Systematic selection of the next generation Martian rotorcraft configurations

The successful deployment of NASA's Ingenuity Helicopter has paved the way for the development of advanced rotorcraft for Martian exploration. Despite Ingenuity's achievements, its limitations in endurance, payload, and range highlight the need for optimised designs for future Martian aerobot missions. This paper addresses these challenges by proposing and systematically analysing various rotorcraft configurations, including single rotors, coaxial designs, tandem rotors, quadcopters, and hexacopters, under Martian conditions. Through a detailed parametric analysis based on simplified momentum theory, power requirements are calculated for each configuration during hover, vertical climb, and forward flight. Special attention is given to coaxial multirotor designs, which offer improved performance in terms of power efficiency and payload capacity. The application of the Battery Mass Fraction (BMF) methodology further demonstrates the viability of electric-powered rotorcraft for extended Martian operations. The study identifies coaxial hexacopters as the most efficient configurations, providing a strong basis for the next generation of Martian aerial vehicles.