Modeling Hypervelocity Impact Temperatures for Europa Clipper Planetary Protection

A scarcely explored means for reducing the probability of biological contamination of a planetary body when inadvertently impacted by an Earth-origin spacecraft is the heat generated by the impact event itself. This paper formulates some necessary considerations and an appropriate analytical approach for modeling and estimating impact induced plastic deformation heat generation in spacecraft metallic components and sub-systems, and applies it to the Europa Clipper mission. Plastic deformation heat generation and other mechanisms were then used as inputs to a separate model developed to compute biohazard mitigation. Considerable temperature increases capable of providing biological sterility for some, but not all of the Europa Clipper's spacecraft components is indicated.