Curiosity Mars Rover
Jay B. Harlow
Posts: 79
I love this guy! It's huge!
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?collection_id=18895&media_id=105929071
I love the new landing system.
Jay
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?collection_id=18895&media_id=105929071
I love the new landing system.
Jay
Comments
The Viking's landed using rocket desents as well... except they wern't lowered to the surface. This landing system was selected so that the rockets from the landing didn't spoil the landing area. In fact, when the crane drops off the lander, it will fly a safe distance away before crashing down.
Bill
-Phil
See this video of how it landed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZqT15DoVmM&feature=player_embedded#at=259
The only difference is that instead of it touching down, it'll hover several feet above the ground and lower the rover down. Once the rover detects wheels down, it'll fire off pyro charges to blow away the bolts holding the cables in place.
Bill
Lots of things moving really fast happens very quickly to safely drop Curiosity safely on the surface of Mars; They've had a number of successes and a handful of spectacular failures. Hard to believe it'll be almost a year before it lands...
Jay
I would work there for food...
I bet if they told you to bring a packed lunch, and to 'bring enough for the rest of us', you'd he happy to work there, anyway...
Me?
I'd be asking what they want on their sanwiches...
The JPL is the Shangri-la/Xanadu/Nirvana for geeks everywhere.
In the Spirit of Opportunity, I say, "Go, Curiosity, along with all your mechanical brethren to follow!" We can take just as much pride in these radiation-hardened explorers of our own creation as we can by sending a hard-to-maintain bag of muscle and bone to do the same job at far greater expense.
-Phil
I agree rovers et al for now...
This weekend I was contemplating Curiosity or larger (mini van to RV) rover that had smaller rovers or quad copter reconnaissance drones which could fly over check out a rock rather then making the larger & slower main rover investigate. Sort of a divide and conquer...
Jay
-Phil
JK, I love Brits, PicAxes & pints of Guiness too, Leon!
Sure, we can send robots there, but at what cost?
And they're SMALL!
Now, imagine sending a couple of TONS of equipment?
Or food and other supplies for a group of colonists?
Anyone mentioning 'hydroponics', 'closed systems' and 'recycling' is in for a nasty surprise.
I don't care what has been 'proved' in assorted 'eden' type experiments with enclosed environments.
Plants = energy storage, yes... Unfortunately, a lot of that energy is derived from sunlight.
It takes a lot of light to run a hydro farm for 50 or more colonists.
(50 really is a minimum number for a startup colony that might be left 'incommunicado' for large periods of time. A multiple-generation colony really need to beging with 500 unrelated people for genetic diversity)
There's been all kinds of talk aout 'generation ships' or even 'in vitro' colonists for colonies in other starsystems.
Except... I thought slavery was abolished...
Until we get much more efficient orbital cargo lifting, and faster spacecraft, there's no way we can start colonising anything.
We can't even build a proper orbital facility yet.
(No the ISS isn't a 'proper orbital facility')
With 'proper' I mean something that can be lived in for years by anyone(read = needs some sort of gravity to stop muscle and bone problems), have cargo facilities and can accept multiple visiting ships at the same time.
It should probably be a bit higher up, too, so that it doesn't drag through Earths upper atmosphere, either.
Lifting may be acheived with a space elevator, as we are slowly developing the tools and materials needed.
(Carbon nanotubes for one)
Spacecraft propulsion, though, is a bit more iffy.
Solar sails have some potential for long-range 'out of the solar system' trips, but it's incredibly vulnerable to even the smallest speck of dirt.
Ion thrusters... Marvellous tech... Can run 'almost forever' but with such a low impulse it takes an ice age or two to reach max speed. (It also needs reaction mass, though only a fifth or so of conventional thrusters?)
The biggest reason we have right now for colonising other planets is the 'giant meteor strike' scenario; that aa falling rock will destroy civilisation on Earth. Some schmucks seems to think that the people on Mars, the Moon or wherever is then going to come back and rebuild everything. Or at least keep the memory of Earth alive...
And frankly, no... For any kind of 'organised rebuild' it would take thousands upon thousands of dedicated workers. And they'd probably need weapons to protect themselves from desperate surivors who wants to raid their supplies.
