9th IAA PLANETARY DEFENSE CONFERENCE 2025

PDF of abstract included as attachment.

Planetary defense (PD) scenarios present unique mission design challenges compared to typical interplanetary missions. Critically, the target body cannot be selected to conform to predefined science or technology demonstration objectives. Instead, cosmic chance dictates the impending Earth...

Abstract
Keywords: Space debris, Near Earth Orbit, Terminal rocket stage, Mitigation, Hazardous.
Terminal stage in Launch vehicle poses several challenges: space debris, residual propellant and high-pressure gases. Space debris is due to spent terminal rocket stage, explosion or fragmentation of damaged space objects. The increasing space debris leads the risk of collisions with...

The close Earth approach of the Apophis is the first event in which 300 m size asteroid flybys with the altitude lower than GEO ring and the exciting event for mankind. The year 2029 in which the close flyby occurs is designated as “International Year of Asteroid Awareness and Planetary Defence” by the United Nation. Since the flyby occurs only 4 years later, the development of a new...

Low-thrust, long-period asteroid deflection strategies have become a primary focus in planetary defense research. In such strategies, autonomous cooperative navigation for multi-spacecraft landing has been recognized as one of the critical technologies to achieve precise spacecraft deployment on the asteroid surface. However, existing spacecraft autonomous navigation methods based on...

The concept of a ≈10 kg “nanolander” equipped with a customized suite of instruments designed to complement its carrier spacecraft’s science has been proven valuable e.g. with the Mobile Asteroid Surface sCOuT (MASCOT) surface science package on JAXA’s Hayabusa2 mission. MASCOT successfully landed and operated on (162173) Ryugu on October 3rd, 2018, bridging the gap between the results of...

The paper proposes an approach to designing transfer trajectories of a spacecraft from its initial orbit in the vicinity of the Sun-Earth libration point to near-Earth asteroids. The features of motion in bounded orbits around libration points, as well as invariant manifolds associated with them, open up the possibility of redirecting a spacecraft to trajectories of rendezvous with near-Earth...

Asteroid spacecraft have significant potential in the field of planetary defense, particularly in preventing or mitigating the threat posed by near-Earth objects (NEOs). These objects, which include asteroids and comets, are classified as potentially hazardous if their orbits bring them into close proximity with Earth. While the likelihood of a catastrophic impact is low, the consequences of...

This proposed Research article focuses on planning a map for “Economically Feasible” merged method for swift growth in sector of “Asteroid Mining” for metal and mineral’s mining from Outer Space. The most focused point is “Identification of Exploration of Rare Earth” metals and minerals to be identified and processed.

Scientific Rationale of this Proposed Concept is conception of Air...

Please see attached PDF.

The European spacecraft mission HERA is currently flying towards the binary asteroid system Didymos. The spacecraft will arrive in the vicinity of the asteroids at the end of 2026 and thanks to its autonomous vision-based GNC, will be able to fly autonomously down to a distance of a few hundred meters from them. The main purpose of the mission is to characterize the impact of DART (NASA...

On September 26, 2022, the DART spacecraft collided with the 160-meter asteroid Dimorphos and shifted its orbital period relative to its 700-meter companion asteroid Didymos by approximately 33 minutes. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) successfully demonstrated deflection of an asteroid by a high-speed kinetic impactor and enabled in-depth analysis of the experimental results.
The...

The European Space Agency (ESA)’s Lunar Meteoroid Impact Observer (LUMIO) mission represents a cutting-edge advancement in understanding the meteoroid environment around the Earth-Moon system. Lead by Politecnico di Milano (PoliMi) and supported by the Italian Space Agency (ASI), the Norwegian Space Agency (NOSA), United Kingdom Space Agency (UKSA), and Swedish National Space Agency (SNSA),...

The Pulsar kinetic Impact technology would allow humanity to literally sleep through the threat of a comet or asteroid which posed a threat to Earth. The Pulsar motor is designed to harness nuclear plasma technologies through a direct fusion drive.
Specifications Below:
The Direct Fusion Drive is a revolutionary steady-state fusion propulsion concept, based on a compact fusion reactor. It...

Keywords: Rapid Response, Reconnaissance Spacecraft, Mitigation Spacecraft, Short-Warning Time

The Planetary Defense Community has worked tirelessly over the last 30 years to detect and catalog potential asteroid and comet impact threats to the Earth. Great progress has been made in our knowledge of the compositions and orbits of the millions of asteroids and comets in the solar system....

Keywords: asteroid flyby, asteroid reconnaissance, mass estimation, mass uncertainty

The near-Earth object (NEO) discovery rate has increased in recent years, and the discovery rate is expected to further increase dramatically when new telescope systems such as LSST and NEO Surveyor come online during the next several years. Significant increases in NEO discovery rate makes it more and...

Performing a stable and robust surface landing on small celestial bodies is essential for future scientific exploration and planetary defense missions. However, in practical missions, due to the weak gravity and complex surface topography, the widely adopted rigid landers are prone to rebound or overturning upon touchdown. This paper reviews a novel landing mode, namely the flexible landing,...

This time, we have time. 2024 PDC25 takes 16 years, 10 months, 2 weeks, and 6 days from its fictitious discovery to its fictitious impact on Wednesday, April 24th, 2041 – and it will, because this is an exercise! 2021 PDC was not so kind, leaving us only 6 months to play with it. The coming close encounter of (99942) Apophis on Friday, April 13th, 2029, when it will get to within 31650 km...

Rapid reconnaissance flyby missions represent the fastest means of characterizing a potentially hazardous asteroid in a planetary defense scenario. Flyby trajectories can often reach the asteroid with launches every year and cruise durations as short as months. In these scenarios, the design, fabrication, and testing of the spacecraft is the longest duration event in the overall timeline. In...

Asteroids are of significant scientific and practical interest, as they represent primordial remnants from the early Solar System. Often referred to as the "building blocks" of planets, these celestial bodies offer unique insights into the processes that governed planetary formation and the evolution of other celestial objects. Additionally, understanding asteroid compositions and orbital...