MONTVILLE, N.J. - The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) needed valves for the agency's Sample Retrieval Lander (SRL), a key element of NASA’s Mars Sample Return program. They found their solution from Marotta Controls in Montville, N.J.
Marotta will supply two types of valves for the SRL, which will carry the Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV), a rocket charged with launching samples off the surface of Mars for return to Earth for study. The first is a customized valve based on the MV130HLT, a heritage design from Marotta’s CoRe Flow Control series. This valve will pressurize the liquid propellant tanks, starting the SRL’s engines. The second Marotta valve, the SPV795, is brand new and designed specifically to shut off the SRL’s descent engines to facilitate a safe landing; this is to accommodate the very thin atmosphere on Mars. Both valves have been optimized to reduce the risk of sample contamination and safeguard the integrity of each vial’s contents.
The Mars Perseverance rover is currently collecting and caching samples on Mars. NASA plans to land a Sample Retrieval Lander near or in Jezero Crater no earlier than 2028, bringing a small rocket (MAV) on which the samples collected by Perseverance would be loaded. Once the samples are launched off the Red Planet, another spacecraft would capture them in Mars’ orbit, and then ferry them to Earth safely and securely in the early to mid 2030s.
“Space flight is in our DNA, and the fact that our valves have been vetted and chosen for such a significant and history-making undertaking speaks to that expertise,” said Max Wolfinger, VP Space Systems, Marotta Controls. “Valves are crucial to the safe and effective launch and landing of the SRL. We’ve been working very closely with the team at JPL to design, enhance, and further adapt our components to meet the mission-critical needs of the Mars Sample Return campaign, developed to help humankind better understand this nearby planet.”
