9 ms·

Journey to Mars: Pioneering Next Steps in Space Exploration [pdf]

127 points by pp19dd 11y ago

awfullyjohn 11y ago
I hope this plan includes the Rich Purnell maneuver.
- gjkood 11y ago
  The book/movie depicts Rich Purnell using some NASA/JPL supercomputers to verify his calculations. Knowing nothing (or less than nothing if thats possible) about Celestial Mechanics, considering that the technique (gravitational assist/slinghsot maneauver???) was used in space probes as early as the 1970s, how much computing power would be needed to do these calculations? I guess the faster the computing resources, the earlier you would get your solutions. But are these calculations that could be done on more run of the mill computing hardware?
  - scigeek42 11y ago
    In the book it describes how the difficulty with the calculation came from the fact that they were continuously firing the spacecraft thrusters (it was some form of drive that used a constant small acceleration). Thus far most all of our probes use short-term bursts to change their velocities. I'm not sure how many ion-engine equipped probes we have that have needed to calculate multiple slingshot manoeuvres. In his interview with Adam Savage the author described how he wound up writing his own custom code to calculate the trajectories of their spacecraft. One could imagine that NASA would need to consider a lot more "real-world" variables than a sci-fi author, so it is somewhat reasonable to think time on a supercomputer could have come in handy.
  - Ankaios 11y ago
    There's no need for a supercomputer. :) Trajectory calculations of that sort are relatively routine, even including the use of ion propulsion, and can be run on a desktop in a reasonable amount of time. (Not to say you can't come up with trajectory calculations that wouldn't benefit from a big cluster, though.) Also, the computer in the movie was Pleiades at NASA Ames.
richmarr 11y ago
This is great & inspiring and all. I just can't help pausing at the apparent tension between "we embark on this journey for all humanity" and "strengthening America’s leadership on Earth and in space". There's certainly nothing wrong with the USA's space agency serving the interests of the USA, and there will (eventually) be technology & economic benefits for other nations too, I just find the language jars.
- MrZongle2 11y ago
  The cynic in me says for you not to worry. In 10 years the United States will (unfortunately) be no closer to landing a man on Mars. The mess that is the Congressional budget process will guarantee it. Much like fusion and AI, an American on Mars always seems about 20-25 years away.
hackuser 11y ago
If you have any interest, I highly recommend reading this. It's not marketing fluff; it has a creative and (seemingly) complete vision and well-thought-through planning, and is clear, concise, and detailed. Maybe someone who follows these issues closely will already know much of it (or maybe not; I have no idea), but it is an education for me and by far the best thing I've read on the subject. For example, the three phases in the title are defined not by physical locations or technological developments, but by dependence on Earth: * Earth Reliant * Proving Ground: R&D in 'cislunar' space * Earth Independent Maybe that's old news to space geeks, but it's new to me and shows an effort to carefully conceive of the mission.
- mediocrejoker 11y ago
  That's what makes it truly exciting to me: it seems like a lot of smart people have been putting serious thought and consideration towards what would/will be required to have a realistic shot at colonizing another planet.
  - stevesearer 11y ago
    The word 'colonize' evokes thoughts of British, Dutch, Portuguese, etc colonization ~500-200 years ago. When thinking of colonizing a new planet, is there any information about who will control the resources of the colony? Will the USA control Martian resources if we get there first or will it be a collaborative effort like the Space Station?
    - clem 11y ago
      At the moment that's something of a moot point. Is there a single resource on Mars that's worth the cost of transporting back to Earth? Until that's the case, it's only going to be the local Martian populace controlling the resources.
    - jerf 11y ago
      Zigging from clem's zag, let me put this another way. There absolutely, positively, beyond a shadow of a doubt will be major political issues that arise from off-planet habitation. But, to be honest, not particularly all that more major than any number of issues that arise on Earth all the time, and we generally muddle through them. It'll be a long time before anyone would have any reason to start a shooting war over an off-planet resource. And science fiction has been predicting the near inevitability that eventually the off-planet colony will demand independence anyhow, a position I see no reason to modify or disagree with, personally. The structural forces in favor of that outcome are just overwhelming.
ohitsdom 11y ago
I'm curious how much cost is added to the flight to Mars if they build a tether/rotating system on the spacecraft to simulate gravity. Seems like too much of a health risk to forgo this and spend years in micro-gravity, although research is limited on the topic (the first two men in a year long study are at ~7 months in space).
- nickff 11y ago
  NASA has unfortunately been neglecting low-gravity (centripetal acceleration) research. The only research I am aware of in this area was conducted by the Soviet Union on mice, and (to the best of my recolection) they found that ~0.3G and relatively low RPM were required to maintain fitness. I agree with you that further work is required on this subject, as it could help future Martians to be healthier and more productive throughout their journey, but it does not seem to jive with NASA's current priorities. NASA has repeatedly rejected proposals for studies and experiments in this area.
  - baobabaobab 11y ago
    NASA actually did a tethered artificial gravity experiment during Gemini with the target docking vehicle. They got it working, although they only spun it up to like .01g.
    - nickff 11y ago
