New Mars Forums

Another one more related to Beagle 2 - most recent news.
Beagle 2 Official Web Site

I venture to add to this, as it is my favourite topic.

I must be the most optimistic about this, although I am not so technically equipped in terraformation area and in creation of life support system.

Humans are very ingenious when they have to achieve something, especially if they have too.

I believe Venus will be fully terraformed (or at least) in the far future, with or without changing its rotation. If a dense wet atmosphere is created on Venus (2.5 bars, 90% nitrogen, 8% oxygen, 2% water) it may be good enough to support steady climate during its 55 day diurnal period (not 243 - its rotational period!). I put Venus as number 3 candidate after Mars and the Moon.

The Moon might be partially terraformed with larger ice asteroids thrown at its poles and its atmosphere would be topped up from time to time. Its atmosphere would be much thinner than Earth's, although enough to make use of parachutes and pressurized tents (not domes).

Mercury is too close to the Sun but polar regions are good candidates for settlement. I still believe that shifting it further from the Sun is possible and if moved to 90-95 mln km orbit would be in the safe distance from Venus and far enough from the Sun to support hot but tolerable atmosphere.

I am in favour of settling the Jovian moons and beyond, although good sources of energy will be required or huge lenses.

Happy New Year everyone and good luck with Beagle 2!

Haven't read the full thread but I think I should mention that record durations in weightlessness set by Russian cosmonauts exceed a year, not just 6 months. I don't remember exactly but I think Romanenko (?) spent from 13 to 18 months on Mir and came back safe and sound, only a little bit week. If someone needs exact info, I'll check later. He had no problems with health, only needed some adaptation to the normal G.

With specially designed exercises people should be able to get to Mars and be productive within a very short period. Even after a long plane flight people need rest. (When I flew from Moscow to Melbourne I had to sleep it off too). If the Mars mission takes place, it shouldn't be for a couple weeks stay, so the astronauts will have enough time to adapt.

Let me express my opinion about this. A lot of people will disagree but it's MY opinion. Most people digest what they are given on TV. Bush said we should envade Iraq and maybe a lot of people disagreed with that initially, he got the support he wanted to go to war and it happened. You may ask, what's the relationsip between the Iraq war and colonizing Mars. Bush managed to get the public support through the media, because the reporters and TV commentators believed in this and these are the people who can convince the majority of the population. At the moment, when they talk about space on TV, it's sometimes with scepticism, irony and not much of enthusiasm. If the journalists and owners of the papers start to believe in space exploration, Mars colonization, etc, there is a big chance there will be more support from rank-and-file people. See how little time is now dedicated to Mars exploration/colonization in the media. Imagine, they talk about it as much as they talk about Iraq. You get even political parties advocating Mars terraformation. A bit exaggerated but you know what I mean.

Another point is, it's human nature:

. You're not alone BGD. There are a lot of people like you. Maybe even worse (in a good sense). A few decades ago, during the cold war, teh Soviet Union had a serious plan to send cosmonauts to Mars without return, because it was considered impossible with the technology to return them back to Earth. There were volunteers who spent years(!) preparing for this project. Then the project was abandoned because of its inhumanity. I watched an interview with one of those cosmonauts, he was very sad when he learned the plan was cancelled. Why would simple people want to go to Mars and want others to go there? For the same reason as they wanted to go to America and Australia in the past - because it's new, unknown, very exciting, an opportunity. The final reason for all missions to Mars should be human expansion - settlement, not just for the science per se.

Hey, KeithPhi, thanks for your posts. We need more enthusiasts like you. Although, I am not convinced we found life on Mars yet but with people like, I'm sure we will.

??????! - Privet ("Hello", here's my attempt to post a word in Russian Cyrillics)

Ochen' khorosho, chto kto-to pytayetsya raznoobrazit' forum raznymi yazykami, ya napishu po-russki. No kakoy smysl? Na kompyuterakh ispol'zuyetsya v osnovnom angliyskiy. Yesli ya napishu kirillitsey po-russki, bol'shinstvo dazhe ne uvidit pravil'nyy russkiy text iz-za kodirovki. Poetomu pishu latinskimi bukvami, nekotoryye nazyvayut etot sposob "Runglish" (RUssian + eNGLISH). Ya soglasen, dlya tekh, u kogo angliyskiy ne rodnoy, tomu trudneye vyrazhat' svoi mysli, no zato my mozhem uchastvovat' v mezhdunarodnykh forumakh i v forumakh na rodnom yazyke. Yavnoye preimushchestvo!

It is very good that someone is trying to diversify the forum with different languages. I will write in Russian. But what's the point? If I write in cyrillics in Russian, the majority won't even be able to see the proper Russian text because of encoding. Computers use English by default. That's why I wrote in Latin letters, some people call it "Runglish" (RUssian + eNGLISH). I agree, for those whose first language is not English, it is harder to express one's thoughts. However, we can take part in international forums and forums in our language. It's an obvious advantage!
:;): :;): :;): :;):
I think, if we start settling other planets, the internationalization will become even more commonplace. To support individual languages, say on Mars, special measure will have to be taken.

Je fr?her, desto besser - the sooner, the better. :laugh:

I agree that only Ganymede and Callisto could be considered for human settlement for the next 100 and more years starting with Callisto. Europa is interesting as a candidate for some primitive extraterrestrial life, so people may just study it. In the future it could be (along with Ganymede and Callisto) the largest supplier of water for newly terraformed or paraterraformed (domed) worlds - Mars, Venus, Mercury and Luna (the Moon).
Problem would be supplying enough solar heat to Ganymede and Callisto but as already discussed in Mercury Terraformation (not quite related to Mercury) it could probably solved with large mirrors.