If we can move that many people into space and to a colony, the odds are we're also able to spot and remove all threats like that.
Nuclear war, deadly virus scenarios?
My guess is that they'd all vote to 'leave that poisonous ball of dirt well alone' instead of coming to help clean up the mess.
It has advantages with less gravity and currently it has no light pollution so telescopes will do well, as long as everything is protected from seasonal dust storms. It's good to send out our precursor exploratory robots to gain knowledge and understanding, set the pace, do the scouting, but the final journey is made by humans in the spirit of the grand exploration that is embedded in our souls and blood.
There was a time when people believed if you sailed too far off into the ocean abyss, you would fall off the flat Earth. But brave explorers ventured forth and founded new land which was colonized where we live today. The journey was not without challenges. Mars will be a great journey of exploration and colonization, a true verification of our ability overcome challenges, to paradigm shift and evolve ourselves and our science to where the rewards are the greatest.
I wouldn't worry too much about life on earth ending, my credit card company keeps telling me that the world will end in 90 days if they don't hear from me.
There's an oldd adage to remember:
There's lies,
there's d@mn lies,
and there's statistics...
A 'young' solar system will have more impacts, but as time goes by it 'cleans out' as the rocks drifting around impacts large bodies(planets mostly), therefore it's not that surprising that we haven't been hit that hard the last few million years...
Also, that rock doesn't necessarily 'destroy all life'. Sure, the one 65million years ago pretty much took care of the dinosaurs, but msot plant life and smaller animals survived just fine. And while it would cause chaos on Earth today, it probably wouldn't wipe out humanity.
(It would be tough going, but some would survive. Civilisation, though, would take a real nasty hit)
Low gravity isn't always an advantage, especially when your skeletal structure and circulatory system is optimised for 1G.
-Tor
Yes, a lot of 'easily accessible' ores have been removed from the ground, but...
You can now find them in their 'refined' form on top of the surface...
There's enough metals accessible almost anywhere for a large group of survivors to 'restart' civilisation.
The 'bump' won't be before they run out of recyclables nearby and have to either start digging for ores or spread out to scavenge other sites.
Also, civilisation isn't defined by the level of their metallurgical sciences.
Metal is an 'enabler' for a lot of technology, but not an absolute requirement for civilisation.
(Feel free to borrow a time machine and take a trip back to the inuits acouple of hundred years ago)
Mostly, a civilisation can be defined by 3 attributes; history, cohesion and purpose.
(My opinion. Feel free to disagree, or come up with a better list)
There's hundreds of thousands and millions of these rogue rocks in the asteroid belt just waiting for tens of thousands of years, and now and then one breaks lose in the orbit and gets swung around Jupiter (see the history of Jupiter to learn about the number of strikes that readily occur on this gas giant). That solar orbit and the proximity of Jupiter can modify the asteroid's orbit causing it to hit Earth. Lucky for us, most monster rogues are captured by Jupiter but now and then a few get through to Earth, and those are the 35 million year mongers.
There's several of these big hits on Jupiter reported in the J.A.L.P.O. for both Jupiter and the Moon. As the Moon lacks atmosphere, it gets bombarded by even smaller rocks that still form large enough to be seen craters and impact results. See the Lunar Transient Phenomenon program by the A.L.P.O.
http://alpo-astronomy.org/index.htm
I find the technology to go to Mars quite entertaining. But having read quite a bit of science fiction about the development of colonies on the moon, withing our solar system, and throughout the galaxy; I find that I presonally am pretty much stuck here on the ground until I find a pretzel to choke on as I am just too old and too early in the timeline.
Don't worry, be happy. Enjoy the life you have and let the insurance companies worry about statistics.
Science fiction has shown us many great things, and many of those things have come true (see the thread about the tricorder by prof_braino and the post about Star Trek). I'm happy to have seen men walk the Moon, the shuttle program, space station, space telescope, probes to all the planets (pluto excepted), computers, cell phones, 3D TV, walking humanoids, antimatter, black holes, climate control, spacecraft to land on asteroids and visit comets, mega-projects, the resolution of Quarks, satellites, GPS, the edge of the Universe, the world's largest telescope, proof of time travel, medical breakthroughs, and internet, all become reality. Consider the potential of what will materialize in the next ten. We're not too old or too early in the timeline - it's the best time to be alive at the prime of these events and to see the best of everything take off!
