InSight is NASA’s first successful precision robotics instrument placement and release on another astronomical body since Apollo. This operations breakthrough enabled NASA’s InSight lander to detect the first known ‘marsquake’, a faint trembling of Mars’s surface on 6th April 2019, 128 Martian days after landing on Mars on the 26th of November 2018.
The Robotics Instrument Deployment Systems (IDS) enabled successfully deployment of the InSight science payload to the surface of Mars. InSight’s payload includes a seismometer (SEIS), Wind and Thermal Shield (WTS) and Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3), enabling scientists to perform the first comprehensive surface-based geophysical investigation of Mars’ interior structure.
The InSight Instrument Deployment System (IDS) consists of the Instrument Deployment Arm (IDA), scoop, five finger “claw” grapple, motor controller, arm-mounted Instrument Deployment Camera (IDC), lander-mounted Instrument Context Camera (ICC), and control software. The IDS enabled the first successful precision robotic instrument placement and release (SEIS and HP3) and first ever precision robotic stacking of two payloads (SEIS and WTS) without closed-loop visual servo control on another planetary surface.
For more details on all aspects of the InSight Lander mission, visit the InSight Project website.