Genesis (spacecraft) (nonfiction)

In its collecting configuration, the Genesis spacecraft exposed several types of solar wind collectors, as well as ion and electron monitors.

Genesis was a NASA sample-return probe that collected a sample of solar wind particles and returned them to Earth for analysis. It was the first NASA sample-return mission to return material since the Apollo program, and the first to return material from beyond the orbit of the Moon. Genesis was launched on August 8, 2001, and crash-landed in Utah on September 8, 2004, after a design flaw prevented the deployment of its drogue parachute. The crash contaminated many of the sample collectors, and, although most were damaged, some of the collectors were successfully recovered.

The Genesis science team demonstrated that some of the contamination could be removed or avoided, and that the solar wind particles could be analyzed using a variety of approaches, achieving all of the mission's major science objectives.