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}} ''Beagle 2'' is a British landing spacecraft that formed part of the European Space Agency's 2003 ''Mars Express'' mission. ''Beagle 2'' is named after . The spacecraft was successfully deployed from the ''Mars Express'' on 19 December 2003 and was scheduled to land on the surface of Mars on 25 December; however, no contact was received at the expected time of landing on Mars, with the ESA declaring the mission lost in February 2004, after numerous attempts to contact the spacecraft were made. The spacecraft's fate remained a mystery until it was announced in January 2015 that ''Beagle 2'' had been located intact on the surface of Mars in a series of images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE instrument. The images suggest that two of the spacecraft's four solar panels failed to deploy, blocking the spacecraft's communications antenna. ==Background== ''Beagle 2'' was conceived by a group of British academics headed by Professor Colin Pillinger of the Open University, in collaboration with the University of Leicester. Its purpose was to search for signs of life on Mars, past or present, and its name reflected this goal, as Professor Pillinger explained: "HMS ''Beagle'' was the ship that took Darwin on his voyage around the world in the 1830s and led to our knowledge about life on Earth making a real quantum leap. We hope ''Beagle 2'' will do the same thing for life on Mars." Isidis Planitia, an enormous flat sedimentary basin that overlies the boundary between the ancient highlands and the northern plains of Mars, was chosen as the landing site and a ellipse centered on was selected.〔 The lander was expected to operate for about 180 days and an extended mission of up to one Martian year (687 Earth days) was thought possible. The ''Beagle 2'' lander objectives were to characterise the landing site geology, mineralogy, geochemistry and oxidation state, the physical properties of the atmosphere and surface layers, collect data on Martian meteorology, climate, and search for biosignatures. Pillinger set up a consortium to design and build ''Beagle 2''. The principal members and their initial responsibilities were: *Open University – Consortium leader & scientific experiments *University of Leicester – Project management, Mission management, Flight Operations Team, instrument management, and scientific experiments *Astrium – Main industrial partner *Martin-Baker – Entry, descent and landing system *Logica – Cruise, entry, descent and landing software *SCISYS – Ground segment and lander software *University of Wales, Aberystwyth – Robotic arm In 2000, when the main development phase started, Astrium took over responsibility for programme management, and Leicester assumed responsibility for mission management which involved the preparations for the operations post launch and the operations control centre. They also teamed up with McLaren Applied Technologies who designed and built landing equipment and the solar panels. In an effort to publicise the project and gain financial support, its designers sought and received the endorsement and participation of British artists. The mission's call-sign was composed by the band Blur, and the 'test card' (Calibration Target Plate) intended for calibrating ''Beagle 2s cameras and spectrometers after landing was painted by Damien Hirst. The Lander Operations Control Centre (LOCC) was located at the National Space Centre in Leicester, from which the spacecraft was being controlled, and was visible to the public visiting the centre. The control centre included operational systems for controlling ''Beagle 2'', analysis tools for processing engineering and scientific telemetry, virtual reality tools for preparing activity sequences, communications systems, and the Ground Test Model (GTM). The GTM was composed of various builds of the ''Beagle 2'' systems, collected together to provide a full set of lander electronics. The GTM was used nearly continuously to validate the engineering and science commands, to rehearse the landing sequence, and to validate the onboard software. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Beagle 2」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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