New Mars Forums

Design a Mission to Europa

You guys will get a kick out of this. I found a flash game at the JPL website that allows you to design a mission to Europa and look for life! In it you pick the number and type of instruments you want to send (Up to four) along with the probe, see if it survived liftoff and en route problems, and use the instruments to see if you can find life with them. Mine was highly succesful, proving in one week the existence of ET . Note, this is the high-speed version, dial-up users might want to use the other version.

The big problem I see with sending a cryo/hydrobot mssion is that you can't send 20 miles of control cable down through that ice pack and expect it to stay intact. You also face daunting problems with trying to comunicate with the hydrobot via remote control. 12 miles is a LONG way for even ELF radio waves to go through, I estimate that it would probably take hours just to e-mail one photo up to the mothership on the surface. Naturally, the hydrobot would be of limited means, it would have to be programed to first spend about four days collecting pictures and temperature/composition readings, then pick the 20 photos it found most intriguing and phone home.

Perhaps another option would be to design a more advanced form of microwave communication. I think that you could send data much faster through a microwave link, but this would require more power. Or perhaps I have no idea what I'm talking about and should shut up when it comes to this field. But humans are creative, someone (Perhaps me!) will think of something to fix all the little problems.

An excellent book I just recieved for Christmas that should appeal to this audience is Beyond. It's essentially a collection of the most spectacular photos ever taken of eight of the planets in the solar system and the sun. Keeping with the title, every photo except one was taken by a robotic explorer, some of which include Voyager, Galileo, the Vikings, and the Mariners. Something that this audience should enjoy is that the Mars section dominates the book, with dozens of pictures from MGS, Mars Odyssey, and the Vikings of the Valles Marineris, sand dunes, and dry channels (Or perhaps cannals? ).

The only major complaint I have with the book is the lack of pictures from landers, which totals to two, I believe. Yes, the MGS and Mars Odyssey photos are breathtaking, but the Vikings landed as well as orbited, something you might overlook from reading it. It also would have been cool to see the surface of Venus and the Moon, but there's nothing from the Venera, Surveyor, Luna or Lunkhod missions. Additionally, there are three pages devoted to Uranus, why (so few, I mean)?

I hope that or the nasty price won't discourage you from checking out this book. I don't know of any better or more concise collection of actual photos of our fellow planets, definately something you should look into if it interests you.

I just thought of another cool off-planet destination that also involves Mercury. Personally, a giant sun doesn't singularly qualify a planet to be on my top ten list, but Mercury has another thing going for it, it's tiny whisp of an atmosphere and slow rotational speed makes it a great place to see the stars. Imagine going there during a total plaentary lineup like that which occured back in 1977, I believe. From one point you could see Mercury, Venus, Earth, the Moon, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn! With reasonably good binoculars, you could also see the Galilean moons, Uranus, and maybe even Phobos. Additionally, you'd get the most brilliant stars  ever seen, probably around five times as many as even perfect conditions on Earth (Ie night the Titanic sank, no wind, no moon).

That would probably be my #5.

Certainly, there would be a huge range of extremeophiles yearning to live in such an environment. What you have to keep in mind is that every square inch, I'm not kidding, EVERY square inch (Minus maybe three or four in the Atacama desert and Antarctica) of Earth is crawling with microorganisms. They are as integral to how this planet operates as is the hydrosphere or the atmosphere, and some of them live in such terrible hellholes Mars would seem like a vacation. There are strains of bacteria that live (Read: thrive) in nuclear reactors, sulfuric acid, and the middle of the Antarctic ice sheet. While I can't name any specific examples I'm sure that there are several species of bacteria that would thrive down in those hidden aquifers below the surface, no matter what life will find a way.

Yeah, you'll need those sunglasses on Mercury. The Mercury fantasy brings to mind a quote form the movie Pi "When I was a little kid, my mom always told me not to look into the sun, so one time when I was six I did." He's temporarily blinded and, well, you'd have to see the movie to get the significance. Anyway, here's my list of interplanetary getaways.

#1: Von Braun City, Delos, Tau Ceti: This is the ficticious planet from the "What if the Event Never Happened" forum. Von Braun City would be a small setelment near the equator with a nearby beach filled to the brim with stromotolites. The beginings of the first tropical rain forest (Brought with the colonists) is sprouting up outside the farmlands, and perhaps the best part about the planet is that all you have to pack is a toothbrush and some casual clothes. The atmosphere is 27% oxygen, with a thick ozone layer, so you can run around all you want outside wihtout a spacesuit!

#2: Titan, Saturn system: Who wouldn't want to go to a moon where there's plenty of beachside real estate, a thick atmosphere for airplanes, and you loose 75% of your weight just for going?! Seriously, I'd love to see Saturn suspended above those orange clouds while standing on the shore of the systems only other ocean. The fact that airplanes get along there too is fine by me, I couldn't stand being seperate from the ability to fly for too long (See my intersts).

