Zachary Watson
Mrs. Willet
Astronomy
3/5/13
Terraforming Mars
Terraforming Mars is the process of making mars hospitable to human life and colonizing a safe environment for people to live. Mars, in retrospect, is the most earth-like planet that resides in our solar system, therefore it is the best planet amongst those around earth for us to attempt to inhabit. I would choose to use a timeline of one thousand years to complete the inhabitation process. Most scientist’s timeline is between one hundred and one hundred thousand years, I believe one hundred is much too short and we would be moving to fast and possibly make a mistake along the way. One hundred thousand on the other hand is too long, earths population would be far too high and we would need another environment sooner. Mars has a good amount of resources available for us to use if we make it to mars, these include oxygen, nitrogen, and water.
In order to get humans to Mars, we would obviously fly there in a spacecraft, this spacecraft would be extremely large because it will serve as home to people for the entirety of the journey. The spacecraft would be made up of an amalgamation of other spacecrafts all connected to form one, and represent a human environment, somewhat like a flying house, looking like boxes practically stacked on top of each other and continually getting smaller, like a wedding cake. Each box represents a “floor” in the “house”, the bottom and largest floor would be the living quarters. We would need a hearty amount of fuel to make it to Mars, nuclear thermal would be the best choice. The liquid hydrogen would be heated to a very high temperature in a nuclear reactor, and would expand through the nozzle of the rocket to make thrust...
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... The Mars Global Surveyor was sent as an orbiter to fly around Mars, it took pictures and was able to point out the annual changes in the cycle of Mars, it also pointed out some new craters. The Odyssey monitored the atmospheric and radiation data of Mars. Spirit was a rover that discovered direct evidence of hydrogen on Mars. The Opportunity rover landed shortly after Spirit , and it found a great amount of hematite in its landing site crater.
We obviously could not breathe on Mars, we would need at least a small supplement of oxygen through some type of a mask. We would need to worry about radiation, although the soil would shield heavy amounts from doing too much harm. It will be extremely exciting to see the future humans can make happen regarding terraforming Mars and hopefully in about one thousand years humans will be riding bicycles on the Red Planet.
Curiosity, launched in 2012 has APXS (one of the science instruments on board the rover), which helps analyses rocks and soil samples (this was also contributed by Canada to the exploration project on Mars).
Elon Musk, NASA, and Nikola Tesla have all incorporated the first steps into the plans for colonizing Mars. Nikola Tesla let out his ideas to colonize mars and now Elon Musk and NASA are currently in the lead of many in the race to colonize this planet. There are ideas to colonize other planets but Mars and the moon are closest to our accomplishments. In 2011 a project was launched known as Mars One. The founders of this project, Bas Lansdorp and Arno Wielders, launched an official idea to send one hundred people to mars for a permanent vacation by the year 2020. Sarah Cruddas from the CNN website says, “The journey itself is expected to take around seven months and recent MIT studies found that, should explorers succeed in landing, using current technology they would likely survive only 68 days.” Crudas goes on explaining how the volunteers are ready to take on any risks for scientific purposes. Mars One is requiring the winning applicants years of training and isolation before being able to set foot on a spaceship that takes them to mars. Later in Febuary 27, of the year 2013 another idea based around moving to mars was proposed by Dennis Tito known as “Inspiration Mars.” The initial plan for “Inspiration Mars” was to send a couple into Mars. They require large funds that were never met and Inspiration mars was called off. The founders of project one had a backup plan known as “Plan B” which
Poetry is known as an avenue to express one’s true thoughts and feelings in disguise, almost like sharing a secret
Mars would be a challenging place for humans to live because of its dry conditions (lack of water) and cold temperatures. The frequent sandstorms and dust devils whipping across the surface of the planet would also make human existence difficult. Scientists believe that Mars had a think atmosphere in the past. They also think Mars was warmer and may have once contained liquid water.
Earth requires about 11,000 m/s of delta-v. To travel to Mars orbit about 6,000 m/s is required. The smallest portion of the delta-v required is the approximately 5,000 m/s necessary to land on the surface of Mars. (Clarke 221). However, what makes this one of the most interesting phase of the trip is that whereas we pretty much know what to expect from the first two legs of the trip, what types of situations we may encounter on landing are largely unknown.
Mars is our next best hope in life on another planet. Because of science mankind can grow and harvest plants in the modified mars soil, make a thick warm atmosphere, and drink no frozen mars water. Mankind can grow and flourish more as a species with this idea of colonizing mars. With more scientific advancements we can colonize mars and we will colonize mars.
I definitely thought it was quite bizarre, and in the beginning I wasn’t too sure if I agreed with their theories of how the town came to be. Particularly that they are able to hide the secret city on Mars for so long and go in secret on a rocket to outer space seemed so far fetched for me to believe.
Starting with Mars being too dangerous. