{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/104938"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/104938","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"Assessment of aerocapture-entry trajectories for human Mars exploration","abstract":"Using aerocapture to insert into an elliptic parking orbit prior to entry, descent, and landing is being explored for human Mars missions. These aerocapture-entry trajectories have advantages over a direct entry, but the advantages come at the cost of additional entry system mass. The goal of this research is to identify the parking orbit which minimizes entry system mass and to compare that to the entry system mass for a direct entry. The impact of a higher efficiency propulsion system, a higher entry velocity, and a reusable thermal protection system on aerocapture-entry system mass requirements is explored. Results indicate that the thermal protection system thickness does not vary significantly with parking orbit selection while shorter period orbits require more propellant for maneuvers. This result is not sensitive to changes in propulsion system efficiency, entry velocity, or heat shield material. Additionally, results show that aerocapture-entry architectures incur a TPS mass penalty up to 27% relative to direct entry, depending on vehicle. In addition, direct entry avoids needing propellant for in-space maneuvers between aerocapture and entry which ranges from 1.5% to 4.5% depending on orbit.","abstract_html":"Using aerocapture to insert into an elliptic parking orbit prior to entry, descent, and landing is being explored for human Mars missions. These aerocapture-entry trajectories have advantages over a direct entry, but the advantages come at the cost of additional entry system mass. The goal of this research is to identify the parking orbit which minimizes entry system mass and to compare that to the entry system mass for a direct entry. The impact of a higher efficiency propulsion system, a higher entry velocity, and a reusable thermal protection system on aerocapture-entry system mass requirements is explored. Results indicate that the thermal protection system thickness does not vary significantly with parking orbit selection while shorter period orbits require more propellant for maneuvers. This result is not sensitive to changes in propulsion system efficiency, entry velocity, or heat shield material. Additionally, results show that aerocapture-entry architectures incur a TPS mass penalty up to 27% relative to direct entry, depending on vehicle. In addition, direct entry avoids needing propellant for in-space maneuvers between aerocapture and entry which ranges from 1.5% to 4.5% depending on orbit.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Zinner, Evan J."],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.S.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Aerospace Engineering","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Putnam, Zachary R."],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2019,"date_issued":"2019-08-23T20:05:21Z","date_published":"2019-08-23T20:05:21Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:42Z","subjects":["Mars Entry Descent Landing Human Exploration Aerocapture Aerocapture-entry TPS Thermal Protection System Parking Orbit"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2019 Evan Zinner"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/104938","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Putnam, Zachary R."]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Zinner, Evan J."]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2019-08-23T20:05:21Z","2019-04-26","2019-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Aerospace Engineering"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.S."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Mars Entry Descent Landing Human Exploration Aerocapture Aerocapture-entry TPS Thermal Protection System Parking Orbit"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2019 Evan Zinner"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/104938"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Using aerocapture to insert into an elliptic parking orbit prior to entry, descent, and landing is being explored for human Mars missions. These aerocapture-entry trajectories have advantages over a direct entry, but the advantages come at the cost of additional entry system mass. The goal of this research is to identify the parking orbit which minimizes entry system mass and to compare that to the entry system mass for a direct entry. The impact of a higher efficiency propulsion system, a higher entry velocity, and a reusable thermal protection system on aerocapture-entry system mass requirements is explored. Results indicate that the thermal protection system thickness does not vary significantly with parking orbit selection while shorter period orbits require more propellant for maneuvers. This result is not sensitive to changes in propulsion system efficiency, entry velocity, or heat shield material. Additionally, results show that aerocapture-entry architectures incur a TPS mass penalty up to 27% relative to direct entry, depending on vehicle. In addition, direct entry avoids needing propellant for in-space maneuvers between aerocapture and entry which ranges from 1.5% to 4.5% depending on orbit.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2019-08-22 without embargo terms","The student, Evan Zinner, accepted the attached license on 2019-04-25 at 12:29.","The student, Evan Zinner, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2019-04-25 at 13:10.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2019-04-26 at 10:31.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13916 on 2019-08-22 at 14:46:49","Made available in DSpace on 2019-08-23T20:05:21Z (GMT). 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The goal of this research is to identify the parking orbit which minimizes entry system mass and to compare that to the entry system mass for a direct entry. The impact of a higher efficiency propulsion system, a higher entry velocity, and a reusable thermal protection system on aerocapture-entry system mass requirements is explored. Results indicate that the thermal protection system thickness does not vary significantly with parking orbit selection while shorter period orbits require more propellant for maneuvers. This result is not sensitive to changes in propulsion system efficiency, entry velocity, or heat shield material. Additionally, results show that aerocapture-entry architectures incur a TPS mass penalty up to 27% relative to direct entry, depending on vehicle. In addition, direct entry avoids needing propellant for in-space maneuvers between aerocapture and entry which ranges from 1.5% to 4.5% depending on orbit.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2019-08-22 without embargo terms","The student, Evan Zinner, accepted the attached license on 2019-04-25 at 12:29.","The student, Evan Zinner, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2019-04-25 at 13:10.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2019-04-26 at 10:31.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #13916 on 2019-08-22 at 14:46:49","Made available in DSpace on 2019-08-23T20:05:21Z (GMT). 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