HR: 0800h
AN: P31C-0218    [Abstracts]
TI: Surface and Borehole Neutron Probes for the Construction and Resource Utilization eXplorer (CRUX)
AU: * Elphic, R C
EM: relphic@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, MS D466/Space Science and Applications, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Lawrence, D J
EM: djlawrence@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, MS D466/Space Science and Applications, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Hahn, S
EM: shahn@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, MS D466/Space Science and Applications, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Feldman, W C
EM: wfeldman@lanl.gov
AF: Los Alamos National Laboratory, MS D466/Space Science and Applications, Los Alamos, NM 87545 United States
AU: Johnson, J B
EM: jjohnson@crrel.usace.army.mil
AF: US Army Corps of Engineers/Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, PO Box 35170, Ft. Wainwright, AK 99703 United States
AU: Chu, P
EM: chu@honeybeerobotics.com
AF: Honeybee Robotics, 460 W 34th Street, New York, NY 10001 United States
AB: The Construction Resource Utilization eXplorer (CRUX) is a technology maturation project for NASA's Exploration Division aimed at providing enabling technology for lunar and planetary surface operations (LPSO). The CRUX will have 10 instruments, a data handling function, and a decision support system (DSS) to provide information needed to plan and conduct surface operations. Here we discuss two instruments of the suite that are specifically aimed at detecting and assessing deposits such as water ice or other hydrogenous volatiles. The Surface Neutron Probe (SNeuP) identifies promising sites for recovery of volatile hydrogen-bearing deposits. Mounted on a rover, SNeuP provides a record of average hydrogen abundance with position and time during a traverse. The entire instrument weighs 480 g, and consumes 1.8 W. The Borehole Neutron Probe (BNeuP) identifies hydrogenous layers, including those bearing water ice, as a function of depth down a borehole. BNeuP weighs 517 g, and consumes <2 W. Both instruments sense the presence of hydrogenous materials by measuring variations in the thermal and epithermal neutron fluxes using helium-3 gas proportional counter tubes. We have carried out tests of the SNeuP instrument, and have demonstrated its ability to detect and locate near-surface hydrogen-bearing deposits. We have also tested BNeuP in a drilling configuration and have demonstrated its ability to locate and quantify the water-equivalent hydrogen content of layered deposits. SNeuP thus helps locate promising sites for drilling and sample recovery, while BNeuP's stratigraphic record of hydrogen with depth is key to successful volatile sample recovery and interpretation of other instruments' data.
DE: 0394 Instruments and techniques
DE: 1823 Frozen ground
DE: 5462 Polar regions
DE: 6225 Mars
SC: Planetary Sciences [P]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005