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We tackle the problem of accurate optical tracking of distant man-made probes, on Halo orbit around the Earth-Sun libration point L2 and beyond, along interplanetary transfers. The improved performance of on-target tracking, especially when observing with small-class telescopes is assessed providing a general estimate of the expected S/N ratio in spacecraft detection. The on-going Gaia mission is taken as a pilot case for our analysis, reporting on fresh literature and original optical photometry and astrometric results. The probe has been located, along its projected nominal path, within 0.13 +/- 0.09 arcsec, or 0.9 +/- 0.6 km. Spacecraft color appears to be red, with (V-R_c) = 1.1 +/- 0.2 and a bolometric correction to the R_c band of (Bol-R_c) = -1.1 +/- 0.2. The apparent magnitude, R_c = 20.8 +/- 0.2, is much fainter than originally expected. These features lead to suggest a lower limit for the Bond albedo a = 0.11 +/- 0.05 and confirm that incident Sun light is strongly reddened by Gaia through its on-board MLI blankets covering the solar shield. Relying on the Gaia figures, we found that VLT-class telescopes could yet be able to probe distant spacecraft heading Mars, up to 30 million km away, while a broader optical coverage of the forthcoming missions to Venus and Mars could be envisaged, providing to deal with space vehicles of minimum effective area Aeff >= 10^6 cm^2. In addition to L2 surveys, 2m-class telescopes could also effectively flank standard radar-ranging techniques in deep-space probe tracking along Earths gravity-assist maneuvers for interplanetary missions.
This is a white paper submitted to the Planetary Science and Astrobiology Decadal Survey. The deep atmosphere of Venus is largely unexplored and yet may harbor clues to the evolutionary pathways for a major silicate planet with implications across th
The five classical Uranian moons are possible ocean worlds that exhibit bizarre geologic landforms, hinting at recent surface-interior communication. However, Uranus classical moons, as well as its ring moons and irregular satellites, remain poorly u
Gaia is the next astrometry mission of the European Space Agency (ESA), following up on the success of the Hipparcos mission. With a focal plane containing 106 CCD detectors, Gaia will survey the entire sky and repeatedly observe the brightest 1,000
Gaia is a very ambitious mission of the European Space Agency. At the heart of Gaia lie the measurements of the positions, distances, space motions, brightnesses and astrophysical parameters of stars, which represent fundamental pillars of modern ast
I provide a summary of the ESA space astrometry mission Gaia regarding its main objectives and current status following the 2nd data release (Gaia DR2) in April 2018. The Gaia achievements in astrometry are assessed with a historical perspective by c