Predicting Weather on Mars
An artist's rendering of a Mars Exploration Rover on the surface of Mars. (Photo courtesy NASA)
Is there such a thing as “weather” on Mars? There are some doubts, considering the planet’s atmosphere is only 1 percent as dense as that of the Earth. Mars, however, definitely has clouds, drastically low temperatures and out-of-this-world dust storms, and Istvan Szunyogh, a Texas A&M professor of atmospheric sciences, has been awarded a NASA grant to analyze and forecast Martian weather.
Mars is the most Earth-like planet we know, but it is still quite different. For example, it is much colder on Mars.
The south pole of the Earth is covered by water ice, but the south pole of Mars wears a dry ice (frozen carbon dioxide) cap. In winter, the temperature at the poles can dip to -140°C (-220 degrees Fahrenheit), which is so cold that even carbon dioxide freezes. (more…)
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Exploring the Final Frontier: Disease Proposed as Major Barrier to Mars and Beyond
The Hamilton-Sundstrand advanced space exploration concept suit equipped with a Xybernaut MA IV wearable computer and a wireless radio networking system developed Dr Steve Braham at Simon Fraser University. (NASA Haughton-Mars Project / Pascal Lee / Mars-like color enhancement)
A new report appearing in The Journal of Leukocyte Biology (http://www.jleukbio.org) argues that human missions to Mars, as well as all other long-term space flights might be compromised by microbial hitchhikers, such as bacteria. That’s because long-term space travel packs a one-two punch to astronauts: first it appears to weaken their immune systems; and second, it increases the virulence and growth of microbes. This combination of factors makes it vital for scientists to find tools that can help people cope with these microscopic hitchhikers before they lead to disease, especially since astronauts will not have the ability to return home to a hospital.
“When people think of space travel, often the vast distances are what come to mind first,” said Jean-Pol Frippiat, one of the report’s co-authors from Nancy-University in France, “but even after we figure out a way to cover these distances in a reasonable amount of time, we still need to figure out how astronauts are going to overcome disease and sickness.” (more…)
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New Concept May Enhance Earth-Mars Communication
An artist's impression of Mars Express. The spacecraft left Earth for Mars on 2 June 2003. It reached its destination after a six-month journey, and has been investigating the planet since early 2004. (ESA - D. Ducros)
Direct communication between Earth and Mars can be strongly disturbed and even blocked by the Sun for weeks at a time, cutting off any future human mission to the Red Planet. An ESA engineer working with engineers in the UK may have found a solution using a new type of orbit combined with continuous-thrust ion propulsion.
The European researchers studied a possible solution to a crucial problem affecting future human missions to Mars: how to ensure reliable radio communication even when Mars and Earth line up at opposite sides of the Sun, which then blocks any signal between mission controllers on Earth and astronauts on the red surface. The natural alignment, known as a conjunction, happens approximately every 780 days, and would seriously degrade and even block transmission of voice, data and video signals.
The research findings were released this week at the 60th International Astronautical Congress (IAC), the world’s biggest space event, being held in Daejeon, South Korea. This new solution is one result of a €100 000 study funded by ESA’s General Studies Programme to catalogue non-traditional orbital zones throughout the Solar System that could be exploited thanks to emerging propulsion technologies. (more…)
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Laser Technique Has Implications for Detecting Microbial Life Forms in Martian Ice
Michael Storrie-Lombardi, PhD, at the Kinohi Institute.
