The Nov Aerospace Science and Technology (vol. 166) includes:
Jiang, X. Zhang, J. Lu, X. Joint design, safety margin, and ground experiments of an underactuated asteroid lander Art. 110630 .2025.110630
Guo, Y. Wen, T. Zeng, X. Energy dissipation mechanism of particle damping landmark on small celestial bodies Art. 110629 .2025.110629
Cars and motorcycles have suspension- heck, even many bicycles these days have suspension. Multi-‘footed’ vehicles use suspension, because the ground surface they interface is not known exactly (or approximately). Even though Hayabusa (and even NEAR Shoemaker) ‘landed’ without landing legs, future missions (including MMX) may opt for multiple legs. But there’s a problem: improperly designed ‘suspension’ (leg joints) may actually be worse. Do we fully understand the suspension issue?
Another approach- tried by Hayabusa- is ‘landers’ with no (nontrivial) rigidity at all. Hayabusa needed artificial landmarks to approach and contact asteroid Itokawa. Before Hayabusa’s sampling attempt, the probe dropped markers in the form of ‘beanbag’ pouches, with reflectors on them. Flopping in any landing configuration merely exposed a different reflector, and ultimately, any one marker per se was disposable. Still, we can’t just let the issue rest. Bearing in mind the Philae results, Guo et al. try to formalize the ‘beanbag’ approach better. Do we fully understand non-suspension?