and Langley research centers brought the total to 150. Team members include: On June 15, 2021, the team behind "Ingenuity" was named the 2021 winner of the John L. "Jack" Swigert, Jr. Award for Space Exploration from the Space Foundation. Conceptual design . NASA's JPL and AeroVironment published the conceptual design in 2014 for a scout helicopter to accompany a rover. By mid-2016, $15 million was being requested to continue development of the helicopter. By December 2017, engineering models of the vehicle had been tested in a simulated martian atmosphere and models were undergoing testing in the Arctic, but its inclusion in the mission had not yet been approved or funded. The United States federal budget, announced in March 2018, provided $23 million for the helicopter for one year, and it was announced on May 11, 2018, that the helicopter  could be developed and tested in time to be included in the Mars 2020 mission. These potential aircraft could have direct communication to an orbiter and may or may not continue to work with a landed asset. Future helicopters could be used to explore special regions with exposed water ice or brines, where Mars microbial life could potentially survive. Data collected by "Ingenuity" is supporting planning of a future helicopter design by engineers at JPL, NASA's Ames Research Center and AeroVironment. The Mars Science Helicopter, a proposed successor to "Ingenuity", would be a hexacopter, or six-rotor helicopter, with  a mass of about compared to of "Ingenuity". Mars Science Helicopter could carry as much as of science payloads and fly up to per flight.