Names to be Landed On Asteroid With Japan's MUSES-C Mission

May 13, 2002:

The Planetary Society of Japan (TPS/J) in cooperation with The Planetary Society, will mount a worldwide public outreach program to land one million names on an asteroid with Japan's MUSES-C mission. Entitled "Let's fly to meet your star prince," the program will enhance public interest in MUSES-C, the world's first sample return mission to an asteroid. "Star Prince" refers to the title character in Saint-Exupery's famous story, "The Little Prince."

The Little Prince makes his home on an asteroid.

Japan's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, ISAS, will launch the MUSES-C spacecraft in November-December this year. TPS/J will collect names to send aboard the spacecraft from May 10 through July 6, 2002.

"The Planetary Society maintains close ties with The Planetary Society of Japan and strongly supports the effort to involve the public in the MUSES-C Mission," said Louis Friedman, Executive Director of The Planetary Society.

MUSES stands for a series of missions performed by the Space Engineering Spacecraft launched by MU rocket. "C" means the third mission of this series. ISAS, the space agency responsible for Japanese robotic exploration of the solar system, successfully flew names of 270,000 people aboard "NOZOMI," which means hope, to Mars in July 1998.

The TPS/J program seeks to send names of at least one million people from around the world aboard the spacecraft to land on the surface of the asteroid. The names will be etched on an aluminum foil sheet enveloped inside a target marker, a softball-sized artificial ball. The target marker will be released onto the asteroid surface as a guiding landmark, enabling the spacecraft to touch down on sample-collecting sites safely and correctly.

The MUSES-C mission will land on Asteroid 1998SF36, which is about 700m x 300m in size and orbits at an averaged distance of 0.9AU from Earth.

TPS/J is the first international affiliate of The Planetary Society. Since its inauguration, TPS/J has been engaged in various public outreach activities through its website, publications and participation in planetary-related events in an effort to enhance public interest in exploring our solar system and search for extraterrestrial intelligence, SETI.

To join the campaign on the Internet, visit:

http://www.planetary.or.jp/muses-c/pc/en/

for details. If you have any questions, fax TPS/J at 011-81-3-5280-2500.