Sounds like science fiction, but that's essentially howscientists intend to test the artificial intelligence on board a craft called Deep Space 1, a hundred million miles from Earth.
DS1 was launched and has already completed 11 of 12scheduled tests of artificial intelligence programs, telecommunicationequipment, circuitry, and other technologies. On July 29th the craftwill its take its final test: a dance with an asteroid.
Scientists want to know if the craft can program itself totravel close to the asteroid, named 1992 KD. It would be a feat of artificialintelligence in which ion propulsion systems and conventional thrusters willzoom the craft at 33,500 miles per hour to a point 6 miles from the asteroid the closest flyby of such an object ever attempted.
The crafts navigation system, AutoNav, has already beensteering the craft safely through outer space. A successful flyby of theasteroid would be convincing evidence that AutoNav should be included in futureprojects.
NASA scientists also hope the fly-by will teach themsomething about the intriguing 1992 KD asteroid, which was discovered byastronomer Eleanor Helin in 1992. Its orbit is highly elliptical. At its closest to the Sun, the asteroid is betweenEarth and Mars. Its furthest point is halfway to Jupiter.
The Deep Space 1 mission is currently scheduled to end onSeptember 18, 1999, but an extension is possible. If the project continues, DS1will give scientists a chance to study a dormant comet (Wilson-Harrington) thatseems to be in the unusual process of changing to an asteroid, and one of themost active comets to regularly enter the inner solar system (Borrelly).
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