Rendezvous Mission to Apophis: I. Mission Overview

An asteroid is important for understanding the condition of our solar system in early-stage because an asteroid, considered as a building block of the solar system, preserves the information when our solar system was formed. It has been continuously flowing into the near-Earth space, and then some asteroids have a probability of impacting Earth. Some asteroids have valuable minerals and volatiles for future resources in space activity. Korean government clarified, in the 3rd promotion plan for space activity, an asteroid sample return mission by the mid-2030s. However, it is almost impossible to do so based on only a single experience of an exploration mission to the Moon, Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter, which will be launched in mid-2022. We propose a Rendezvous Mission to Apophis(RMA), beneficial in terms of science, impact hazardous, resource, and technical readiness for the space exploration of Korea.