      From what I read, they were never even sure of what the centripetal acceleration (G-force) actually was, because of the uncertainty of the measurements. Either way, I suppose you could call this research, but I have always categorized this as a proof of concept of a potential research method. It should also be noted that NASA has had trouble with tethers in the past, due to vibrations along the wire(s) and orbital mechanics related issues.
- gizmo686 11y ago
  Minor nitpick, in the 1995-1996, Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov spent 437 consecutive days in space.
hackuser 11y ago
Is there a web version of this? It's too bad if all this great information is hidden away in a PDF, which few will bother to open (even on HN, and fewer in the general public) and which I'll probably be unable to find in the future. I found the following website, but my initial impression is that it's lacks a lot of the great material in the PDF: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html http://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html
- mpweiher 11y ago
  Why? I click on the link and it opens in the browser like any other content. Except that it's easier to download.
  - hackuser 11y ago
    > I click on the link and it opens in the browser like any other content That's one thing I'm not doing. IME Firefox's PDF rendering is worse than external applications; it has trouble rendering many more files and the rendering is much harder to read.
- wiz21 11y ago
  >> which I'll probably be unable to find in the future Could you elaborate on this ?
  - hackuser 11y ago
    An untitled URL (i.e., just a filename) is not easily found in my browser history and searches tend to find web pages, which is what most people read and link to. I just did a quick search to find a NASA webpage with a link to this document, and it didn't appear among the top results AFAICT. I didn't spend much time on it, but that's part of my point: It's not easy to find.
    - ItsDeathball 11y ago
      If you search for "journey to mars pdf" it's the top result, with a breakout box and summary. Not sure how much easier that can be.
stevecalifornia 11y ago
Kudos to NASA for improving their communications with the general public. This is exactly the kind of document I want to see-- broad yet appropriately detailed and decorated with wonderful art. I am excited for a future where Mars plays a similar role in science as Antarctica. I hope that my two young daughters have the opportunity to do research on another planet if that's what they want to do.
shostack 11y ago
Is it just me or has NASA really been on point with capitalizing on the PR opportunity surrounding The Martian? - Numerous Reddit frontpage posts/AMA's - Great buzz around discoveries - This plan Not knocking them--NASA needs all the love they can get. I've just become very aware of a much larger NASA presence in my news sources than I'm used to.
- pp19dd 11y ago
  Nah. For me it was this 70 MB photo of Pluto that convinced me that they're not hyping anything, but delivering actual results: http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/crop_p_color2_enhanced_release.png http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/cro... Think I spent half a day staring at that photo, just zooming and panning and wishing I had a bigger screen. Anyhow, they bring up this data bandwidth issue front and center in the PDF. More to my point (if I had one), the probe was launched in 2006 and took 9 years to get there. The 70 MB photo was taken half a year ago and just now managed to get transmitted (surely they had other things queued up and so forth.) I don't think that I've done anything for 9 years, and I would never wait half a year for a page to load, so NASA's convinced me that they can do longevity.
Animats 11y ago
Congress failed to fund the Commercial Crew Program, which would have put astronauts in space on Space-X boosters using the existing Falcon rocket and Dragon capsule. Instead, NASA's pork programs are getting funding. Colonizing Mars is a fantasy. The worst real estate on Earth can support life better than the best real estate on Mars. It would be easier to colonize Antarctica or underwater on a continental shelf than Mars. Send robots to look around, sure. We now know what Mars looks like. Nearly airless, dusty, rocky, maybe some brine or ice. Years of orbiters haven't found anything really exciting that justifies more surface exploration. The US should build a Venus lander that can survive that environment and let us get a good look at Venus. The only surface pictures of Venus are from Soviet spacecraft of the 1970s. It's time for another look.
- pdabbadabba 11y ago
  > Years of orbiters haven't found anything really exciting that justifies more surface exploration. Beyond liquid water, I'm not sure what more you could hope for. Little green men, I guess?
- trhway 11y ago
  >Colonizing Mars is a fantasy. The worst real estate on Earth can support life better than the best real estate on Mars. it obviously didn't cross your mind that the worst life on Mars may be better than best life on Earth [at least for some people, like the ones who died or almost died 100 years ago on the way to North or South poles]
devy 11y ago
Not impressed. Considering Dr. Robert Zubrin's Mars Direct plan and later revised Mars Semi-Direct plan announced in the early 90s even with the space technologies back then. [1][2][3][4] [1]: https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/376589main_04%20-%20Mars%20Direct%20Power%20Point-7-30-09.pdf https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/376589main_04%20-%20Mars%20Direct%2... [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7ZDf5KZGAk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7ZDf5KZGAk [3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcTZvNLL0-w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcTZvNLL0-w
clockworkelf 11y ago
The earth is not a globe and the space program is a lie. 4km laser experiment https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0qR-cQxOqPo https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0qR-cQxOqPo

