NASA Perseverance will land on Mars in February, and if this critical moment goes well, they will be able to take off preparations for the Mars Sample Return mission, because the new rover brings with it a container with capsules, in which it will gradually store samples of interesting rocks or sediments. And it will be about these capsules or tubes that this article will be about, because in their case it is not a simple tube closed at both ends. –
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NASA’s goal was, of course, to create compact, lightweight, but very durable capsules that could survive the rocket’s launch from the surface of Mars, flight to Earth, and most importantly, its descent through its atmosphere and final landing. In their case, it is not advisable to underestimate anything, as they have to protect the result of several years of efforts by two major missions of NASA and ESA. And it would be a great pity if they failed, after all, more than enough can go wrong.
NASA loaded a total of 43 capsules in the shape of laboratory tubes into the abdomen of the rover Perseverance, in which case thorough cleaning and sterilization were a matter of course, so that we could be sure that everything that came to us in them really originated on Mars. Five of them are therefore controllable, which will not be filled (they will only be opened once on Mars) and will be used for the purpose of comparing possible contamination. NASA also has its experience from the Apollo program, right from the first landing of Armstrong and Aldrin, who brought a total of 21.8 kg of samples with them in a triple-sealed aluminum case. This is also shown in this photograph from the simulation, which shows Neil Armstrong himself.
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Capsules must safely insulate their cargo for ten years, so it is no wonder that special attention has been paid to them. Each tube of about 15 cm, made mainly of titanium with an aluminum shell, was carefully checked on a computer tomograph so that hidden defects could be ruled out. In the same way, each one was made with high precision to ensure safe handling and there was no risk of something getting stuck somewhere due to unequal dimensions. But what makes it up?
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In addition to titanium and aluminum itself, the inner coating of titanium nitride is also very important, which is very hard and durable, but also inert. However, the capsules are also equipped with a simple plunger, which is used here for handling.
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The chapter in itself is the cleaning of capsules, which could not be done perfectly so as not to contain even a nanogram of impurities. A limit of 150 nanograms was set for organic impurities, and the limit was even ten times stricter, specifically for those that could indicate the presence of life. This can be related to the fact that a mere fingerprint represents organic impurities weighing about 45,000 nanograms, so it is no wonder that the cleaning of the capsules took place in clean rooms inside the clean rooms. Specifically, compressed filtered air, deionized water, and sonic purification with acetone or other solvents were used for this purpose.
Finally, from the 93 capsules thus treated, the final 45 were selected, which were the best cleaned.
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