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NASA Advanced Supercomputing (NAS) Division World-class modeling, simulation, and supercomputing in support of the NASA mission

Asteroid Threat Modeling

AMS Seminar Series

Speaker: Darrel Robertson, Science and Technology Corporation / Applied Modeling & Simulation Branch, NASA Ames Research Center

Presentation

Seminar Slide Deck (PDF-11MB)

Abstract

NASA's Asteroid Grand Challenge is to find all asteroids of threat to mankind and know what to do about it. This will involve determining what will actually hit us and when, not just a probability distribution, and determining how much damage it will likely do. It will involve deciding on detection methods such as ground or space based assets and characterization of the asteroids either remotely or by rendezvous, and finally it will involve deciding on mitigation strategies. This presentation will focus on state-of-the-art modeling of asteroid entry and break-up in the atmosphere. Currently there is a very wide range of estimated damage that a given asteroid will do: Estimates of the Tunguska meteor vary from 3 to 700 megatons TNT. We will aim to use physics based simulations of the break-up and blast to reduce the uncertainty in the modeling so that physical variables such as asteroid size, speed, composition, and strength are the dominant drivers of variation in predicted damage not the assumptions in the theory used. Understanding the change in ground damage with physical properties of the asteroid will inform decision making in the Asteroid Grand Challenge, such as how small asteroids are still of concern, which remote characterization methods yield the most information regarding potential damage, and possibly even trade-offs between disruptive vs. non-disruptive mitigation methods.

Biography

Robertson recently joined the Engineering Risk Assessment group at NASA Ames Research Center, and began work on asteroid hazard modeling. He has over ten years of experience in aerospace fire, explosion, and safety modeling and launch vehicle simulations. He received his master's and Ph.D. in aeronautics and astronautics from MIT on spacecraft electric propulsion CFD modeling, and postdocs at the European Space Agency and University of Stuttgart on electric propulsion experimental design and testing. Most recently, he worked for the Air Force Research Laboratory on perching micro air vehicles and acoustic stealth UAVs.