Question 1
A suitable site for the landing of a spacecraft on the planet Mars is identified at a point, A. The shortest time from sunrise to sunset at point A must be found.
Radians should be used throughout this question. All values given in the question should be treated as exact.
Mars completes a full orbit of the Sun in 669 Martian days, which is one Martian year.
On day t, where , the length of time, in hours, from the start of the Martian day until sunrise at point A can be modelled by a function, R(t), where
The graph of R is shown for one Martian year.
Question (a)
(a)
Use your answers to parts (b) and (c) to find
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Question (i)
(i)
the maximum value of R(t);
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Question (ii)
(ii)
the minimum value of R(t).
[ 1 ]
Question (b)
(b)
Find, in hours, the shortest time from sunrise to sunset at point A that is predicted by this model.
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