127 points by pp19dd 11y ago

awfullyjohn 11y ago

I hope this plan includes the Rich Purnell maneuver.

gjkood 11y ago
The book/movie depicts Rich Purnell using some NASA/JPL supercomputers to verify his calculations. Knowing nothing (or less than nothing if thats possible) about Celestial Mechanics, considering that the technique (gravitational assist/slinghsot maneauver???) was used in space probes as early as the 1970s, how much computing power would be needed to do these calculations? I guess the faster the computing resources, the earlier you would get your solutions. But are these calculations that could be done on more run of the mill computing hardware?
- scigeek42 11y ago
  In the book it describes how the difficulty with the calculation came from the fact that they were continuously firing the spacecraft thrusters (it was some form of drive that used a constant small acceleration). Thus far most all of our probes use short-term bursts to change their velocities. I'm not sure how many ion-engine equipped probes we have that have needed to calculate multiple slingshot manoeuvres. In his interview with Adam Savage the author described how he wound up writing his own custom code to calculate the trajectories of their spacecraft. One could imagine that NASA would need to consider a lot more "real-world" variables than a sci-fi author, so it is somewhat reasonable to think time on a supercomputer could have come in handy.
- Ankaios 11y ago
  There's no need for a supercomputer. :) Trajectory calculations of that sort are relatively routine, even including the use of ion propulsion, and can be run on a desktop in a reasonable amount of time. (Not to say you can't come up with trajectory calculations that wouldn't benefit from a big cluster, though.) Also, the computer in the movie was Pleiades at NASA Ames.

richmarr 11y ago

This is great & inspiring and all. I just can't help pausing at the apparent tension between "we embark on this journey for all humanity" and "strengthening America’s leadership on Earth and in space". There's certainly nothing wrong with the USA's space agency serving the interests of the USA, and there will (eventually) be technology & economic benefits for other nations too, I just find the language jars.

