Going to Mars is a major step in space exploration. It’s not a quick jaunt nor will it be easy to accomplish. The trip is already in the planning stages, and there’s a good chance it’ll happen in the next decade or so. That’s why NASA and other agencies have detailed mission scenarios in place, starting with trips to the Moon. Recently, NASA updated its “Moon to Mars Architecture” documents, including a closer look at some key decisions about Mars exploration.
Continue reading “NASA Gives us an Update on its Long-term Plans for the Moon and Mars”Ingenuity Suffers Rotor Damage, Ending the Mission
There have been numerous robotic space missions reach the end of their operating life over the years and for a multitude of reasons. Be they catastrophic failure or a scheduled end but I must say one that has recently made me a little sad is the demise of the Ingenuity helicopter on Mars. It sustained damage after its recent flight and can now no longer fly. In a mission that was supposed to complete five flights in 30 days, the plucky little helicopter completed 72 flights over three years!
Continue reading “Ingenuity Suffers Rotor Damage, Ending the Mission”NASA 2024 NIAC Program Selects Deep-Space Hibernation Technology for Development
In the next fifteen years, NASA, China, and SpaceX will make the next great leap in space exploration by sending the first crewed missions to Mars. This presents many challenges, not the least of which is distance. Even when they are closest to each other in their orbits (aka. when Mars is in Opposition), Mars can still be up to 55 million km (34 million mi) from Earth. Using conventional propulsion (chemical rockets), a one-way transit can last six to nine months, which works out to a total mission time (including surface operations) of about three years.
That’s a very long time for people to be in microgravity, not to mention exposed to solar and cosmic radiation. To address this, NASA is investigating advanced propulsion methods that will reduce transit times and hibernation technologies that will allow crews to sleep through most of their voyage. This year, the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program selected the Studying Torpor in Animals for Space-health in Humans (STASH) experiment, a new method for inducing torpor developed by Ryan Sprenger and colleagues at the California-based biotechnology firm Fauna Bio Inc.
Continue reading “NASA 2024 NIAC Program Selects Deep-Space Hibernation Technology for Development”Why Mars Died
We know of Mars as the Red Planet, for its surface and atmosphere is caked in endless swirling dust of rusted iron, the rusting action provided by the always-eager oxygen. But this was not always so.
Continue reading “Why Mars Died”NASA Lost Contact With its Ingenuity Helicopter Briefly, but it's Back
Imagine remotely flying a drone or small aircraft from a great distance and loosing contact with it during flight. You’d likely assume the worst, that your aircraft was probably laying in a crashed heap in some remote location.
That’s what engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory went through with the beloved Ingenuity helicopter on Mars, millions of miles away. During a recent quick pop-up flight that was supposed to last just 32 seconds, Ingenuity lost communications before it touched back down. The engineers back on Earth had no idea if the little helicopter landed safely or not.
Continue reading “NASA Lost Contact With its Ingenuity Helicopter Briefly, but it's Back”Future Mars Helicopters Could Explore Lava Tubes
The exploration of Mars continues, with many nations sending robotic missions to search for evidence of past life and learn more about the evolution of the planet’s geology and climate. As of the penning of the article, there are ten missions exploring the Red Planet, a combination of orbiters, landers, rovers, and one helicopter (Ingenuity). Looking to the future, NASA and other space agencies are eyeing concepts that will allow them to explore farther into the Red Planet, including previously inaccessible places. In particular, there is considerable interest in exploring the stable lava tubes that run beneath the Martian surface.
These tubes may be a treasure trove of scientific discoveries, containing water ice, organic molecules, and maybe even life! Even crewed mission proposals recommend establishing habitats within these tubes, where astronauts would be sheltered from radiation, dust storms, and the extreme conditions on the surface. In a recent study from the University Politehnica Bucuresti (UPB), a team of engineers described how an autonomous Martian Inspection Drone (MID) inspired by the Inginuity helicopter could locate, enter, and study these lava tubes in detail.
Continue reading “Future Mars Helicopters Could Explore Lava Tubes”The Ice Sheet on Mars is Even Thicker Than Previously Believed
Maybe Mars isn’t as dry as we thought. ESA’s Mars Express has revealed new details about a region near Mars’ equator that could contain a massive deposit of water ice several kilometers deep. If it is indeed ice, there is enough of it in this one deposit that if melted, water would cover the entire planet up to 2.7 meters (almost 9 feet) deep.
But ice is just one explanation for the unusual features detected by the orbital spacecraft. Another is that this is a giant pile of dust several kilometers deep — although the dust would still need to have some ice mixed in.
Continue reading “The Ice Sheet on Mars is Even Thicker Than Previously Believed”A Biocatalytic Reactor for Detoxifying Water on Mars!
Mars is the next frontier of human space exploration, with NASA, China, and SpaceX all planning to send crewed missions there in the coming decades. In each case, the plans consist of establishing habitats on the surface that will enable return missions, cutting-edge research, and maybe even permanent settlements someday. While the idea of putting boots on Martian soil is exciting, a slew of challenges need to be addressed well in advance. Not the least of which is the need to locate sources of water, which consist largely of subsurface deposits of water ice.
Herein lies another major challenge: Martian ice deposits are contaminated by toxic perchlorates, potent oxidizers that cause equipment corrosion and are hazardous to human health (even at low concentrations). To this end, crewed missions must bring special equipment to remove perchlorates from water on Mars if they intend to use it for drinking, irrigation, and manufacturing propellant. This is the purpose of Detoxifying Mars, a proposed concept selected by the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program for Phase I development.
Continue reading “A Biocatalytic Reactor for Detoxifying Water on Mars!”Early Mars Climate was Complex, with Streams Flowing Intermittently for Millions of Years
There’s overwhelming evidence that Mars was once wet and warm. Rivers flowed across its surface and carved intricate channel systems revealed by our orbiters. Expansive oceans even larger than Earth’s may have covered a third of its surface. Then something happened: Mars lost its atmosphere, cooled down, and surface water disappeared.
Continue reading “Early Mars Climate was Complex, with Streams Flowing Intermittently for Millions of Years”Machine Learning Could Find all the Martian Caves We Could Ever Want
The surface of Mars is hostile and unforgiving. But put a few meters of regolith between you and the Martian sky, and the place becomes a little more habitable. Cave entrances from collapsed lava tubes could be some of the most interesting places to explore on Mars, since not only would they provide shelter for future human explorers, but they could also be a great place to find biosignatures of microbial life on Mars.
But cave entrances are difficult to spot, especially from orbit, as they blend in with the dusty background. A new machine learning algorithm has been developed to quickly scan images of the Martian surface, searching for potential cave entrances.
Continue reading “Machine Learning Could Find all the Martian Caves We Could Ever Want”