It's a overdesigned mess!
(The USAF requirement of it being able to reach a polar orbit for eample, meant that it had to be much more powerful, and therefore also heavier, and cost a lot more to launch. How many times did it actually USE that ability? and wouldn't it have been cheaper to use rockets to launch the payload then?)
As for the statistics of asteroids or other rocks dropping on us, it's strange that it has been so regular.
Such regularity would usually mean that there's an outside force causing them to be pushed from their normal orbit. And if the last time it happened was 65 million years ago, instead of 35, does that mean we 'skipped' a cycle? and that the next rock is due in 5million years?
Or that the reason for the rocks have disappeared?
(Random is math-speak for 'we can't figure out the formula and starting conditions', not 'there's no reason for it to happen')
Just rambling...
You'd be surprised how much you can learn from Hollywood.
Two independent movies, "2012" and "Deep Impact" both confirm that simply getting to high ground will save your life when asteroids hit, oceans rise and the earth crumbles. In 2012, you had to be on the top of Mt. Everest. Better safe than sorry.
There certainly is a place for fiction in the creativity of humankind, but statistical paranoia is not very helpful. Neither is Bruce Willis saving the world -- ask Demi Moore.
There is a random nature to some of these asteroids. As we travel through space, an asteroid can end up captured and flung about into a new direction, i.e. it need not originate from the Kuiper belt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuiper_belt
The largest mass planets and the sun have the greatest influence on these objects. Some astronomical papers have stated Jupiter has "saved the Earth" on numerous occasions as it pulls in heavy mass objects.
As for the timing of the next large incoming, it's overdue, and that's one reason for escalating interest in finding ways to avert one before it strikes the Earth.
It only takes a small change in angular direction when the object is far away to avert it as opposed to a massive change when the object is near. So orbital mechanics tracking when the objects are still far away is very important.
-Phil
It does have lots of water, and a CO2 atmosphere, but it is a VERY thin atmosphere with winds approaching 300 mph frequently... but the atmosphere is so thin that these 300 mph winds might actually have trouble blowing a tin can around. Plants like CO2, but they like it under some pressure. Wind turbines also need a sufficient mass of air to actually turn them. Colonizing Mars would take quite a while, starting with literally black-dusting the whole planet (carbon microparticles) to darken, and warm it, which would melt the water, release more water vapor and start the greenhouse cycle in earnest. It would take many years, but it would be a prime job for robotic craft. Then we could bring in the plants that thrive in the harshest alpine conditions, and give them a decade or so to take hold. Realistically, if we started today, it would take us 50 years before we could walk on Mars without pressure suits and O2. Even then, we'd still need supplemental O2.
All that aside, everything else you said is absolutely true. We humans are explorers, and without frontiers and challenges, we wither away. Only in the last century has humanity expanded to every corner of the globe, with every square inch mapped and claimed. Our frontiers on Earth are dwindling... basically the oceans, of which we know pathetically little, are the last true frontiers on Earth. But the vastness of space, and the call of the unknown possibilities for life - the limitless distance that will yield new discoveries for eternity, an endless frontier of mystery... THAT just stirs the soul to action and feeds our very core. So yes, robots, for now. But eventually, we will crawl over the bars of our cradle and walk into places we can only imagine now. I hope we all get to see it in our lifetimes.
Dave
Not much to stop a sunstorm from destroying unprotected electronics...
(Or cooking colonists out on the surface)
Assuming the strikes occur at truly random times. Then there is no such thing as "overdue".
The flip of a coin coming up heads is 50/50 regardless of how it has come up in the past.
If you flip a coin 9 times and just happens to come up heads each time, what are the chances that it will come up heads the 10th time ? Still 50/50.
If a big strike happens (on average) every 35 million years, then the chance of it happening in ANY given year is 1/35_000_000. It doesn't matter if we have gone 35 million years without a strike, 350 million years without a strike or 10 years without a strike. The chance is the same each year.
This commonly called the "Gambler's Fallacy". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambler%27s_fallacy
P.S. Great discussion by the way...
Bean