#3: Olympus Mons, Mars (5976 AD): This would be one of the first cities on a terraformed Mars 5,000 years from now (Hey, I can dream can't I!). The city is located by the shore of the Atlantic Ocean (Some Italian astronomer named it that back in the 1800s and apparently no one switched it in 5,000 years) on the foothills of Olympus Mons, enriched by fresh volcanic soil. The failure to find any life on Mars during the initial exploration in the 21st century actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise, exempting Mars from the ban on terraforming of any planet with indiginous life passed in 2027. Terraforming was not easy, and took forever, but it did gave us a second Earth. This one gets #3 just on basic coolness factor.  

#4: Hadley City, Moon, Terran system. This would be one of the first Lunar colonies, tucked away in Hadley Rile (Hence the name). Located near the foothills of the lunar Alps, you can enjoy activities ranging from golfing (A long par 5 is 10,000 yds) to 6th-g skateboarding (The newest X-treme sport) to hiking in the Alps. There's even a historical landmark at the Apollo 15 landing site.

Yeah, that's kinda what my point was. If you look at the comparisons, it's almost sad how little work was done in missions like the Vikings and Pathfinder. Essentially, the Vikings landed, scanned some soil and sat for six years saying that there's no life on Mars before finally kicking off. Compare that to how you'd do it on Earth. One geologist would charter a small plane to head out to the Atacama desert, take some soil samples, read the results and head back home. Elapsed time is around an hour, and the cost is aobut $2,000 for equipment (Realistic?) plus $250 for the plane and $3 for lunch. Not bad compared to Viking's inconclusive results for an astronomically high price.

Pathfinder did so little that even NASA says it's biggest accomplishment is getting to the surface intact. I suppose that it really wasn't designed to return much scientific gain, but still, besides the airbags and Sojourner, all Pathfinder proved was that JPL employees could give rocks wacky names like Scooby Doo, Yogi, and Couch. If you could make a robot that could do the amount of work in its lifetime that geologist on Earth can do in a day it would be an astounding accomplishment. Nothing will come close to it within the next fifty years (Robot tech just isn't THAT good) and I'm not that patient!  :angry:

As for helicopters, yes that would certantly be possible! All you need as an increadibly lightweight frame made out of something like mylar and kevlar and some gigantic rotors. The bonus of having thin air is that you can spin the rotors faster without exceeding the sound (And efficency drop) barrier. This means that electric motors can spin at their ideal speed without need for energy-zapping gear systems. Another bonus is that even though the copter's airframe would only seem to be moving at 20 mph (What's called indicated air speed) it's ground speed would be 200 mph. That allows you to cover lots of ground very quickly, and since it's a helicopter you can stop wherever you like.

One of the biggest arguments against sending people to Mars is that it's way to expensive. However, one time I decided to stop and think about which would actually have better exploration efficency and therefore be a better buy. The result? You can actually save a lot of money by sending people to Mars than just sending a robot and crossing your fingers that it doesn't end up lke the two thirds that just crashed or failed.

Okay, so, let's compare a mission like Mars Direct to the MER missions. The MERs will cover about 100 square meters a day for 90 day, IF all goes as planned. So for $200 million you get measurments and an analysis of rocks covering a total area of 9,000 square meters. If you sent a human mission with 6 astronauts, two of them could be working at all times on a three-shift basis. I estimate that two astronauts could cover 100 meters in about one hour or so, so in less than four days you accomplish the equivalent work of an entire rover mission. Additionally, the team will stay for more than a year, so you get a hundred times more work done just studying rocks.

But that's not all! A human mission could could also carry a vehicle such as a truck-style rover or even a helicopter to scan an much wider area in much less time. They could also carry more heavy equipment and study everything more thuroughly, along with the ability to carry samples home. Overally, I think ti's fair to say that a Mars Direct mission could get 1-2,000 times more work done than an unmanned rover, along with being more reliable. Once you factor in a price tag of $20 billion (Fair price?) the total comes to equal -to- twice the efficency of a MER.

And that doesn't even factor into account other things like money returned to the economy through more jobs and spinoffs or a hightened intrest in science leading to more people going into those fields. Of course, there's also the bonus  that we (The US) get to be the first to go. If we want the most cost-effective mission, I think it'd be a good bet to try to go manned. What do you think?

Wow, this topic is getting completely out of control! I was going to quote part of what you said but instead I'll address one point at a time because there's too much in what you said that I'd like to adress. First, I didn't accuse you of complaining about men. I was just making a point that right now we've happened to reach a point where we're closer to equality than ever before. That doesn't mean I assume you or anyone else opposes that view, I'm just presenting a fact.

Second, well, how do I apologize for being too stern? I wasn't trying to, so sorry if it came across that way. I was actually just poking fun at the exchange of comments at the top of the page between Cindy and Rxle so it's not like I was taking everything too seriously. Maybe I should use more of these emoticons to convey the point next time.   :laugh:   

Whatev.