MrZongle2 11y ago
The cynic in me says for you not to worry. In 10 years the United States will (unfortunately) be no closer to landing a man on Mars. The mess that is the Congressional budget process will guarantee it. Much like fusion and AI, an American on Mars always seems about 20-25 years away.

hackuser 11y ago

If you have any interest, I highly recommend reading this. It's not marketing fluff; it has a creative and (seemingly) complete vision and well-thought-through planning, and is clear, concise, and detailed. Maybe someone who follows these issues closely will already know much of it (or maybe not; I have no idea), but it is an education for me and by far the best thing I've read on the subject. For example, the three phases in the title are defined not by physical locations or technological developments, but by dependence on Earth: * Earth Reliant * Proving Ground: R&D in 'cislunar' space * Earth Independent Maybe that's old news to space geeks, but it's new to me and shows an effort to carefully conceive of the mission.

mediocrejoker 11y ago
That's what makes it truly exciting to me: it seems like a lot of smart people have been putting serious thought and consideration towards what would/will be required to have a realistic shot at colonizing another planet.
- stevesearer 11y ago
  The word 'colonize' evokes thoughts of British, Dutch, Portuguese, etc colonization ~500-200 years ago. When thinking of colonizing a new planet, is there any information about who will control the resources of the colony? Will the USA control Martian resources if we get there first or will it be a collaborative effort like the Space Station?
  - clem 11y ago
    At the moment that's something of a moot point. Is there a single resource on Mars that's worth the cost of transporting back to Earth? Until that's the case, it's only going to be the local Martian populace controlling the resources.
  - jerf 11y ago
    Zigging from clem's zag, let me put this another way. There absolutely, positively, beyond a shadow of a doubt will be major political issues that arise from off-planet habitation. But, to be honest, not particularly all that more major than any number of issues that arise on Earth all the time, and we generally muddle through them. It'll be a long time before anyone would have any reason to start a shooting war over an off-planet resource. And science fiction has been predicting the near inevitability that eventually the off-planet colony will demand independence anyhow, a position I see no reason to modify or disagree with, personally. The structural forces in favor of that outcome are just overwhelming.

ohitsdom 11y ago

I'm curious how much cost is added to the flight to Mars if they build a tether/rotating system on the spacecraft to simulate gravity. Seems like too much of a health risk to forgo this and spend years in micro-gravity, although research is limited on the topic (the first two men in a year long study are at ~7 months in space).

nickff 11y ago
NASA has unfortunately been neglecting low-gravity (centripetal acceleration) research. The only research I am aware of in this area was conducted by the Soviet Union on mice, and (to the best of my recolection) they found that ~0.3G and relatively low RPM were required to maintain fitness. I agree with you that further work is required on this subject, as it could help future Martians to be healthier and more productive throughout their journey, but it does not seem to jive with NASA's current priorities. NASA has repeatedly rejected proposals for studies and experiments in this area.
- baobabaobab 11y ago
  NASA actually did a tethered artificial gravity experiment during Gemini with the target docking vehicle. They got it working, although they only spun it up to like .01g.
  - nickff 11y ago
    From what I read, they were never even sure of what the centripetal acceleration (G-force) actually was, because of the uncertainty of the measurements. Either way, I suppose you could call this research, but I have always categorized this as a proof of concept of a potential research method. It should also be noted that NASA has had trouble with tethers in the past, due to vibrations along the wire(s) and orbital mechanics related issues.
gizmo686 11y ago
Minor nitpick, in the 1995-1996, Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov spent 437 consecutive days in space.