An innovative technique called L.I.F.E. imaging used successfully to detect bacteria in frozen Antarctic lakes could have exciting implications for demonstrating signs of life in the polar regions of Mars, according to an article published in the current issue of Astrobiology, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. The article is available free online at www.liebertpub.com/ast
Michael Storrie-Lombardi, PhD, from Kinohi Institute (Pasadena, CA), and Birgit Sattler, PhD, from the University of Innsbruck, Austria, used laser-induced fluorescence emission (L.I.F.E.) imaging to detect red and infrared fluorescence activity produced by cyanobacteria present in the ice of frozen Antarctic lakes. This noninvasive technique does not destroy individual target organisms or disrupt the structure of microbial communities or the surrounding ice matrix. The authors’ work, described in the article “Laser-Induced Fluorescence Emission (L.I.F.E.): In Situ Nondestructive Detection of Microbial Life in the Ice Covers of Antarctic Lakes” was conducted as part of the 2008 Tawani International Expedition to Schirmacher Oasis and Lake Untersee in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. (more…)
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Mars, Methane and Mysteries
Artist's impression of Mars Express. (Alex Lutkus)
Mars may not be as dormant as scientists once thought. The 2004 discovery of methane means that either there is life on Mars, or that volcanic activity continues to generate heat below the martian surface. ESA plans to find out which it is. Either outcome is big news for a planet once thought to be biologically and geologically inactive.
The methane mystery started soon after December 2003, when ESA’s Mars Express arrived in orbit around the red planet. As the Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS) began taking data, Vittorio Formisano, Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario CNR, Rome, and the rest of the instrument team saw a puzzling signal. As well as the atmospheric gases they were anticipating, such as carbon monoxide and water vapour, they also saw methane. (more…)
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105-Day Mars Simulation: U.S. Studies Focus on Improving Work Performance
This is an image of the inside of the Institute for Biomedical Problems' isolation facility in Moscow. (Photo Courtesy of the European Space Agency.)
From March 31 to July 14, a six-man international crew called an isolation chamber in Moscow their home. The crew, composed of four Russians and two Europeans, simulated a 105-day Mars mission full of experiments and realistic mission scenarios, including emergency situations and 20-minute communications delays.
U.S. participation in the mission consisted of three research teams with experiments evaluating solutions to conditions that impact work performance. The projects evaluated lighting interventions to counter sleep disruption due to shift work or long hours, tested two objective methods of measuring the impact of stress and fatigue on performance, and assessed interactions between crew members and mission control. The three projects were funded by the Houston-based National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI). (more…)
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Many Characteristics of Mars, Including Ice, Are Similar to Earth, Paper Says
Mars gets as far as 250 million miles away, but many parts of it closely resemble places on Earth, including its landscape, history of water, soil and even its weather, says a Texas A&M University researcher in the current issue of Science magazine.
Mark Lemmon, a professor of atmospheric sciences who has been involved with Mars missions for years.
, says last year’s Phoenix Mars Lander mission keeps revealing secrets about the planet, answering some questions but raising other big ones. He is one of several authors detailing the Phoenix discoveries.
“Phoenix landed in a place that has access to Martian ice, which is exciting by itself,” Lemmon says of the Mars probe, which landed May 25, 2008. The mission goals were to investigate the suitability of Mars for past or present life, but Phoenix was incapable of detecting life itself. (more…)
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New Instrument to Detect Water Deep Underground on Mars
These images show the concept for a flight version of the Mars Time Domain Electromagnetic Sounder (MTDEM), which uses induction to detect groundwater up to 5 km deep. (SwRI and Ball Aerospace.)
With the whoosh of compressed gas and the whir of unspooling wire, a team of Boulder scientists and engineers tested a new instrument prototype that might be used to detect groundwater deep inside Mars.
The Mars Time Domain Electromagnetic Sounder (MTDEM) uses induction to generate electrical currents in the ground, whose secondary magnetic fields are in turn detected at the planetary surface. In this way, the electrical conductivity of the subsurface can be reconstructed.
“Groundwater that has been out of atmospheric circulation for eons will be very salty,” says the project’s principal investigator Dr. Robert Grimm, a director in the Space Science and Engineering Division at Southwest Research Institute. “It is a near-ideal exploration target for inductive systems.”
The inductive principle of the MTDEM is distinct from the wavelike, surface-penetrating radars MARSIS and SHARAD presently orbiting Mars. “The radars have been very useful in imaging through ice and through very dry, low-density rock,” says Grimm, “but they have not lived up to expectations to look through solid rock and find water.” (more…)
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Definitive Evidence for Ancient Lake on Mars
This is reconstructed landscape showing the Shalbatana lake on Mars as it may have looked roughly 3.4 billion years ago. Data used in reconstruction are from NASA and the European Space Agency. (G. Di Achille, University of Colorado)
A University of Colorado at Boulder research team has discovered the first definitive evidence of shorelines on Mars, an indication of a deep, ancient lake there and a finding with implications for the discovery of past life on the Red Planet.
