Ingenuity (helicopter) – Wikipedia

NASA helicopter on the Mars 2020 mission

Ingenuity, nicknamed Ginny, is a small robotic helicopter operating on Mars as part of NASA's Mars 2020 mission along with the Perseverance rover, which landed on February 18, 2021. Two months later, on April 19, Ingenuity successfully completed the first powered controlled extraterrestrial flight by an aircraft taking off vertically, hovering, and landing, for a flight duration of 39.1seconds.[5][6][7] As of December 15, 2021, the helicopter has made 18 successful flights.

Ingenuity was designed and built by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Other contributors include NASA's Ames Research Center, NASA's Langley Research Center,[8] AeroVironment, Inc., SolAero, and Lockheed Martin Space.[9] Ingenuity's rotors measure 1.2m (4ft),[1][10][11] while its entire body is 0.49m (1ft 7in) tall.[1] Its fuselage measures 13.6cm 19.5cm 16.3cm (5.4in 7.7in 6.4in), and sports four landing legs that are 0.384m (1ft 3.1in) long each.[1] Ingenuity is operated by solar-charged batteries that power dual counter-rotating rotors mounted one above the other. During its 30-day technology demonstration, Ingenuity was intended to fly up to five times at altitudes ranging 35m (1016ft) above the ground for up to 90 seconds each.[1][12] The expected lateral range was exceeded in the third flight, and the flight duration was exceeded in the fourth flight. With those technical successes, Ingenuity achieved its original objectives. The flights proved the helicopter's ability to fly in the extremely thin atmosphere of another planet over a hundred million miles from Earth without direct human control. Ingenuity operates autonomously, performing maneuvers planned, scripted and transmitted to it by JPL.

After the brief demonstration phase, JPL then began more flights as operational demonstrations, to show how aerial scouting can benefit future exploration of Mars and other worlds.[13][14] In its operational role, Ingenuity is observing areas of interest for possible examination by the Perseverance rover.[15][16][1][17]

Ingenuity travelled to Mars attached to the underside of Perseverance, which touched down at the Octavia E. Butler Landing site in Jezero crater on February 18, 2021.[18][19][20] The helicopter was deployed to the surface on April 3, 2021,[21][22] and Perseverance drove approximately 100m (330ft) away to allow the drone a safe "buffer zone" in which it made its first flight.[23] Success was confirmed three hours later in a livestreaming TV feed of JPL mission control.[25][26][27] On its fourth flight, April 30, 2021, Ingenuity became the first interplanetary spacecraft whose sound was recorded by another interplanetary spacecraft, Perseverance.[28]

Ingenuity carries a piece of fabric from the wing of the 1903 Wright Flyer, the Wright Brothers' airplane used in the first controlled powered heavier-than-air flight on Earth. The initial take-off and landing area for Ingenuity is named Wright Brothers Field as a tribute.[29] Before Ingenuity, the first flight of any kind on a planet beyond Earth was an unpowered balloon flight on Venus, by the Soviet Vega 1 spacecraft in 1985.[30]

The lower gravity of Mars (about a third of Earth's) only partially offsets the thinness of the 95% carbon dioxide atmosphere of Mars[35] thus making it much harder for an aircraft to generate adequate lift. The atmospheric density of the Red Planet is about 1100 as that of Earth at sea level, or approximately the same as 87,000ft (27,000m), an altitude never reached by existing helicopters. To keep Ingenuity aloft, its specially shaped blades of enlarged size must rotate at a speed at least 2400 and up to 2900 rpm, or about 10 times faster[10] than what is needed on Earth.[36][37] The helicopter uses contra-rotating coaxial rotors about 1.2m (4ft) in diameter. Each rotor is controlled by a separate swashplate that can affect both collective and cyclic pitch.[38]

There are two cameras on board: the downward-looking black-and-white navigation camera (NAV) and the color camera to make terrain images for return to Earth (RTE).[17] Although it is an aircraft, it was constructed to spacecraft specifications in order to endure the acceleration and vibrations during launch.[37] It also includes radiation-resistant systems capable of operating in the environment of Mars. The inconsistent Mars magnetic field precludes the use of a compass for navigation, so Ingenuity relies upon different sensors grouped in two assemblies. All sensors are commercial off-the-shelf units.

