The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
Water on Mars
Urian
__BANNED USERS regular
__BANNED USERS regular
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/space/07/31/nasa.mars/index.html
-Phoenix lander determines a sample of Mars soil contained 1 percent water ice
-Onboard "ovens" will help determine whether organic chemicals are present
-Experiment to take a week; scientists then to analyze results for several weeks
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
"We have water," said Bill Boynton of the University of Arizona, lead scientist for the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer, the ovens that will cook the sample and measure the temperatures needed to vaporize the components.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
So, this has been a long time coming for a lot of people. I always knew it would happen eventually, but now that we are hopefully pretty close to indisputable evidence that there are traces of life-supporting water on Mars, we can then move on and figure out at what point in the planet's lifecycle it had larger bodies of water, as well as active life.
Will this prove to the world that we're not alone in the universe, or do you think they'll need more obvious evidence to be convinced? What new discoveries do you guys think lies ahead for NASA, and what does this event specifically mean to you? What i'm curious about is what other things the rover might find if it found this so soon after it's landing.
-Phoenix lander determines a sample of Mars soil contained 1 percent water ice
-Onboard "ovens" will help determine whether organic chemicals are present
-Experiment to take a week; scientists then to analyze results for several weeks
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
"We have water," said Bill Boynton of the University of Arizona, lead scientist for the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer, the ovens that will cook the sample and measure the temperatures needed to vaporize the components.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
So, this has been a long time coming for a lot of people. I always knew it would happen eventually, but now that we are hopefully pretty close to indisputable evidence that there are traces of life-supporting water on Mars, we can then move on and figure out at what point in the planet's lifecycle it had larger bodies of water, as well as active life.
Will this prove to the world that we're not alone in the universe, or do you think they'll need more obvious evidence to be convinced? What new discoveries do you guys think lies ahead for NASA, and what does this event specifically mean to you? What i'm curious about is what other things the rover might find if it found this so soon after it's landing.
Urian on
0
Posts
Yes, exactly. I'm not so good on the science front regarding this, I just know it's a huge discovery (obviously) and has a lot of implications. I'm very very happy about it.
http://twitter.com/MarsPhoenix/statuses/839088619
It's pretty cool, but most people have assumed there was/is water for a couple of years now due to some of the geography. We've had experimental confirmation since June, and it's caused only the barest of stirs in the public awareness.
The results of what is in the water will be interesting, but getting people to Mars isn't feasible right now for various boring reasons (one of the key ones being that the crew of a ship have a very high chance for at least one of them to need surgery during the mission due to the minimum length of a return trip, and surgery in space would require a ship's doctor and a lot of technology we don't have).
Biggest downers I can think of would be the constant high radiation they'd be exposed to when they're outside earths magnetic field. So the cancer risk would probably be super high
Edit: Annoyingly I can't provide sources as I got the info from an astronaut I met earlier this year and I didn't make notes
Another NASA fun factor - the 500 year plan for interstellar travel. Can't seem to find the link now but there was a NASA article published in which they detailed a plan to develop interstellar travel - the first 100 years were brainstorming, the second century was more detailed planning etc. Talk about a brainstorming session :P!
I wonder how long it'll be till we get ships like the ship from the movie Sunshine..
Can't we just find some people who are ok with it being a one-way trip?
I mean, if we're that desperate to send people there. What's the advantage to putting men on mars anyway?
If I was offered a chance to go to Mars on the proviso that it was a one way trip, I'd take it.
It wouldn't have to be very high (20% min) but I probably wouldn't sentence myself to death.
Also, on topic - I look forward to strange Martian diseases. (Don't drink the water!)
Ok, alternatively just don't tell them. I mean, again, if it's so damn important. Lots of things go wrong with space missions. Ooops, the space ship blew up during the spool-up cycle for the return trip. Such brave men and women, a nation mourns them, the world thanks them, state funeral, etc.
What, I-No.
.....uh, modern science isn't exactly the ethical wasteland you seem to think it is.
Edit: So I'm thinking of the massive cluster fuck such a thing would cause if NASA did it. Then I had an epiphany: Russia. "Хорошо путешествия!"
Why not? We've built other things in space.
Direct link to the image (Warning! Largish)
---
I've got a spare copy of Portal, if anyone wants it message me.
What about plotting a trajectory that meant that you were always either accelerating or braking? That'd probably be the quickest way to get there anyway, if you could manage to pack in the fuel required, and it'd mean that there would always be an artificial gravity on board the ship (except for the likely very short period while they are in orbit around Mars).
(edit) Also the pic was brilliant, let's make a t-shirt!!!
All we need to do is send arnie up there to find the alien reactor and then we can all have holiday homes!
Awesome discovery with exciting follow up conclusions.
We probably could get to Mars in ten to twenty years. The engineering we would need has already been invented. Nevertheless, the trip would be prohibitively expensive. Until the American tax payers decide that we need to raise taxes to the level they are in other affluent countries, there is no point in expecting a Mars voyage anytime soon, at least by the United States. Perhaps the European Union could do it.
If you were looking for the thrust to provide gravity for your crew, well, forget about it. Chemical fuels are simply too inefficient for that. Most of space travel nowadays is done by coasting, because chemical fuel is way too heavy to carry very much of it.
That sort of thrust held at a constant level would require harassing nuclear power, a fusion drive, or something like the Orion project if it ever got off the ground.
INHOSPITABLE!!!111 - McCain
Well, to be fair Orion is nuclear, just the most primitive form (hey guys, lets put atomic bombs under our seat! wooo!). But Orion would give you that massive thrust, enough that you could use it as artificial gravity. I doubt you'd be able to maintain it for very long though. Nuclear heating is a neat idea, I've never heard of that one before. Does the nuclear fuel heat something to the point of ionizing it, making it a variation of an ion drive? Either way it sounds like one of those efficient but slow methods.
Excerpt:
"Now, a team of researchers working in New Mexico has found traces of life inside salty halite crystals. The discovery is "an invaluable resource for understanding the evolutionary record [of Earth] over a geological time frame," according to Jack Griffith of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and his colleagues, who recently published their work in the journal Astrobiology."
Now the relevancy to this is, is it possible there are rock salts on Mars in caverns, etc..? I'd like to see NASA's plans on further exploration of Mars, if there are any plans to go into the various valleys and other craters and what not. That'd be amazing.
As for propulsion, what about Magnetoplasmadynamic thruster(MPDT, and I picked this one because it had the coolest name). If the only significant issue is power, then it saddens me that NASA still hasn't figured out a way to utilize nuclear powered probes/ships in space.
I thought that with the Project Prometheus cancellation(or slow death), it looked like most of their nuclear powered research was going to die with it as well.
And man, F greenpeace. Hey we're NASA, we gave you velcro and the microwave. You're welcome.
And I thought some British guy trying to create a new type of radar during WWII invented the microwave?