Rosetta Space Probe
If you like space adventures, you might want to follow the Rosetta Space Probe which made history Wednesday as it became the first probe to rendezvous with a comet on its journey around the sun. The probe is named after the Rosetta Stone, a stele of Egyptian origin featuring a decree in three scripts. (see below)
The lander is named after the Nile island Philae, where an obelisk (see below) was discovered with inscriptions. A comparison of the hieroglyphs on the Rosetta Stone and the obelisk catalyzed the deciphering of the Egyptian writing system. Similarly, it is hoped that these spacecraft will result in better understanding of comets and the early Solar System.
In a more direct analogy to its namesake the Rosetta spacecraft also carries a micro-etched nickel alloy Rosetta disc donated by the Long Now Foundation inscribed with 13,000 pages of text in 1200 different languages.
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Europe's Rosetta probe goes into orbit around comet 67P BBC - August 7, 2014
Europe's Rosetta probe has arrived at a comet after a 10-year chase.
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Rosetta is a robotic space probe built and launched by the European Space Agency to perform a detailed study of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. On August 6, 2014 it approached 67P/ChuryumovÐGerasimenko to a distance of about 100 km and reduced its relative velocity to 1 m/s, thus becoming the first spacecraft to rendezvous with a comet.
Ancient Egypt