Estimated to be more than 3 billion years old, the lake appears to have covered as much as 80 square miles and was up to 1,500 feet deep — roughly the equivalent of Lake Champlain bordering the United States and Canada, said CU-Boulder Research Associate Gaetano Di Achille, who led the study. The shoreline evidence, found along a broad delta, included a series of alternating ridges and troughs thought to be surviving remnants of beach deposits.
“This is the first unambiguous evidence of shorelines on the surface of Mars,” said Di Achille. “The identification of the shorelines and accompanying geological evidence allows us to calculate the size and volume of the lake, which appears to have formed about 3.4 billion years ago.” (more…)
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Protecting Mars from Earth Bugs
Testing of next generation rovers onboard the Arctic Mars Analogue Svalbard Expedition. This "Cliffbot" rover is being designed to sample rock outcrops on Mars and the Moon where scientifically relevant samples are easier to access. (Photo courtesy of Kvell Ove Storvik, Arctic Mars Analog Svalbard Expedition.)
Scientists have developed a new cleaning protocol for space hardware, such as the scoops of Mars rovers, which could be used on future “Search for Life” missions on other planets.
The new protocol was developed as part of a project to investigate life that exists in extreme Arctic environments, which are the closest analogue we have on Earth to the surface of Mars. The studies are also designed to help guide future NASA and ESA planetary missions.
Published today in the journal Astrobiology, the decontamination protocol was developed and tested by scientists at the University of Leeds and NASA. It deals with the dilemma known as ‘forward contamination’ - ensuring that bugs from Earth don’t hitch a ride across space and jeopardise the integrity of samples collected by rovers.
The decontamination protocol involves a cocktail of chemicals that were applied and tested on various sampling devices, including a glacial ice core drill and a rover scoop. (more…)
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Public Suggests Mars Photo Locations
Users click on a segment of Mars Odyssey's ground track to suggest an area of Mars to photograph using ASU's THEMIS multiband camera.
Arizona State University researchers and scientists have created two new features for Google Earth 5.0, the popular online application that lets users tour Earth, the starry sky, and the Red Planet Mars.
The first of the new features lets anyone, anywhere, recommend places on Mars to photograph with ASU’s THEMIS camera on NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter. The second new feature shows the most recent infrared images of Mars sent back to Earth from the THEMIS camera. (more…)
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Possibility of Finding Life on Present-Day Mars Increases
This image, taken by the Surface Stereo Imager of NASA's Phoenix Lander, shows Martian soil piled on top of the spacecraft's deck and some of its instruments. Data from the Phoenix Lander shows that salts formed from perchlorates discovered there have the potential to be found in liquid form under the conditions on present-day Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Max Planck Institute)
Researchers at the University of Arkansas have shown that salts formed from perchlorates discovered at the Phoenix landing site have the potential to be found in liquid solution under the temperature and pressure conditions on present-day Mars.
Research professor Vincent F. Chevrier and graduate students Jennifer Hanley and Travis S. Altheide report their findings in the current issue of Geophysical Research Letters. Their work provides the first demonstration of a potential stable liquid on present-day Mars in the immediate environment of the lander.
“Under real, observed Martian conditions, you can have a stable liquid,” said Chevrier.
The researchers studied the properties of sodium and magnesium perchlorates, salts detected by the Phoenix lander, under the temperature, pressure and humidity conditions found at the landing site. The discovery of perchlorates on Mars by the Phoenix mission surprised scientists – the compounds are rare on Earth, found mostly in extremely arid environments such as the Atacama Desert in Chile. (more…)
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Mars Explorer Says We’ll Find Life on Other Planets within 10 Years
By Tracey Bryant
Peter Smith, principal investigator of NASA's Phoenix Mars Mission, shows images of Mars during his talk at the University of Delaware. (Photo by Kathy F. Atkinson/University of Delaware)
Within 10 years, we’ll find life outside Earth — that’s the prediction of Peter Smith, the University of Arizona professor who led NASA’s Phoenix Mars Mission.
