InSight – TWINS

The TWINS instrument, developed at CAB, is part of the first mission to study the interior of Mars.
TWINS

Mission launch: 05/05/2018

Landing on Mars: 26/11/2018

Landing Site: Elysium Planitia

Principal investigator: José Antonio Rodríguez Manfredi

The InSight mission (Interior exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) is a mission of NASA’s Discovery Programme for the exploration of Mars.

The mission will help to understand the processes that shaped the rocky planets of the Solar System (including Earth) more than 4,000 years ago. It is the first mission to study the interior of Mars.

Centro de Astrobiología is part of the mission with the TWINS (Temperature and Wind Sensors for InSight mission) environmental station. TWINS has been designed at the Centro de Astrobiología in collaboration with CRISA and is designed to support one of the mission’s instruments, the SEIS (Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure) instrument, which will measure seismic movements and meteorite impacts on Mars.

Each TWINS boom consists of two sensors, one for temperature and one for wind, in the shape of a mast that continuously monitor the environmental conditions in the InSight landing area.

Other instruments that are part of InSight are the HP3 (Heat flow and Physical Properties Package) and the RISE (Rotational Interior Structure Experiment) instrument. HP3 checks the heat flow from the interior of the planet to the surface, while RISE measures the oscillations in Mars’ rotation to try to reveal whether it has a molten or solid core.

Related news

Se publican los primeros resultados científicos de la misión InSight en Marte

TWINS ya está de camino a Marte

El Centro de Astrobiología vuelve a Marte

Quedan menos de 90 días para el lanzamiento de InSight

¿Qué tiempo se espera en Marte para hoy?

Related publications

The atmosphere of Mars as observed by InSight
READ MORE >>
Initial results from the InSight mission on Mars
READ MORE >>
A Study of Daytime Convective Vortices and Turbulence in the Martian Planetary Boundary Layer Based on Half‐a‐Year of InSight Atmospheric Measurements and Large‐Eddy Simulations
READ MORE >>
Effects of a Large Dust Storm in the Near‐Surface Atmosphere as Measured by InSight in Elysium Planitia, Mars. Comparison With Contemporaneous Measurements by Mars Science Laboratory
READ MORE >>

Team

Advanced Instrumentation Department, Astrophysics Department
Telephone: +34 915206404