hackuser 11y ago

Is there a web version of this? It's too bad if all this great information is hidden away in a PDF, which few will bother to open (even on HN, and fewer in the general public) and which I'll probably be unable to find in the future. I found the following website, but my initial impression is that it's lacks a lot of the great material in the PDF: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html http://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html

mpweiher 11y ago
Why? I click on the link and it opens in the browser like any other content. Except that it's easier to download.
- hackuser 11y ago
  > I click on the link and it opens in the browser like any other content That's one thing I'm not doing. IME Firefox's PDF rendering is worse than external applications; it has trouble rendering many more files and the rendering is much harder to read.
wiz21 11y ago
>> which I'll probably be unable to find in the future Could you elaborate on this ?
- hackuser 11y ago
  An untitled URL (i.e., just a filename) is not easily found in my browser history and searches tend to find web pages, which is what most people read and link to. I just did a quick search to find a NASA webpage with a link to this document, and it didn't appear among the top results AFAICT. I didn't spend much time on it, but that's part of my point: It's not easy to find.
  - ItsDeathball 11y ago
    If you search for "journey to mars pdf" it's the top result, with a breakout box and summary. Not sure how much easier that can be.

stevecalifornia 11y ago

Kudos to NASA for improving their communications with the general public. This is exactly the kind of document I want to see-- broad yet appropriately detailed and decorated with wonderful art. I am excited for a future where Mars plays a similar role in science as Antarctica. I hope that my two young daughters have the opportunity to do research on another planet if that's what they want to do.

shostack 11y ago

Is it just me or has NASA really been on point with capitalizing on the PR opportunity surrounding The Martian? - Numerous Reddit frontpage posts/AMA's - Great buzz around discoveries - This plan Not knocking them--NASA needs all the love they can get. I've just become very aware of a much larger NASA presence in my news sources than I'm used to.

pp19dd 11y ago
Nah. For me it was this 70 MB photo of Pluto that convinced me that they're not hyping anything, but delivering actual results: http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/crop_p_color2_enhanced_release.png http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/cro... Think I spent half a day staring at that photo, just zooming and panning and wishing I had a bigger screen. Anyhow, they bring up this data bandwidth issue front and center in the PDF. More to my point (if I had one), the probe was launched in 2006 and took 9 years to get there. The 70 MB photo was taken half a year ago and just now managed to get transmitted (surely they had other things queued up and so forth.) I don't think that I've done anything for 9 years, and I would never wait half a year for a page to load, so NASA's convinced me that they can do longevity.

Animats 11y ago

Congress failed to fund the Commercial Crew Program, which would have put astronauts in space on Space-X boosters using the existing Falcon rocket and Dragon capsule. Instead, NASA's pork programs are getting funding. Colonizing Mars is a fantasy. The worst real estate on Earth can support life better than the best real estate on Mars. It would be easier to colonize Antarctica or underwater on a continental shelf than Mars. Send robots to look around, sure. We now know what Mars looks like. Nearly airless, dusty, rocky, maybe some brine or ice. Years of orbiters haven't found anything really exciting that justifies more surface exploration. The US should build a Venus lander that can survive that environment and let us get a good look at Venus. The only surface pictures of Venus are from Soviet spacecraft of the 1970s. It's time for another look.

pdabbadabba 11y ago
> Years of orbiters haven't found anything really exciting that justifies more surface exploration. Beyond liquid water, I'm not sure what more you could hope for. Little green men, I guess?
trhway 11y ago
>Colonizing Mars is a fantasy. The worst real estate on Earth can support life better than the best real estate on Mars. it obviously didn't cross your mind that the worst life on Mars may be better than best life on Earth [at least for some people, like the ones who died or almost died 100 years ago on the way to North or South poles]

devy 11y ago

Not impressed. Considering Dr. Robert Zubrin's Mars Direct plan and later revised Mars Semi-Direct plan announced in the early 90s even with the space technologies back then. [1][2][3][4] [1]: https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/376589main_04%20-%20Mars%20Direct%20Power%20Point-7-30-09.pdf https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/376589main_04%20-%20Mars%20Direct%2... [2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7ZDf5KZGAk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7ZDf5KZGAk [3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcTZvNLL0-w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcTZvNLL0-w

clockworkelf 11y ago

The earth is not a globe and the space program is a lie. 4km laser experiment https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0qR-cQxOqPo https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0qR-cQxOqPo