The Upper Sensor Assembly with associated vibration isolation elements is mounted on the mast close to the center-of-mass of the vehicle to minimize the effects of angular rates and accelerations. It consists of a cellphone grade Bosch BMI-160 Inertial measurement unit (IMU) and an inclinometer (Murata SCA100T-D02), which is used only on the ground prior to flight to calibrate the IMU accelerometers biases. The Lower Sensor Assembly consists of an altimeter (Garmin LIDAR Lite v3), both of the cameras and a secondary IMU, all mounted directly onto the Electronics Core Module and not onto the mast. The down-facing Omnivision OV7251 camera supports visual odometry, in which images are processed to produce navigation solutions that calculate helicopter position, velocity, attitude, and other variables.[17]

The helicopter uses solar panels to recharge its batteries, which are six Sony Li-ion cells with 3540Wh (130140kJ) of energy capacity[34] (nameplate capacity of 2 Ah).[17] Flight duration is not constrained by the available power, but by the motors heating up 1C every second.[39]

The helicopter uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor with a Linux operating system.[40] Among other functions, this processor controls the visual navigation algorithm via a velocity estimate derived from terrain features tracked with the navigation camera.[41] The Qualcomm processor is connected to two flight-control microcontroller units (MCUs) to perform the necessary flight-control functions.[17]

The telecommunication system consists of two identical radios with monopole antennae which support the data exchange between the helicopter and the rover. The radio link is built upon the low-power Zigbee communication protocols, implemented via 914 MHz SiFlex 02 chipsets mounted in both the rover and helicopter. The communication system is designed to relay data at 250kbit/s over distances of up to 1,000m (3,300ft). The antenna located on the solar panel of the helicopter weighs 4 grams and may communicate equally in all directions.[42]

The Mars Helicopter team in 2018

Some of the Ingenuity team in 2019

The history of the Mars Helicopter team dates back to 2012, when MiMi Aung was leading then JPL director Charles Elachi on a tour of the Autonomous Systems Division. Looking at the drones demonstrating onboard navigation algorithms in one of the labs, Elachi asked, "Hey, why don't we do that on Mars?" Engineer Bob Balaram briefed Elachi about feasibility, and a week later Elachi told him, "Okay, I've got some study money for you". By January 2015 NASA agreed to fund the development of a full-size model, which came to be known as the "risk reduction" vehicle. As project manager, Aung assembled a multidisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, and technicians leveraging all of NASA's expertise.[43]

The JPL team was never larger than 65 full-time-equivalent employees, but program workers at AeroVironment and NASA AMES and Langley research centers brought the total to 150.[43] Team members include:

On June 15, 2021, the team behind Ingenuity was named the 2021 winner of the John L. "Jack" Swigert, Jr. Award for Space Exploration from the Space Foundation.[63]

NASA's JPL and AeroVironment published the conceptual design in 2014 for a scout helicopter to accompany a rover.[8][64][65] By mid-2016, $15 million was being requested to continue development of the helicopter.[66] By December 2017, engineering models of the vehicle had been tested in a simulated martian atmosphere[17][10] and models were undergoing testing in the Arctic, but its inclusion in the mission had not yet been approved or funded.[67] The United States federal budget, announced in March 2018, provided $23 million for the helicopter for one year,[68][69] and it was announced on May 11, 2018, that the helicopter could be developed and tested in time to be included in the Mars 2020 mission.[70] The helicopter underwent extensive flight-dynamics and environment testing,[17][71] and was mounted on the underside of the Perseverance rover in August 2019.[72] NASA spent about $80 million to build Ingenuity and about $5 million to operate the helicopter.[73]

In April 2020, the vehicle was named Ingenuity by Vaneeza Rupani, a girl in the 11th grade at Tuscaloosa County High School in Northport, Alabama, who submitted an essay into NASA's "Name the Rover" contest.[74][75] Known in planning stages as the Mars Helicopter Scout,[32] or simply the Mars Helicopter,[11] the nickname Ginny later entered use in parallel to the parent rover Perseverance being affectionately referred to as Percy.[76]

Ingenuity was designed to be a technology demonstrator by JPL to assess whether such a vehicle could fly safely. Before it was built, launched and landed, scientists and managers expressed hope that helicopters could provide better mapping and guidance that would give future mission controllers more information to help with travel routes, planning and hazard avoidance.[77][78][79] Based on the performance of previous rovers through Curiosity, it was assumed that such aerial scouting might enable future rovers to safely drive up to three times as far per sol.[80][81] However, the new AutoNav capability at Perseverance significantly reduced this advantage, allowing the rover to cover more than 100 meters per sol.