While Smith is not predicting we’ll encounter the six-legged apes that appeared on Mars in the science fiction books by Edgar Rice Burroughs that captured his imagination as a youngster, he does think we’ll find microscopic organisms there.
And ultimately, whether it happens this century or a thousand years from now, we’re going to be sending humans to the Red Planet, according to Smith.
Smith held the audience spellbound in his lecture, “Journey of the Phoenix,” on April 16 at the University of Delaware, as he shared images taken by the Phoenix Mars Lander, which touched down in the Martian arctic on May 25, 2008.
The mission was a collaboration of numerous agencies and academic institutions, including the University of Arizona’s Science Operations Center, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver, along with scientific institutes in Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, and Switzerland. (more…)
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Gullies on Mars Show Tantalizing Signs of Recent Water Activity
The gully system in the Promethei Terra region of Mars appears to have been carved by melt water and may be the most recent period when water was active on the planet. (NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)
Planetary geologists at Brown University have found a gully fan system on Mars that formed about 1.25 million years ago. The fan offers compelling evidence that it was formed by melt water that originated in nearby snow and ice deposits and may stand as the most recent period when water flowed on the planet.
Gullies are known to be young surface features on Mars. But scientists studying the planet have struggled with locating gullies they can conclusively date. In a paper that appears on the cover of the March issue of Geology, the Brown geologists were able to date the gully system and hypothesize what water was doing there.
The gully system shows four intervals where water-borne sediments were carried down the steep slopes of nearby alcoves and deposited in alluvial fans, said Samuel Schon, a Brown graduate student and the paper’s lead author.
“You never end up with a pond that you can put goldfish in,” Schon said, “but you have transient melt water. You had ice that typically sublimates. But in these instances it melted, transported, and deposited sediment in the fan. It didn’t last long, but it happened.”
The finding comes on the heels of discoveries of water-bearing minerals such as opals and carbonates, the latter of which was announced by Brown graduate student Bethany Ehlmann in a paper in Science in December. Those discoveries build on evidence that Mars was occasionally wet far longer than many had believed, and that the planet may have hosted a warm, wet environment in some places during its long history. (more…)
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Why Robots Get Stuck in the Sand
By studying the physics of movement on granular media, Georgia Tech researchers revealed that robots attempting to move across sandy terrain should move their legs more slowly, especially if the sand is loosely packed.
Today’s advanced mobile robots explore complex terrains across the globe and even on Mars, but have difficulty traversing sand and other granular media like dirt, rubble or slippery piles of leaves.
A new study published February 10 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences takes what may be the first detailed look at the problem of robot locomotion on granular surfaces. Among the study’s recommendations: robots attempting to move across sandy terrain should move their legs more slowly, especially if the sand is loosely packed. (more…)
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Mystery of New Mars Gullies May Be Solved
Gullies with characteristics of water-carved channels have been found on Mars. University of Arkansas researchers have determined a possible way in which such gullies might be formed. (Photo courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech.)
University of Arkansas researchers have used chemistry and geology to create a model that may explain the mystery of how modern-day gullies form on the surface of Mars.
Research professor Vincent F. Chevrier and graduate student Travis S. Altheide of the Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences report their findings in Geophysical Research Letters.
Planetary surveys have found abundant evidence of gullies on Mars, which suggest that at some point liquid has flowed across the planet’s surface. Liquid water cannot exist on the surface of Mars given the current temperatures and pressures, so for many years, scientists theorized that the gullies formed hundreds of thousands of years ago during a change in the angle between the planes of the planet’s equator and its orbit about the sun.
However, the Mars Global Surveyor discovered a gully where none had been three years before, prompting scientists to speculate as to how it formed. Chevrier and Altheide decided to look at the possibility of brine – a concentrated solution of water and salt – as a potential gully carver. Water ice and salts are both found in various locations on the planet. And certain brines have much lower freezing points than water and therefore have the potential to exist in liquid form on Mars. (more…)
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