C-LIFE is a landed camera suite, suitable for Ocean World surfaces, consisting of a color Context Reconnaissance Stereo Imager and an LED flashlight that can also identify biogenic material through fluorescence. The C-LIFE design leverages ongoing work (with industry partners Space Dynamics Lab, SRI International and Ball Aerospace) from our ICEE-2 and COLDTech awards in low-temperature detector qualification, radiation modeling and mechanical design. It takes advantage of our development work on the Descent Imager for Europa Hazard Avoidance and Radiation Durability (DIEHARD) and camera development on other missions. The C-LIFE camera head is mounted on the Europa Lander’s high gain antenna, which provides tilt and pan capability. Minimal electronics in the camera head control and read out the detector and LEDs. Electronics in the lander vault perform most camera functions and image processing. C-LIFE contains no moving parts. In lieu of a focus mechanism, C-LIFE utilizes high F/number optics and a field of view elongated in the vertical direction with progressive focus from top (infinity e.g. imaging horizon) to bottom (close e.g. imaging sample delivery port). Strip filters (that match Europa Clipper’s Europa Imaging System) on the detectors and partly-overlapping images provide color coverage. Heaters warm C-LIFE to operating temperatures, allowing self-heating to take over, but otherwise the camera is unheated in order to conserve energy. We combine two independent eyes into one mechanical housing (Figure 1) with a dual periscope design, which reduces the mechanical envelope, shielding mass, heating energy and total cabling distance. We use LEDs in three bands to illuminate and to excite fluorescence. Fluorescence excited by these three bands can identify the presence of key metabolic biomarkers and discriminate the quantities of live cells, dead cells and spores in a terrestrial setting. Figure 1. A dual-periscope design, with eyes 20 cm apart, folds optical trains (incoming rays in gray) to mutually shield focal planes. Fold mirrors locate LEDs inside the camera for shielding.

On October 20, 2020, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft performed its Touch-and-Go (TAG) activity, in which it briefly contacted the surface of the asteroid Bennu and successfully collected a sample of regolith. Subsequent images of the sampling mechanism showed that thousands of small regolith particles were escaping from it, apparently in conjunction with movements of the mechanical arm and wrist joint by which the sampling mechanism is attached to the spacecraft. The escaping particles could be tracked from one image to another, and across multiple images, which allowed the OSIRIS-REx optical navigation team to detect, associate, and track particles using a combination of manual and automated techniques. The associated tracks each represent a unique particle that was further analyzed to estimate its ejection time, 3D trajectory, and velocity, as well as its photometric properties, which were used to compute its brightness, size, and mass. Compiling the aggregate photometric and physical data for all of the particles leads to an estimate of total sample mass lost during the post-TAG imaging sequences. These results further inform an understanding of the sample escape mechanisms and sample loss that occurred before the sample head was stowed in the return capsule on October 28, 2020. The material presented here is based upon work supported by NASA under Contract NNM10AA11C issued through the New Frontiers Program.