Evaluating The Capability of the SPARTA Toolkit to Quantitatively Characterize Planetary Regolith

The overall success of NASA’s strategic objective of placing humans on extraterrestrial planetary surfaces depends on a thorough understanding of a planetary regolith's near-surface environmental and geomechanical properties. Comprehensive in situ characterization of planetary regolith surface and subsurface properties is critical to the operational success of all future landed (manned or unmanned) and roving science missions involving surface or near-surface contact. Understanding the geomechanical properties of planetary regolith and determining whether water exists in the subsurface are central to NASA’s exploration strategy for future manned long-term exploration of the Moon and Mars. SPARTA (Soil Properties Assessment, Resistance, Thermal, Analysis) is a highly versatile, miniature toolkit that provides NASA with a new capability for in situ measurements of mechanical, thermal, and electrical properties of dry or icy regolith during surface-landed missions. SPARTA is versatile and can be operated on terrestrial planetary bodies such as the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Venus, asteroids, and comets with or without atmospheres, that may/may not contain water/ice.