Asteroid mining with small spacecraft and its economic feasibility

Pablo, Calla,; Fries, Dan; Welch, Christopher J.

doi:10.48550/arxiv.1808.05099

Cited by 7 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 10 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Considering possible applications, specifically the mining of water in space has become a major focus for near-term options. Most proposed projects for asteroid mining, however, involve spacecraft based on traditional designs resulting in large, monolithic and expensive systems (Calla 2018).…”

Section: Asteroid Miningmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In particular, volatiles have received attention for in space use, due to their relative ease of extraction. For example, Calla et al, (2018) explored the technological and economic viability of supplying water from NEAs to cislunar orbit. Only resources with a high value to mass ratio are interesting, due to the high cost of returning such material.…”

Section: Why Is Asteroid Mining Needed?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These last two characterization phases are endeavors are endeavors currently pursued by asteroid mining companies using small spacecraft (https://www.planetaryresources.com/missions/arkyd-301/). However, recent advances in the miniaturization of spacecraft components and mining equipment may allow for a more cost effective and reliable approach to mine NEAs overall (Calla et al, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Technological importance of asteroid mining

ÇABUK

2021

Eurasian Journal of Biological and Chemical Sciences

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

With the ever-growing demands of the population and the ever-growing world of consumption and technology, the resources of the planet Earth are limited. Some of the Earth's major resources, such as metals and minerals needed to develop the technology and food industries, may be depleted within the next 40-50 years, based on known terrestrial reserves and increased consumption. For industrial and technological development of humanity, new discoveries are needed in future realization as well as future discoveries. Asteroids are celestial bodies of scientific importance to reveal the formation, chemical composition and evolution of the Solar System. As the name implies, "Near Earth Asteroids", metal have been found to be potentially close to possible because they are sufficiently close and can be found in precious metals and minerals. The reservoirs of important substances such as water, metals and semiconductors can be found in these celestial bodies. Although the Asteroids and the Earth are composed of the same elements, the Earth's relatively stronger gravity has attracted all the heavy elements to its core over time. An asteroid rain deprived of such valuable elements results in the formation of gold, cobalt, iron, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, osmium, palladium, platinum, rhenium, radium, ruthenium and tungsten elements (from the core to the surface). Today, these metals are extracted from the Earth's crust and are required for economic and technological advancements. Therefore, the geological history of the Earth can be a very good step for the future of asteroid mining.

show abstract

Section: Asteroid Miningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Why Is Asteroid Mining Needed?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Technological importance of asteroid mining

ÇABUK

2021

Eurasian Journal of Biological and Chemical Sciences

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In addition, the abundant resources will help scientists innovate in more application areas. So, if an asteroid that is rich in rare metal minerals is found, scientists would send unmanned spacecraft to study it if necessary [3]. The prospect of asteroid mining is promising, but the mining of asteroid minerals is quite difficult [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Research on Global Fairness Coefficient Based on AHM-CRITIC-TOPSIS Algorithm

Sun

2022

E3S Web Conf.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

With the signing of treaties for the exploration and utilization of outer space by most countries, mankind has begun to advance the exploitation of asteroid resources. However, due to the large number of countries involved and the limited space and resources of the planets, the issue of fairness in resource exploitation is gradually emerging. Asteroid mining is a typical example. To define global fairness, analyze the national allocation of asteroid mining, with the impact of mining sector changes, and propose mining fairness policies, we construct one model to measure global equity. in order to construct a Global Fairness Coefficient (GFC) and allocate mining resources and space, we collect data of 14 indicators from 5 dimensions of 266 countries, measure the global fairness coefficient of each country based on the AHM-CRITIC-TOPSIS coupled evaluation model, and rank countries by this coefficient. Finally, countries are divided into three categories using hierarchical clustering, and mineral resources are allocated to countries by category. Among them, the United States (0.482), China (0. 452), and Japan (0.414) are the top three countries in the ranking. In conclusion, the global equity coefficient model, linear regression model of planetary mining task allocation, sectoral change impact regression model, and global mining hierarchy analysis model constructed in this paper can provide a better assessment of global equity and provide relevant policy recommendations and decision options.

show abstract

“…Sampling and surveying asteroids and comets provide unique opportunities to study the history and development of the solar system (10)(11)(12). Interest in visiting and surveying small solar system bodies was exclusively scientific up to recently, when several commercial entities showed interest into prospective asteroid mining and -with human space flight ambitions once again looking beyond Earth orbit -since topics surrounding in-situ resource utilization on minor planets are now of particular interest (13)(14)(15).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geodesy of irregular small bodies via neural density fields: geodesyNets

Izzo¹,

Gómez²

2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Asteroids' and comets' geodesy is of increasing interest in a wide range of fields ranging from astronomy to potential future mining prospects, as well as being essential to successful proximity operations of spacecraft. However, the problem of inferring the internal density distribution of irregular bodies from gravity measurements is challenging and ill posed, with the added difficulty of finding compact representations of the gravitational field surrounding them. We present a novel approach based on artificial neural networks, socalled geodesyNets, and present compelling evidence of their ability to serve as accurate geodetic models of highly irregular bodies using minimal prior information on the body. The approach does not rely on the body shape information but, if available, can harness it. GeodesyNets learn a three-dimensional, differentiable, function representing the body density, which we call neural density field. The body shape, as well as other geodetic properties, can easily be recov-1

show abstract

Asteroid mining with small spacecraft and its economic feasibility

Cited by 7 publications

References 10 publications

Technological importance of asteroid mining

Technological importance of asteroid mining

Research on Global Fairness Coefficient Based on AHM-CRITIC-TOPSIS Algorithm

Geodesy of irregular small bodies via neural density fields: geodesyNets

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About