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It's a great achievement with some really interesting work done on the landing algorithms with terrain recognition and it seemed to have worked exceptionally we

It's a great achievement with some really interesting work done on the landing algorithms with terrain recognition and it seemed to have worked exceptionally well. Looking forward for the next landing in May of the Chinese rover and all the science these robots will produce. Also, the test of Ingenuity, the helicopter, will be very interesting to watch, that could really pave the way for a different exploration style in the future. And finally, maybe the next transfer window will already see some Starships, that would really change everything.

jaegerpicker 6y ago
Ingenuity is maybe the most interesting and coolest advance for space travel. The idea of a remote drone to explore Mars is just rad! I can totally nerd out about that!
- kibwen 6y ago
  A great video where the host visits the drone, interviews its makers, and goes over the cool technical aspects of it and its mission: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GhsZUZmJvaM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GhsZUZmJvaM
- suyash 6y ago
  More about Ingenuity https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/aerospace/robotic-exploration/nasa-designed-perseverance-helicopter-rover-fly-autonomously-mars https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/aerospace/robotic-explor... and it's source code https://github.com/nasa/fprime https://github.com/nasa/fprime
  - jvanderbot 6y ago
    That is not Ingenuity's source code, that's the software framework used to link the various software modules. It's generic to any mission / instrument.
    - suyash 6y ago
      correct
- jvanderbot 6y ago
  You may be interested in dragonfly then: https://www.nasa.gov/dragonfly https://www.nasa.gov/dragonfly
jws 6y ago
Early starships got me thinking: given the high likelihood of a failed starship landing, and maybe having the ability to send one before fully engineering a payload… What would you ballast a starship with for the practice missions? Useful materials which might survive a RUD and aim for someplace near a likely landing zone? If you crash the parts of a milling machine, a lathe, some tooling, some assorted metals stock, and a bunch of assorted wire, well sure you just cleared out a machine shop auction, but maybe there comes a day when an early Mars colony would be thrilled to go clean up your “landing” site.
- L_226 6y ago
  Soil? Though not sure it is prudent to potentially spread active biological material all over a pristine (eco)system.
  - nickik 6y ago
    Mars soil is usable for plants. Or should be at least. So no need to bring soil from earth.
- blackrock 6y ago
  Don’t litter Mars Elon. Stick your landing. LOL.
- saberdancer 6y ago
  Bunch of 2x4s and screws/nails :D.
- mikewarot 6y ago
  Why not work on some very small machines that can mine and refine materials to make more of themselves?
  - george3d6 6y ago
    Because "refine" really means "melt at temperatures ranging from 500 to 4000 degrees celsisu and then extract via various mechanical processes and/or using various reactants which often require gigantic plants to produce and are highly unstable". Basically all of the history of science until 200 years ago was figuring out "mine and extract" and the course of civilization is very much linked with the price & quality of metal structures they could produce. But it's gotten so good we take it for granted. However that is because of gigantic plants situated in specific areas where energy is cheap that do this thing at an amazing scale. Aluminum is cheap as chips, except that it used to be more expensive than platinum (and at a much higher impurity ratio than the stuff we use for baking or for making cheap cases). Heck, gold is "a thing" because we could purify and mold it without bringing it to a melting point and it was, for a very long time, the only metal available to us to do anything with, way before the bronze age. And the problem with the refinement process is that you can't really "be smart" about it, reaching very high temperatures is one of those things you can't really scale down in an efficient way. You'd have to propel 100,000 tons of factory to mars in order to efficiently refine anything remotely close to the metals we had access to 100 years ago. Which is not to touch on the mining bit, that is in itself very complicated (see how slowly and shallowly rovers are currently able to drill). Are there workarounds for this? Maybe, I don't think anyone knows them though, they are not the kind of thing that's within easy reach. Maybe if we happen to stumble upon large reserves of bismuth or lead or gallium or mercury close to the surface of Mars, and build a whole branch of engineering around using those to build machinery... ? But my limited knowledge of geophysics and geology tells me that finding those in large amounts is very unlikely. For reference, if you take an oven, that can reach, say, 450 degrees celsius (home) and up to 700 (industrial). Those aren't enough to refine any "useful" metal (e.g. iron) and building them requires materials that were produced at 1500+ degrees. IANAChemist/IANAMaterialScientist/IANABlacksmith though, so take with a spoon of salt.