In 2019, preliminary designs of Ingenuity were tested on Earth in simulated Mars atmospheric and gravity conditions. For flight testing, a large vacuum chamber was used to simulate the very low pressure of the atmosphere of Mars filled with carbon dioxide to approximately 0.60% (about 1160) of standard atmospheric pressure at sea level on Earth which is roughly equivalent to a helicopter flying at 34,000m (112,000ft) altitude in the atmosphere of Earth. In order to simulate the much reduced gravity field of Mars (38% of Earth's), 62% of Earth's gravity was offset by a line pulling upwards during flight tests.[34] A "wind-wall" consisting of almost 900 computer fans was used to provide wind in the chamber.[84]:1:08:051:08:40

After deployment, the rover drove approximately 100m (330ft) away from the drone to allow a safe flying zone.[21][22] The Ingenuity helicopter was expected to fly up to five times during a 30-day test campaign, early in the rover's mission.[1][12]

Each flight was planned for altitudes ranging 35m (1016ft) above the ground, though Ingenuity soon exceeded that planned height.[1] The first flight was a hover at an altitude of 3m (9.8ft), lasting about 40 seconds and including taking a picture of the rover. The first flight succeeded, and subsequent flights were increasingly ambitious as allotted time for operating the helicopter dwindled. JPL said the mission might even stop before the 30-day period ended, in the likely event that the helicopter crashed,[84]:0:49:500:51:40 an outcome which did not occur. In up to 90 seconds per flight, Ingenuity could travel as far as 50m (160ft) downrange and then back to the starting area, though that goal was also soon exceeded with the fourth flight.[1] The helicopter uses autonomous control during its flights, which are telerobotically planned and scripted by operators at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). It communicates with the Perseverance rover directly before and after each landing.[84]:1:20:381:22:20

After the successful first three flights, the objective was changed from technology demonstration to operational demonstration. The goal shifted towards supporting the rover science mission by mapping and scouting the terrain.[85] While Ingenuity would do more to help Perseverance, the rover would pay less attention to the helicopter and stop taking pictures of it in flight. JPL managers said the photo procedure took an "enormous" amount of time, slowing the project's main mission of looking for signs of ancient life.[86] On 30 April 2021, the fourth flight successfully captured numerous color photos and explored the surface with its black-and-white navigation camera. On May 7, Ingenuity successfully flew to a new landing site.

On 5 September 2021, after successful completion of the Operations Demonstration phase, the mission was extended indefinitely.[87]

Perseverance dropped the debris shield protecting Ingenuity on March 21, 2021, and the helicopter deployed from the underside of the rover to the martian surface on April 3, 2021.[89] That day both cameras of the helicopter were tested taking their first b/w and color photos of the floor of Jezero Crater in the shadow of the rover.[90][91]

Ingenuity's rotor blades were successfully unlocked on April 8, 2021 (mission sol 48), and the helicopter performed a low-speed rotor spin test at 50 rpm.[92][93][94][95]

A high-speed spin test was attempted on April 9, but failed due to the expiration of a watchdog timer, a software measure to protect the helicopter from incorrect operation in unforeseen conditions. On April 12, JPL said it identified a software fix to correct the problem. To save time, however, JPL decided to use a workaround procedure, which managers said had an 85% chance of succeeding and would be "the least disruptive" to the helicopter.

On April 16, 2021, Ingenuity successfully passed the full-speed 2400 rpm rotor spin test while remaining on the surface.[26] Three days later, April 19, JPL flew the helicopter for the first time. The watchdog timer problem occurred again when the fourth flight was attempted. The team rescheduled the flight, which succeeded on April 30. On June 25, JPL said it had uploaded a software update the previous week to permanently fix the watchdog problem, and that a rotor spin test and the eighth flight confirmed that the update worked.

The Ingenuity team plans to fly the helicopter every two to three weeks during its indefinitely extended mission.[87] The helicopter's longer-than-expected flying career lasted into a seasonal change on Mars, when the atmospheric density at its location became even lower. The flight team prepared by commanding Ingenuity to ground-test a faster rotor blade rotation, needed for sufficient lift. JPL said the higher planned flight speed of 2700 rpm would pose new risks, including vibration, power consumption and aerodynamic drag if the blade tips approach the speed of sound. The test speed was 2800 rpm, giving a margin for increase if the intended flight speed of 2700 is not enough. Ingenuity faced another challenge to remain functional during the Martian winter and solar conjunction, when Mars moves behind the Sun, blocking communications with Earth and forcing the rover and helicopter to halt operations. The shutdown happened in mid-October 2021, for which preparations started in mid-September.[98][99] The helicopter remained stationary at its location 575 feet (175 meters) away from Perseverance and communicated its status weekly to the rover for health checks.[100] JPL intended to continue flying Ingenuity since it survived solar conjunction.[101][102]NASA leadership has acknowledged that extending the mission adds to the original Ingenuity budget of $80 million but has stated that any increase would be minimal compared to what NASA is learning.[103]

