Wisdom GPR measurements in a cold artificial and controlled environment

Abstract

International audienceThe WISDOM (500MHz - 3GHz) GPR is one of the instruments that have been selected as part of the Pasteur payload of ESA's 2018 ExoMars Rover mission. One of the main scientific objectives of the mission is to characterize the nature of the shallow sub-surface on Mars and WISDOM has been designed to explore the first ∼ 3 meters of the sub-surface with a vertical resolution of a few centimetres. In order to illustrate and quantify the WISDOM performance, measurements in cold artificial and controlled conditions have been performed by the prototype. The objectives of this experiment were the detection of home made internal layering and the possible detection of a wedge included in the permafrost filled with different material with known characteristics. Some results and comparisons with a simple simulation are presented here and show the WISDOM performances

Development of an Agile beam georadar prototype for the investigation of pLanetary environment (AGILE)

“…9 shows the ability to detect and locate a fractures (slot corner) with an antenna having a narrow radiation pattern (Fig. 9b) [5].…”

UWB Vivaldi Antenna Array Lower Band Improvement for Ground Penetrating Radar Applications

“…Those clefts have a width of only several cm and are consequently hardly detectable. Previous works [6], simulations and measurements show that an aperture angle around 20 degrees is necessary for detect clefts, implying the use of an antenna array. Without the DORT method, we need at least ten reference antennas.…”

“…From a conventional Vivaldi antenna [7], [6] commonly used in GPR, we designated a reference antenna with a defined footprint of 173 mm × 299 mm (less than the 200 mm × 300 mm compliant with space mission size constraints -in March 2020 for example in the WISDOM (Water Ice Sub-surface Deposit Observation on Mars) context with LATMOS laboratory).…”