Missions to asteroids and comets are becoming increasingly feasible both fr
om a technical and a financial point of view. in particular, those directed
towards the Near-Earth Asteroids have proven suitable for a low-cost appro
ach, thus attracting the major space agencies as well as private companies.
The choice of a suitable target involves both scientific relevance and mis
sion design considerations, being often a difficult task to accomplish due
to the limited energy budget at disposal. The aim of this paper is to provi
de an approach to basic trajectory design which allows to account for both
aspects of the problem, taking into account scientific and technical inform
ation. A global characterization of the Near-Earth Asteroids population car
ried out on the basis of their dynamics, physical properties and flight dyn
amics considerations, allows to identify a group of candidates which satisf
y both, the scientific and engineering requirements. The feasibility of ren
dezvous and flyby missions towards them is then discussed and the possibili
ty of repeated encounters with the same object is investigated, as an inter
mediate scenario. Within this framework, the capability of present and near
future launch and propulsion systems for interplanetary missions is also a
ddressed. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.