Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

Void · 2015-01-21 08:55:41

Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.
I got this link from Impaler:
http://www.unibio.dk/technology/
It is an excellent provision by Impaler.
He however is interested in a method to feed a “Crew, either directly or indirectly”. So to comply with his wishes, I will leave the thread he created alone “Life support systems > Protein fermentation”, thank him for providing “http://www.unibio.dk/technology/”.
And hope to integrate this device into a collection of processes which might be scaled from a small settlement, to a planet wide network involved in some terraformation.
Thanks again Impaler.

Last edited by Void (2015-01-21 11:08:15)

Void · 2015-01-21 08:57:41

There are related references on the site already:

Atmospheric Separations:
http://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=7150

Martian Air Breathing Engine:
http://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=7156

Last edited by Void (2015-01-21 09:01:07)

Void · 2015-01-21 09:11:26

I will list three energy sources to drive biology on Mars.
1) Atmospheric chemicals (O2 & CO).
2) Reduction of water using Rigolith (Not all Rigolith is suitable).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regolith
3) Solar (I intend to limit solar to only applications where 1 & 2 are enhanced by using it, other solar would be redundant to existing materials on this site).

So presuming that there is an effective method to extract/concentrate free O2 & CO from the Martian atmosphere (You can look at the reference materials), then this machine may be able to run off of those two gasses and water. http://www.unibio.dk/technology/ It would likely need an alternate organism, and the energy level is lower, but the gasses are available on Mars.

Another method should it be possible to isolate the CO would be to process it with a solar concentrating mirror, adding CO and H20, which would produce CH4, and CO2, which it seems the machine is actually designed to run off of.

In Impaler indicates that the machine can be relatively small, so indeed as he has suggested, it can be enclosed in a small room. Multiple copies could be made as a method of scale-up, or perhaps the machine could be scaled up itself.

Anyway if the above is possible, then it should be a companion of human activity from small settlement to planetwide settlement.

So, I go to item #2 which would involve Serpentinization. In support of it, I offer the 2nd method of use to support activities, where solar concentrating mirrors are used to impose heat on ice/water bodies, and salt is included to discourage turn-over of the water, to encourage stratification of the water. This presumably could involve high latitude ices, and basins where the water would collect. The reservoirs will have to be ice covered, and at least at first the ice has to be protected.

An alternative and companion plan is to drop an asteroid onto a polar ice cap, creating a lake where Serpentinization can act on the asteroid materials. If done correctly on the South Polar ice cap it could also release a great deal of CO2, and Methane which could inflate the atmosphere to an average of ~11 mb, which would make ice significantly more stable.

Ultimately I would like to see a ice covered sea covering the northern 1/3 of the planet more or less. I feel this method has a lot to offer. But taking it to that extreme is an option, not a requirement.

Serpentinization
http://oilonmars.blogspot.com/
I am not sure there is oil from abiotic processes, but I am also not qualified to dispute that it could exist.

If the free Oxygen of Mars could be economically concentrated, I can think of three uses for it.
1) Oxidize CO.
2) Oxidize Hydrocarbons from Serpentinization.
3) Provide breathing gasses for Humans.

If not all Oxidized, Hydrocarbons from Serpentinization could leak into the atmosphere, and cause a increased greenhouse effect.

The nature of an Antarctic Dry Valley Lake is to have the briniest water at the bottom. They are natural solar collectors, and the water can go to 20 degrees C, while the layers above are cold.

Such a brine should have a relatively better chance of penetrating into sub-lakebed regolith, since it is briny, and will not freeze until well below 0 degrees C.

Mars may have a lot of volcanic rock which has not been properly introduced to liquid water, so I am supposing that it might be possible to induce Serpentinization, which might lead to warm springs, which exhaust hydrocarbons.

This could be sized according to conditions. At first before the atmosphere thickens, the lake ice has to be artificially protected from evaporation, and the evaporating portion has to be replaced, perhaps from a glacier. Solar concentration mirrors would be used to convey steam to the waters to keep them warm.

Later if the atmosphere becomes more suitable for stable ice, these bodies of water could be solar collectors.