I am optimistic and I hope that a few planets and satellites could be terraformed with more or less effort to a better or worse extent, if not terraformed, some planets could be paraterraformed to have a sustainable, self-dependant life.

Let me express my views about each terraformable/colonizable planet/moon apart from the Jovian moons:

Mercury:
Negative: too close to the Sun, bad rotation.
Positive: Heavy as Mars, rich metals.
To terraform one very difficult option is to move it further away from the Sun (min. 90 mln km, or even further and make it Venusian satellite). If not possible to move, some people offer to lock its rotation, so that it always faces the Sun and settle the dark side of it.
Venus:
Negative: slow rotation.
Positive: high gravity, a lot of nitrogen.
Terraformable if rotation could be increased. Question: imagine Venus had Earth's atmosphere and water but the same distance from the Sun and rotation same as it is now. How bad would it be? Too hot during the long day and too cold during the long night? That's for sure but maybe genetic engineering would help to create plants and maybe animals that can survive in such environment. Speeding up Venus's rotation is desirable but might be impossible with current technology.
Luna:
I believe rotation is a problem but not as big as on Venus. Problem is low gravity. Perhaps the Moon can hold an atmosphere but it has to be topped up every few thousand years. In my opinion, the terraformed Moon would be a better value that keeping it as a site for telescopes and some production in vacuum.
Mars would be the "easiest" to terraform.

...

If there is no nitrogen on Mars or too little, it should be imported from Titan or from Venus (Venus has 2-3 bars of nitrogen, it only needs to be separated from other gases). It's going to take a long time but who said that terraforming is quick? The larger the containers, the faster the shuttles, the better.

I think we can't get away without shipping gases from planet to planet but if this technology is developed we can terraform other planets. If people want something badly they can make it happen.

I am moved! You guys are so emotional about preserving a piece of rock? Red Io movement?
Actually, creating an atmosphere won't stop the volcanic activity on Io and terraforming - if it ever happens on Io, won't happen overnight - plenty of time to study the volcanoes. It's the tug-of-war between Jupiter and its other satellites that create this activity. Were Io in a different position it would be no different than our Moon.
We went off-topic. I am not concerned about terraforming Io. I just think that human mission to Europa might be possible but requires a lot of lab testing as for the radiation protection.
RobS (or anyone reading), what's your opinion about radiation levels on Jupiter's satellites on the side turned away from Jupiter (Io, Europa and Ganymede). As I said before, I believe they will be protected by their own body. For example, the night side of the Moon is bombarded with cosmic rays but not with solar rays.
A bit fantasy: if life exists on Europa under the icy crust, will it be only on the side turned away from Jupiter, or the creatures use filtered Jupiter's radiation as a source of energy?

Thanks for answering, Cindy. I see you have doubts about it as well.
I remember reading about the protection from radiation by the body of the planet/moon itself on a NASA site, it makes sense too. Why should Jupiter's radiation envelop Europa from all sides. I don't think anything is hit by solar radiation on the dark side, e.g. the Moon or Earth. Approaching could be a problem but the ships must be designed for this. The astronauts/cosmonauts will face the same problem when travelling to Mars during possible Solar flares. The thicker the insulation the safer it is. The ships could be equipped with a small room used during the approach with thick metal double walls with lots of sand in them.

Yes, Io is volcanically more active than any other body in the Solar system, it doesn't mean though that every inch of it is affected, there are large "quiet" spots. Io doesn't have volatiles apart from sulphur gases erupted from volcanoes but it's the heaviest natural satellite in the Solar system (our Moon is the second) and its mass is more like that of a planet, so maybe another candidate for terraforming. In Mars trilogy (K.S. Robinson), they were considering shifting Io to a higher orbit from Jupiter and bombarding it with ice asteroids.

Anatoli

I, actually, think Mercury is quite valuable and should not be neglected. Mercury is too close to the Sun, so it can't be terraformed if it's not shifted into a higher orbit. Terraformable planets are few and Mercury should be considered next after Mars and Venus.

See the following link about moving and spinning up planets:
Paul Birch's Page

I think if Mercury could be shifted to about 90-95 mln km from the Sun (56  to 59 mln miles), it could be terraformed. Currently it is 46 (perihelion)- 70 (aphelion) mln km from the Sun. With Earth's atmosphere and rotation speed the average temperature would be about 45 C (113 F). It would be quite hospitable to live near the poles. Of course, I made a lot of assumptions about future technology development. For comparison - I read about Venus simulation - if it had Earth's atmosphere, water and rotation, its average temperature would be 25 C (77 F). (It's 8 C on Earth (46 F).

I am also interested in Jovian moons to be settled but the gravity on them is very low and they are on the other extreme - too cold. So I'd prefer Mercury to Ganymede, although I think a human mission to Mercury will happen later.

As for the size of the Sun when seen from Mercury - it's about 2.5 times larger as seen from Earth, could be different at perihelion and aphelion.

Anatoli

Hazer, have you read my note? I meant Mercury if it was shifted further from the Sun and spun up to rotate faster (if it's possible). That's what the link is about.

Mercury is one of the few candidates for terraforming but it's too close to the Sun, so if the technique for shifting and spinning up planets is developed, then Mercury should not be neglected.