(Record values highlighted)

This was the first time the helicopter had to land at an airfield which was not surveyed by any means other than MRO satellite imagery.[116][117]

(Sol 254)

(Sol 268)

Ingenuity has two commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) cameras on board. The Sony IMX 214 with 4208 x 3120 pixel resolution is a color camera with a global shutter to make terrain images for return to Earth (RTE). The Omnivision OV7251 (640 480) VGA is the downward-looking black and white rolling shutter navigation camera (NAV), which supplies the onboard computer of the helicopter with the raw data essential for flight control.[17]

While the RTE color camera is not necessary for flight and may be switched off (as in flights 7 and 8), the NAV camera works throughout each flight, catching the first frame before takeoff and the last frame after landing. Its frame rate is synchronized with blade rotation to ease online image processing.

During flight, all NAV frames must be carefully stored in the onboard helicopter computer, with each frame assigned the unique timestamp of its creation. Loss of a single NAV image timestamp was an anomaly that caused the helicopter to move erratically during flight 6.

The longer a flight lasts, the more NAV photos must be stored. Each new record flight duration automatically means a record number of images taken by the NAV camera. The frequency and timing of the camera's operations are predetermined not for the sake of records, but due to the technical necessity. A huge number of NAV files does not overload the local storage of the helicopter. Less than 200 NAV files are uploaded to the NASA storage after each flight starting from the 8th, and the total volume of this package is only about 5 Megabytes[148] The limitations are imposed by weakness of local telecommunications: when landed, helicopter relays data to the rover in a slow mode of 20 kbit/s.[17] Another significant inconvenience here is caused by the location of the antenna on the side of the rover: if turned wrong side to the helicopter, it may impede signal propagation with its massive metal body.

Most of the NAV files are not transmitted to the rover base station for return to Earth. After the fourth flight, MiMi Aung confirmed that "images from that navigation camera are typically used by Ingenuity's flight controller and then thrown away unless we specifically tell the helicopter to store them for later use". From more than 4000 NAV files acquired on flight four, only 62 were stored.[152]

With the end of the flight technology demonstration, Perseverance project manager Jennifer Trosper relinquished her team's responsibilities for photographing Ingenuity to concentrate exclusively on the rover science mission of searching for signs of ancient Martian life. Without pictures from the rover, the flight team relied more heavily on photos taken by the helicopter NAV camera to confirm Ingenuity's location. The helicopter, however, does not create or refine the maps, but rather, depends upon work coordinated by the U.S. Geological Survey's Astrogeology Science Center and performed by the NASA Mars and Lunar Cartography Working Groups.[citation needed]

To support the Mars-2020 mission, USGS used photos by the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) to produce Context Camera (CTX) and Digital Terrain Models (DTM) and orthoimage mosaics. Those images were used by the Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN) feature on the Perseverance descent vehicle and helped determine the safest landing location.[153] Using maps created from photos and radar elevation data previously acquired by the MRO and other NASA missions, planetary cartographers manually correlate them with terrain features seen by Ingenuity's small and lens-distorted NAV images.[citation needed] After each NAV frame is assigned a georeference, the resulting flight maps are shown at NASA's Mars-2020 tracking service.[88] NAV frames from Ingenuity are also used to produce moving images that show the Martian terrain passing under Ingenuity during its flights.

In November 2021 the Ingenuity team started to supply scientists a new kind of photographic materials the color photos taken on the ground during the interflight periods. By December, 3 two such photos were received on Earth, the first one acquired on November 15 (sol 263)[150] and another on November 27 (sol 274).[151]

Flight 3 (April 25, 2021)

Flight 4 (April 30, 2021)

Flight 6 (May 23, 2021)last 39 seconds

Flight 7 (June 8, 2021)(48 seconds)

Flight 8 (June 22, 2021)(75 seconds)

Flight 9 (July 5, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 10 (July 24, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 11 (August 5, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 12 (August 16, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 13 (September 5, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 14 (October 24, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 15 (November 6, 2021)191 frames

Flight 16 (November 21, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 17 (December 5, 2021)full real-time animation

Flight 18 (December 15, 2021)full real-time animation

Unlike Perseverance, Ingenuity does not have a special stereo camera for taking twin photos for 3D pictures simultaneously. However, the helicopter has made such images by taking duplicate color photos of the same terrain while hovering in slightly offset positions, as in flight 11, or by taking an offset picture on the return leg of a roundtrip flight, as in flight 12.[154]

As of December 16, 2021, 2091 black-and-white images from the navigation camera[146] and 104 color images from the terrain camera (RTE)[155] have been published.

