New Mars Forums

Researchers Develop New Machine for Detecting Signs of Life on Mars

It appears that the  briefcase-size MOA, which includes laser spectroscopy, tiny pumps, valves and fluid channels for sampling the martian soil but it also has knobs on the side. How will a robot turn these? ???

Great results thou form a test at detecting amino acids at 70 parts per trillion from a Panoche Valley, California. This test sample mineral jarosite is simular to patches that were discovered on Mars last year by the rover Opportunity.
The device was also previous tested in the  Atacama Desert in Chile one of the driest place on Earth.

This will be another great cooperational venture with the ESA and I hope that it will be successful. 

So what we are seeing is the photon hitting the lense? ???
Yes I do recall, thinking that maybe these were peices of what would be considered volcanoids for mercury.

A great chart of the lander sequence to land on Titan.

Editorial Spend the money here first by someone that does not know the value of the science that will be returned IMO. 

Well it has been a little while since the xprize but now it is time to look towards the future with the xprize cup that may start in September.

My comment on twice was for each shuttle to fly 2 flights each to give a total of 6 missions per year.

My thought on the delta was only for a resupply capability similar to the russians and not for construction as a short term fix. Just in case a shuttle is stranded and unrepairable until materials for a proper repair where launched to the station. Which might occur if we are to use such a delta configuration for that reason.

I myself am concerned that as mission for shuttle start that the standing army of workers will get sloppy trying to keep up with the increased work load of having to get a second shuttle ready after each flight is launched for the purpose of rescue. Keeping in mind that we are planning to launch each no more than twice a year. Means a less than 6 month turn around between missions and that each mission to mission launch time is no more than 2 months apart.
Under that scenario we are going to have trouble keeping up with the launch rate to refurbishment between flights only after just a few.

If the ISS is the save haven (supplies lasting only 45 tops) we may then need to come up with rather than a rescue mission but a resupply the ISS capability and to stop relying on the Russians for that with there soyuz and progress combinations.

How hard would it be to retro-fit a Delta IV payload section for being grasped by the arm once near the station? No automated docking at first, that could come later as we need to continue with resupply responsibilities.

Having done this step would relieve the build up and chance of failure of a shuttle due to workmanship issues.

Following some more link on other pages the network gives a time out error connection refused. It would appear that there servers are being over welmed by the volume of traffic and is being very direct on who has immediate access to Hygens and Titan images.

edit
Nasa Cassini Hygens site more here if you have not been yet.

Trying to compare the Mer pictures to those of the hygens lest you forget the mer camera was selected and installed from cutting edge designs that are only at most 3 years old. Then again the hygens were put in place more than 7 maybe 8 years ago. Can you just picture where we were just that long ago with the invention we all take for granted called a PC was being used by all. I can tell you I was using a 386 maybe running at 40 mhz that barely had 16mb of memory and a hard drive that was at best 200mb in size. Nowadays we are using machines that are 2G for processor speed 686 or avalon with 256mb of ram on a stick with 80g drives. So you see how far technology has come since then.

Be patient, the images of titan will come, they will as long it stays running.

I have enjoyed all the updates from all  , but I find it very disappointing  to find two other threads grumbbleling about picture quality and lack of color. They should be happy that they are getting anything back at all.

In the Unmanned probes you will find
Disappointment pictures from titan And under the Free Chat Piss Poor Hygens Camrea Shots I am tired of the BS!

Where were all of you grumblers when the ESA needed money for better higher tech instrumentation though the developement years until it was launched 7 years ago.
You have nothing to whine about..
:angry:

Gee well here is a theory that is connected to the existance of other Earth planets being possible.

Does science make room for aliens? Researchers argue that new theories better the odds

Huygens' descent to Titan journal

Indicates that the probe has taken about 147 minutes to reach the surface and that it was a little longer than expected.
Also your info on the electronics is contained in the write up as well. Only 30 minutes of transmitted data before the probe would have needed to turn is indicated.

I guess it will take a few more orbits to get something meaningful from the lander.