Last edited by Void (2015-01-21 11:23:33)

Impaler · 2015-01-21 21:06:28

Oil is defiantly of biological origin, carbon isotopic ratios established this for Earth, abiotic oil has always been a junk science claim to attempt to pretend these resources are not scarce, the oil-on-mars stuff is just pure crank nonsense. METHANE can be abiotic, but abiotic processes 'crack' hydrocarbons into shorter smaller molecules, they don't form them into longer ones, this is why coal/oil are 'cooked' into Natural ga by geologic heat and pressure, not the other way around. Some of our Natural gas deposits may have small amounts of abiotic Methane in them at some tiny fraction, their are also huge deposits of not commercially valuable methane (far more then in all the commercial reserves) dissolved in underground water as well, and obviously all the methane in the Earths primitive atmosphere was initially abiotic and was 'biotic' only after thouse first microbes fixed the carbon.

If your goal is to terraform Mars then you need to release Methane into the atmosphere not consume it as would be done by the digestion machine I described. Their is no biological process that we can do in a vat that is going to produce more Methane then the process that is feeding it could have just created directly. Methane generating organisms on Earth are decomposers, if we synthesize 'food' that consists of long-chaim hydrocarbons being fed to these decomposers then we would have more methane by just making methane rather then long-chain food. Only if we had long-chain hydrocarbons for some other reason, like a waste byproduct from agriculture would it makes sense to feed them too methanogenic bacteria, but ultimately I think it's more likely that agricultural wastes will be more valuable for recycling within the artificial biosphere mainly because of the trace minerals and nutrients they contain, things that will be much more difficult to replace then the bulk hydrocarbon content of the waste. So were just likely to run the same sabeteir-electrolysis type methane synthesizers that we use to make propellent and dump the 'fuel' right to the atmosphere to produce a greenhouse effect.

We are seeing methane releases on Mars now, and that could be a biotic or abiotic process. In either case accelerating or accentuating this release would be a potent greenhouse gas. This might be simpler/more energy efficient then trying to run a factory to produce Methane, the 'stimulation' of the Methane from Mars itself might consist of drilling wells and injecting more of what ever material is the limiting factor in the current generation process be it biotic or abiotic their will always be a limiting factor. Frackturing the rock to allow more venting of Methane already present or which is being stimulated, were already doing this by accident on gas fields.

P.S. Shouldn't this have gone in terraforming sub-forum?

Last edited by Impaler (2015-01-21 21:19:55)

Void · 2015-01-22 06:56:08

Impaler asked:

Shouldn't this have gone in terraforming sub-forum?

Actually, I think both, but why be redundant.

I have been pushing the lake thing for quite a time. It may or may not be a contributing following method for settlement.

It is almost certain that built goods transported from Earth would constitute the bulk of the habitat for humans. After that other solutions could be considered such as Lava Tubes, and yes melted ground ice to contribute to habitat and life support. As habitation might move to higher latitudes taking advantage of ice bodies and converting them into melted reservoirs could be an option. That would be a form of "Local" pseudo terraformation. the soil and rock at the bottom of such a reservoir would experience a partially terraformed environment, but it would only be inclusive to small portions of Mars, and would most likely be paid for by providing life support to humans. Any planetary terraformation would be an afterthought, the utilization of excess resources if any.

As the method was scaled up, it could perhaps involve 25% of the surface of Mars. To upgrade the rest of Mars would require massive atmospheric manipulation. The release of Hydrocarbons could be a part of that, but more likely the heavy lifting for that would be done with supergreenhouse gasses.

I did include reservoirs, but you will note that I actually am interested also in O2 & CO in the atmosphere, which can be done without reservoirs. With the machine you presented.

However where the lakes can really become involved with life support is this:
-Solar concentrating mirrors heat a fluid. Perhaps Water/Steam, but there are other options.
-It is not precluded that that steam flow could generate electricity.
-The heat sink for that would be the bottom water of a reservoir.
-Heat could accumulate in the bottom of such a reservoir all summer.
-In the winter climate later, that heat could be used to generate electricity again, venting the heat to the universe through radiators. At that particular time it would be very advantageous to use the electricity and native cold to process atmosphere. Trying to extract O2, CO, N2, Argon, etc.

As desired those gasses could be dissolved into the reservoir waters for future use, and in the case of O2 and CO, perhaps to promote microbial life. Or the O2 and CO could go to the machine you presented.

Problems with the idea:
-Availability of water.
-Protection of the surface ice of the reservoir from evaporation.

In any first small installations, protection of the ice would have to be mechanical. A layer of regolith over it might work at high latitudes.

