NASA's Venus descent probe passes furnace heat tests
NASA has successfully tested an engineering model of its DAVINCI probe in a high-temperature furnace to simulate the extreme conditions of the Venusian surface. The probe, designed to study the planet's atmosphere and surface composition, passed six thermal cycles unscathed.
Why it matters
This test is a critical milestone for the DAVINCI mission, which aims to determine if Venus was once habitable and to capture high-resolution surface imagery.
An engineering model of a NASA descent probe designed to explore Venus has passed a thermal test simulating the extreme temperatures of the planet’s surface.
The test, which ran from Aug. 28 to Sept. 10, was conducted for the Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging (DAVINCI) mission at Rex Heat Treat in Bedford, Pennsylvania, one of few facilities able to heat hardware to Venus-like temperatures as rapidly as the probe will experience. DAVINCI is intended to study the origin, evolution and present state of Venus, including whether it once had oceans and was habitable like Earth.
Engineers heated the probe in a ceramic-lined furnace to 869°F (465°C) over about an hour, matching the heating rate expected during its descent, then repeated the thermal cycle five more times. The model completed every cycle unscathed, with more than 100 thermal sensors monitoring hardware simulating the probe’s instruments.
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