jaegerpicker 6y ago

Ingenuity is maybe the most interesting and coolest advance for space travel. The idea of a remote drone to explore Mars is just rad! I can totally nerd out about that!

kibwen 6y ago
A great video where the host visits the drone, interviews its makers, and goes over the cool technical aspects of it and its mission: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GhsZUZmJvaM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GhsZUZmJvaM
suyash 6y ago
More about Ingenuity https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/aerospace/robotic-exploration/nasa-designed-perseverance-helicopter-rover-fly-autonomously-mars https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/aerospace/robotic-explor... and it's source code https://github.com/nasa/fprime https://github.com/nasa/fprime
- jvanderbot 6y ago
  That is not Ingenuity's source code, that's the software framework used to link the various software modules. It's generic to any mission / instrument.
  - suyash 6y ago
    correct
jvanderbot 6y ago
You may be interested in dragonfly then: https://www.nasa.gov/dragonfly https://www.nasa.gov/dragonfly

jws 6y ago

Early starships got me thinking: given the high likelihood of a failed starship landing, and maybe having the ability to send one before fully engineering a payload… What would you ballast a starship with for the practice missions? Useful materials which might survive a RUD and aim for someplace near a likely landing zone? If you crash the parts of a milling machine, a lathe, some tooling, some assorted metals stock, and a bunch of assorted wire, well sure you just cleared out a machine shop auction, but maybe there comes a day when an early Mars colony would be thrilled to go clean up your “landing” site.

L_226 6y ago
Soil? Though not sure it is prudent to potentially spread active biological material all over a pristine (eco)system.
- nickik 6y ago
  Mars soil is usable for plants. Or should be at least. So no need to bring soil from earth.
blackrock 6y ago
Don’t litter Mars Elon. Stick your landing. LOL.
saberdancer 6y ago
Bunch of 2x4s and screws/nails :D.
mikewarot 6y ago
Why not work on some very small machines that can mine and refine materials to make more of themselves?
- george3d6 6y ago
  Because "refine" really means "melt at temperatures ranging from 500 to 4000 degrees celsisu and then extract via various mechanical processes and/or using various reactants which often require gigantic plants to produce and are highly unstable". Basically all of the history of science until 200 years ago was figuring out "mine and extract" and the course of civilization is very much linked with the price & quality of metal structures they could produce. But it's gotten so good we take it for granted. However that is because of gigantic plants situated in specific areas where energy is cheap that do this thing at an amazing scale. Aluminum is cheap as chips, except that it used to be more expensive than platinum (and at a much higher impurity ratio than the stuff we use for baking or for making cheap cases). Heck, gold is "a thing" because we could purify and mold it without bringing it to a melting point and it was, for a very long time, the only metal available to us to do anything with, way before the bronze age. And the problem with the refinement process is that you can't really "be smart" about it, reaching very high temperatures is one of those things you can't really scale down in an efficient way. You'd have to propel 100,000 tons of factory to mars in order to efficiently refine anything remotely close to the metals we had access to 100 years ago. Which is not to touch on the mining bit, that is in itself very complicated (see how slowly and shallowly rovers are currently able to drill). Are there workarounds for this? Maybe, I don't think anyone knows them though, they are not the kind of thing that's within easy reach. Maybe if we happen to stumble upon large reserves of bismuth or lead or gallium or mercury close to the surface of Mars, and build a whole branch of engineering around using those to build machinery... ? But my limited knowledge of geophysics and geology tells me that finding those in large amounts is very unlikely. For reference, if you take an oven, that can reach, say, 450 degrees celsius (home) and up to 700 (industrial). Those aren't enough to refine any "useful" metal (e.g. iron) and building them requires materials that were produced at 1500+ degrees. IANAChemist/IANAMaterialScientist/IANABlacksmith though, so take with a spoon of salt.