Mars •

Martian Resources for 2030 Colonization

May 17, 2016 By Dustin Smith Leave a Comment

Mars’ surface. Martian Resources

NASA’s plans for the 2030 Mars human landing are being bolstered by Martian resources, new tools, and technologies used to sustain astronauts on the red planet.

NASA’s Human Exploration and Operations Directorate is considering what science experiments will be conducted upon landing and the conditions in which they will be performed.

Many experts are pushing for a new Mars orbiter to launch. If approved, this next-generation orbiter might go out as soon as 2022. It would be an orbiter with advanced telecommunications, a much powerful radar, and electric propulsion.

A telecommunication orbiter is currently under construction, although there is no official mission planned for 2022.

Last year scientists proposed approximately 50 Mars locations for the future landing.

People need perfect touchdown sites for landing and carrying out operations. A good site will also provide Martian resources for the new explorers to use. NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is on its new mission called HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) to take new pictures of the elected landing zones.

Any of these 50 locations must allow astronauts access to least 110 tons of water.

Last month NASA made public the Mars Water In-Situ Resource Utilization Planning Study (ISRU) report which looks into ways the exploration crew could tap into water resources on Mars.

Water on Mars would be utterly transformative for the planet. It would provide drinking sources and crops cultivation; it would offer processed breathable air and oxygen to propel vehicles.

The report has ruled the extraction of water from Mars’ atmosphere out because of the immense complexity of such a system. Being a reconnaissance mission, this approach would go beyond this a practical deployment.

They would need mass, power, volume and complex mechanics. With Mars’s density of water being so low, “it would take a massive processing system” said Richard Davis, assistant director of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.

But a possible water extraction method would be mining Mars for ice deposits. The method implies drilling a hole, vaporizing surface ice, bringing the stuff up as a gas and condensing it into liquid.

What they want is to make the Martian resources and environment work for us, not against us.

There are many technical problems to consider when approaching the Martian resources for future explorations (like the mass and power of the equipment required), but for NASA’s assistant director David, what will make this colonization possible in the year 2030 will the people’s belief in it.

Image source: Vimeo

Mars May Not Be Suited for Colonies

April 18, 2016 By Jesse Skelton 2 Comments

Elon Musk declared that he wants to retire on the Red Planet.

According to the data sent back by the Maven probe, Mars may not be suited for colonies after all. It seems like the Red Planet’s atmosphere is doomed by solar winds, making it uninhabitable, unfriendly, and forever dry. But hope is not lost, NASA didn’t spend billions of dollars just to get scared by some winds, be they electrically charged winds that are coming from the sun.

The Maven Data

NASA sent a lot of robots and satellites to Mars in order to see whether or not the planet is able to sustain life. the rovers are constantly pacing the surface, while an array of artificial satellites is orbiting the planet, scanning and analyzing, trying to find out more about it.

And while the machines never sent back any pictures of Martians trying to hide from the camera or doorways to underground settlements, they did discover what happened to the Red Planet’s atmosphere.

According to the data sent by the Maven probe, Mars is being constantly attacked by solar winds that are hurling electrically charged particles towards the Red Planet. These powerful waves drain the gasses from the planet’s surface, turning it into a cold, arid desert where life has no chance of prospering again.

Is the Colonies Dream Over?

NASA spent billions of dollars trying to prepare for a manned mission to Mars. There are additional companies that are working on the same project. Independent agencies are trying their best to head out towards the Red Planet by 2030, so a little solar wind will not stop them from getting there.

The Mars dream is still an ongoing project. The Space Agency is even currently undergoing an experiment to see if potatoes could really grow on the Red Planet.

They have given a second thought to Weir’s book and decided to try and see if the vegetables are going to grow in the arid soil. In order to mimic the dry conditions of the planet, researchers from NASA collected soil from the Pampas desert and planted more than fifty different types of the vegetable.

If they are successful in cultivating potatoes in Pampas soil, then they will continue the experiment in a controlled environment that mimic the thinner atmosphere and the weaker gravitational conditions.

Even though the data sent back by the Maven probe made some believe that Mars may not be suited for colonies, after all, there are still many people actively working on ways to keep the 2030 manned mission alive.

Image source: YouTube

Europe’s ExoMars Probe Set to Solve Mars Methane Mystery

March 14, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Europe and Russia teamed up to solve Mars methane mystery. Pictured: a sunset on Mars captured by NASA’s Spirit rover.

On March 14, the European Space Agency along with Russia’s space agency will launch the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter to Mars. The liftoff will take place at the Baikonur cosmodrome, in Kazakhstan.

According to official reports, the probe is designed to map and analyze the Red Planet’s atmosphere. The mission is especially interested in methane and other elements that make up less than 1% of the Martian atmosphere: sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, and water vapor.

Scientists are puzzled that methane is so present on Mars. The gas is usually rare in nature, making it all the way more fascinating that it was found on a lifeless planet.

Researchers believe that methane should be easily destroyed by the extreme weather on Mars. But recent readings suggest that methane levels are constant and occasionally display some spikes.

So, scientists theorize that there must be a source that keeps replenishing methane on the remote planet. Some planetary scientists believe that the most likely source is geological.

There are two theories: methane could be released in the wake of chemical interactions between specific subsurface rocks and water; or methane could be trapped in ice for millennia and get released into atmosphere during sporadic melting events.

Yet, other scientists hope that the source could be biological just like on Earth. On our planet, the gas comes mostly from living organisms, so it could be a possibility for Mars’ methane to be generated by bacterial life forms.

Dr Jorge Vago, ESA head of the project at ExoMars mission, explained that regardless of the type of source, methane suggests that there must be subsurface liquid water on the planet, which makes Mars slightly more active than scientists had envisioned.

The probe is equipped with two instruments, ACS and NOMAD, that can make a detailed map of methane concentrations both in atmosphere and at ground level.

Plus, there’s a scientific camera dubbed CaSSIS that can seek geological sources of methane, while a forth tool called FREND can detect hydrogen in the crust’s upper layer, which can be a sign that hydrated minerals and water are close by.

ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter is slated for launch at 15:31 local time. It will be coupled to a Proton rocket that will carry it to space and place it on a trajectory to Mars. The journey to space would last about 10 hours, while the trip to Mars would take seven months.

Image Source: Wikimedia

Curiosity Reveals Ancient Acidic Water on Mount Sharp on Mars

April 12, 2015 By Dustin Smith

Curiosity rover’s stopover on Mars’ surface had revealed ancient acidic water on the red planet’s Mount Sharp. The rock sample from the mountain, which NASA named the “Mojave 2”, was analyzed, and experts have discovered large quantities of ‘jarosite’, a sulfate mineral that develops into acidic samples.

NASA scientists also revealed that such mineral indicate more acidic conditions nearby Mount Sharp than other places, which Curiosity has drilled before. Now, scientists are studying why Mojave 2 had evidence of high levels of acidic water, and whether the mountain was shaped through retreating acidic water. A new method of drilling the Mojave 2 was successful, allowing the experts to use similar methods in extracting samples around Mount Sharp’s circumference before Curiosity continues to investigate the mountain top.

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The Maven Data

Is the Colonies Dream Over?

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