Wikipedia:Peer review/Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter/archive2

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

We've had quite a few fairly major changes over the last few months, and I'd like to get some input as to the changes. I'd like to try for a FA spot sometime in the near future, as MRO is getting ready to start it's science phase. There were alot of changes from the future tense to the past or present tense, and I wouldn't mind an extra set of eyes to make sure everything makes sense. Thanks for your help! Tuvas 19:09, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

It looks pretty good. Some of the text could use a little fine-tuning, but overall it's nice work. Here's a few comments and suggestions:

• By USD did you mean U.S. dollars? This could be linked to United States dollar. At first glance I thought USD might have been the acronym for an organization.
• The introduction uses the acronyms HiRISE, CRISM, and SHARAD without explaining what they mean. It think the sentence would be satisfactory without the " such as HiRISE, CRISM, and SHARAD" as these are covered in detail later. Likewise SHARAD is mentioned down in the "Launch and orbital insertion" section without an explanation.
• The statement in the introduction that the orbiter "will transfer more data back to Earth than all previous interplanetary missions combined" should have a reference.
• "...considered for the 2003 launch opportunity, however" needs a period before the "however". Otherwise the sentence is slightly confusing.
• Can "visible-near-infrared spectrograph" be clarified and linked? Perhaps "visible and near-infrared spectrograph" would do?
• Did the MRO come in at budget?
• Could you clarify what "completed its burns in fifty-six minutes" means? Is that from the start of the launch or from the separation? Did it perform multiple burns?
• transfer orbit could be linked to Hohmann transfer orbit.
• In the section that discusses aerobraking, a little discussion of the process might be useful. Many people think of entry into an atmosphere as a process that generates enormous amounts of heat, per the STS. So perhaps you could clarify the interaction of the spacecraft with the sparse upper atmosphere of Mars?
• MCS switches the frequency measurements to μm from the earlier nm. It's good to be consistent.
• I think "Mars Express MARSIS" should have a quote mark after the word Express: "Mars Express' MARSIS".
• The gap prior to the "MCS" section could be eliminated for a consistent look.
• "UHF software defined radio" needs a hyphen: "software-defined", if I am understanding the statement correctly. Likewise "software-defined" later in the same paragraph.
• kbit and Mbit need to be linked.
• What is a "5e-13 USO"? Could this be made clearer?
• Typo: informaion

Thanks. :-) — RJH (talk) 16:10, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm starting to work on these changes, I've got the first two under wraps... I'll try to get more of them as the day goes on. Tuvas 17:01, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm sure there's no hurry, and they're just suggestions. — RJH (talk) 18:41, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I've been working on your suggestions, I still have a few more to do, but, well, there's the time issue... I hope though most of them have been made just fine. I'm going to take a look at the rest of them ASAP. Tuvas 19:29, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

I have just a few points:

• The final orbit is said to be a 250x316km orbit, but the aircraft performed aerobraking with a 426km periapsis altitude, so how can the 250x316km final orbit not be a decay orbit? There is clearly something wrong. In fact, Mars Global Surveyor article claims a much more likely 110km (later 120km) periapsis altitude for aerobraking. Maybe the space.com reference is wrong?
  Aerobraking altitude is not given.
• The Italian Space Agency's role is not clear. It's listed as a contractor, wich means NASA paid for the instruments ASI provided, which is quite strange. Maybe the instruments provided by ASI were ASI-funded, and ASI had in return some observation time, or something like that, just like the NASA/ESA agreement for Hubble time, in a smaller scale? This would make ASI something more similar to a partner rather than a contractor. Maybe http://geodynamics.wustl.edu/phillips/rjp_home/Seu_SHARAD.pdf contains this information.
• The following statement is not clear: "Doppler informaion on landed vehicles will also enable scientists to accurately determine the surface location of Mars landers and rovers" — the original NASA version is, to me, more clear: "When landers and rovers have landed safely on Mars, Electra can provide precise Doppler data which, when combined with Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's position information, can accurately determine the location of the lander or rover on the surface of Mars."
• Maybe "The two MER spacecraft currently on Mars" is not correct and should be replaced with "The two MER spacecrafts currently on Mars"
• Atlas V wasn't properly linked, but I edited.
• This statement is not clear: "Due to lack of spectrum at 8.41 GHz X-band, future high-rate deep space missions will use 32 GHz Ka-band." — Lack of spectrum? Did the author mean that at 32 GHz the interplanetary medium absorbs less than at 8 GHz? If so, it is not clear, and a reference is missing (http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Mars_Reconnaissance_Orbiter&diff=78698153&oldid=78539399#_note-ant doesn't say that)

I hope this can help. // Duccio 16:20, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

A few comments. The 426 wasn't the altitude during aerobraking, rather, it was the atitude during the brief period between MOI and Aerobraking. During aerobraking, the periapsis atitude was around 100 km. I haven't found how this information is wrong in the article. The Italian Space Agency provided one of the instruments, if you did a search you would find that. It could be worded better. They provided SHARAD, the radar on MRO. As for the rest of the things, well, I'll get working at them, ASAP. Tuvas 23:05, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

You're right, the article wasn't wrong on the aerobraking altitude, it just didn't say it, I changed my review entry, sorry for that. On the second point, it's not what ASI provided — SHARAD, the article is clear on that — it's how and why, it is the nature of the agreement between ASI and NASA (or JPL or whoever made the agreement with ASI) that needs more coverage on the article. // Duccio 00:10, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

One more point:

• Article says "MRO's telecommunications system will transfer more data back to Earth than all previous interplanetary missions combined", but the source cited says "more than all the data transmitted by all previous JPL spacecraft put together", so maybe we should change it to "all previous JPL interplanetary missions combined".

// Duccio 16:04, 2 October 2006 (UTC)