NASA and JPL officials described the first Ingenuity flight as their "Wright Brothers moment", by analogy to the first successful airplane flight on Earth.[29][156] A small piece of the wing cloth from the Wright brothers' 1903 Wright Flyer is attached to a cable underneath Ingenuity's solar panel.[157] In 1969, Apollo 11's Neil Armstrong carried a similar Wright Flyer artifact to the Moon in the Lunar Module Eagle.

NASA named Ingenuity's first take-off and landing airstrip Wright Brothers Field, which the UN agency ICAO gave an airport code of JZRO for Jezero Crater,[158] and the drone itself a type designator of IGY, call-sign INGENUITY.[159][160][161]

The Ingenuity technology demonstrator could form the foundation on which more capable aircraft might be developed for aerial exploration of Mars and other planetary targets with an atmosphere like Mars Science Helicopter.[77][17][162] The next generation of rotorcraft could be in the range between 5 and 30kg (11 and 66lb) with science payloads between 0.5 and 5kg (1.1 and 11.0lb).[163] These potential aircraft could have direct communication to an orbiter and may or may not continue to work with a landed asset.[22] Future helicopters could be used to explore special regions with exposed water ice or brines, where Mars microbial life could potentially survive.[73][17]

Data collected by Ingenuity is supporting planning of a future helicopter design by engineers at JPL, NASA's Ames Research Center and AeroVironment. The Mars Science Helicopter, a proposed successor to Ingenuity, would be a hexacopter, or six-rotor helicopter, with a mass of about 30kg (66lb) compared to 1.8kg (4.0lb) of Ingenuity. Mars Science Helicopter could carry as much as 5kg (11lb) of science payloads and fly up to 10km (6.2mi) per flight.[163]

March 29, 2021: after Ingenuity was extended vertically into place after being rotated outward from its horizontal position on the belly of the rover, Perseverance takes photos for the panorama, catching in its field of view the debris shield which protected Ingenuity during landing and was dropped on March 21, 2021

Debris shield released and dropped

Ingenuity swings down, with two of its four legs extended

Ingenuity with all legs extended

Rotor blades are unlocked for tests and flying

The slow-speed (50 rpm) spin up test on sol 48

The high-speed (2400 rpm) spin up test on sol 55

The Wright Brothers Field and the overlook location

The Wright Brothers Field

View of the field from the rover

Rover track and Wright Brothers Field

Flight profile for Ingenuity's Flight 15

Topography between Mars helicopter and rover for Flight 17

Landed after flight 3 (25 April 2021)

Landed after flight 5 at Airfield B (7 May 2021)

One day after sixth flight (Sol 92)

Four days after 7th flight (Sol 111)

Seven days after 8th flight (Sol 127)

Sol 45 (6 April 2021): grounded before flights

In-flight image (19 April 2021, altitude 1.2m (3ft 11in))

Landing after the first flight (19 April 2021)

First color aerial photo (22 April 2021, altitude 5.2m (17ft), flight 2)

Flight 3, rover is seen left-up from the 5.0m (16.4ft) height

Flight 3, the rover (enlarged)

Heading towards Airfield B (flight 4, 30 April 2021)

Flight 5, altitude 10m (33ft) (7 May 2021)

Perseverance rover (left) viewed about 85m (279ft) away from 5.0m (16.4ft) height (April 25, 2021)

Flight 6, view from 10m (33ft) towards Stah

Flight 7, above the terrain (8 June 2021)

Flight 8, landed (22 June 2021)

Flight 9, flying over the Stah (July 5, 2021)

Flight 11 NW along Stah

The first ground photo after conjunction (sol 236)

Slow speed blade rotation test (sol 240)

Flight 15 (6 November 2021)

Flight 16 (21 November 2021)

Post-flight 16 rover view

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Ingenuity (helicopter) - Wikipedia