Okay, in hindsight I shouldn't've used the word "ethically." First, I hate any argument that involves ethics simply because of all the tripe I've heard against cloning, GM crops, and evolution. Second, there's a scientific reason to go red as well. Sure, there might be life on many other worlds out there circling distant G-type stars, but what if there isn't? Even if we find indiginous life on Mars we have no reason to assume it's common elsewhere, just more circumstantial evidence along the lines of (Caveman voice) "Oh, loook, it happen here! There must be life everywhere!" That argument didn't work for Percival Lowell, it's not going to work now.

So let's assume for a moment that it turns out that Mars is the only non-Earth nearby source of life. If we destroy the whisp of an ecosystem that exists with terraforming, we'd forever loose a wealth of information on how life comes about and where it can survive. We'd be back to working with an example of one, and necessitate yet more speculation and guesswork. I don't want to spark a your-mama argument, but perhaps a spirited discussion on the matter would be pertinent.

However, if we can conclusively prove that Mars doesn't have life now and terraforming won't pave over any previously-living fossils, I'd be all for terraforming as long as the price is right. Both are pretty daunting tasks, as no matter what there would always be some faint glimmer of hope that life just might be somewhere we haven't looked yet. As for the second, any way you look at it terraforming has a monsterous price tag that would be very difficult to justify commercially or scientifically. And no matter what you run into the problem of how to get Mars' core running again. Perhaps a sequel to   The Core would give us the answer.

I've been watching CNN for the last 30 minutes and haven't heard the Wright's name once! In fact, the special tonight is about inside Iraq. Big deal, they say something about Iraq every day, is the public really so apathetic that they can't muster up a little interest about the centennial of flight?

I'm glad Bush didn't say anything about going to the Moon. Even if he said something it's not like we'd have gone, better to not even get our hopes up. I'm just waiting until Scaled Composites or one of the other X-Prize contenders gets us there.

Aah! Now everyone's spelling Martian wrong, not just Cindy! For further referance, that's "Martian", not "Marsian." I really don't know who decided to end one planet's possesive adjective with a "tian" (Mars), and another with a "sian" (Venus), but I don't make the rules, I just tell other people to follow them.

As for an actual response, life doesn't necessarily have to smack us in the face to be there. After all, it took years to develop the technology to discover life in places like Yellowstone, nuclear reactor cores, and Antarctica. Life is extremely good at living, but it also does a pretty good job at hiding, so I don't think it's very surprising that neither of the Vikings found anything. Heck, even with today's technology we can hardly find anything in the Atacama desert.

Come to think of it, how different would life look on Mars, even if it origionated there? I haven't taken biology yet, but from what I've learned life arose in a very predictable pattern here on Earth. First the tides mixed up a soup of proteins, then surface tension bound tiny spheres of nuclear material (DNA, not uranium) together, which after gaining a cell wall of lipids became Earth's first (And still most successful) life. It's hard to imagine this natural process occuring in a substantially different way on Mars, so Martian life actually should be pretty simmilar to Terran life. Of course, no one will mention that until we find a strain of bacteria identical to E. Coli tucked away in Gusev Crater.

Right, steering the discussion back on topic, I've recently heard more and more evidence that Mars is dead because it's simply too small to keep the tectonic cycle circulating for more than one or two billion years. I don't like, and I use that word tentatively, this idea, because what it means is essentially that an Earth-like planet has to be above a certain size to maintain Earth-like longevity. Of course, you can't pick and choose evidence based on what you like and dislike, facts are facts and that's the foundation of science.

I'm not quite sure how we can tie this into the topic discussion, because under this scinerio there is no singular event that we can ask "What if" about. However, after I got the creative juices going I managed to think of one absurd event that could have gone differently and give us a different Mars today.

Okay, there's mounting evidence that Neptune formed much closer to the sun than it is today, and as it ventured outward its tidal forces greatly influenced the growth of the solar system. So what if as Neptune was forming it got into a slightly more eliptical orbit? Now, let's just suppose that this new orbit sent a chunk of material about the size of Europa towards Mars. If it happened to be on a certain orbit, it would intersect with Mars, areobrake, and go into orbit around it. Stranger things have happened, like Uranus tipping over or Earth getting its moon.

I estimate that a Europa-size object would exert such huge tidal forces on Mars, that shearing alone could keep the core running. Of course, it's entirely possible that this is an insane idea only a poorly-educated freshman would concoct, but let's assume it were possible. With Mars' core buring strong to today, it could keep the sillicate-carbon cycle running and stay at a comfy Earth-like temperature. Imagine what that would be like for Lowell and the other astronomers to look through their telescopes and see vast oceans and forests, the inner system would be a very different place under this scinareo.

I actually enjoyed talking with you guys about interstellar transportation, but that whole thing is kind of off topic in here. Perhaps we should move that into the "interplanetary transport" forum.