If someone were terraforming the atmosphere of Mars in a manner that increased the air pressure, then that could reduce the amount of mechanical covering required on the ice of a reservoir.

On the other hand, if you are placing 20 degree Centigrade over a surface that may outgas as it is heated, then your reservoir may contribute to terraforming.

Typical terraforming plans expect to wait very long times for the ground to be warmed up. This would transfer heat into the ground much faster than that.

The two are tied together.

However, my primary angle is life support. A contribution to terraformation is a potential secondary consequence.

I prefer "Pay as you go plans". Life support.

Actually if you did not with intent terraform Mars, but just kept adding humans, when their numbers got large enough, the byproducts of their metabolism would eventually terraform Mars. So putting humans on Mars in large numbers and prospering them is terraforming Mars.

Last edited by Void (2015-01-22 07:14:58)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-08-26 05:18:54

On the rocks: the microbiology of Antarctic Dry Valley soils

https://www.nature.com/articles/nrmicro2281

At times interesting stuff pops up in regards to biology and space in dot edu sites or university and college press
Some online journals articles

Cambridge Home
Journals
articles
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals … /firstview

Bacteria That Synthesize Nano-sized Compasses to Navigate Using Earth's Geomagnetic Field

https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowled … -15669190/

A microbial driver of clay mineral weathering and bioavailable Fe source under low-temperature conditions

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10 … 80078/full

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-11 09:34:16

Underground microbes may have swarmed ancient Mars, new study suggests
https://apnews.com/article/astronomy-sc … e7cb50b59a

Thiophenes on Mars: Biotic or Abiotic Origin?

https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10. … .2019.2139

The question whether organic compounds occur on Mars remained unanswered for decades. However, the recent discovery of various classes of organic matter in martian sediments by the Curiosity rover seems to strongly suggest that indigenous organic compounds exist on Mars. One intriguing group of detected organic compounds were thiophenes, which typically occur on Earth in kerogen, coal, and crude oil as well as in stromatolites and microfossils. Here we provide a brief synopsis of conceivable pathways for the generation and degradation of thiophenes on Mars. We show that the origin of thiophene derivatives can either be biotic or abiotic, for example, through sulfur incorporation in organic matter during early diagenesis. The potential of thiophenes to represent martian biomarkers is discussed as well as a correlation between abundances of thiophenes and sulfate-bearing minerals. Finally, this study provides suggestions for future investigations on Mars and in Earth-based laboratories to answer the question whether the martian thiophenes are of biological origin.

The first detection of organic compounds on Mars was done by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) on the Viking landers, which revealed the presence of chloromethane and dichloromethane. At that time, this detection was interpreted as terrestrial contamination, but it is now realized that it derived most likely from the reaction of indigenous martian organic compounds with perchlorate

another newmars forum discussion

'Earth bacteria could thrive in briny water on Mars'
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=8307

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-10-11 09:39:00)

Void · 2022-10-11 20:00:12

This post is from: "Index» Water on Mars» Liquid water confirmed on Mars", #25

This is new to me..........
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=NA … M%3DHDRSC3
Quote:
NASA Reveals MAJOR NEW Discovery On Mars!
YouTube · 3,000+ views · 6 hr ago · by The Space Race
It sounds fairly real, strangely enough.
They think geothermal heat, I also speculate ground currents.
For instance, the Solar wind creates a Proton Aurora. Also, the dust storms and dust devils have electric properties.
A liquid solution including water can be conductive, particularly if it has salt/ions.
But it seems that we are looking for how a liquid could exist, they seem to think a liquid does exist.
Done

So, is the liquid water really there, and is it habitable?

Does it feed through aquifers that feed ice volcano's, is that a possible source of some of the ice slabs? Is it possibly the source of water in the Marriner rift valley?

A lot of long shots, but if any are true then look for life there.

Done.

Last edited by Void (2022-10-11 20:06:10)

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#1 2015-01-21 08:55:41

Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#2 2015-01-21 08:57:41

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#3 2015-01-21 09:11:26

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#4 2015-01-21 21:06:28

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#5 2015-01-22 06:56:08

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#6 2022-08-26 05:18:54

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#7 2022-10-11 09:34:16

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

#8 2022-10-11 20:00:12

Re: Life support from Abiotic and Biotic factors together.

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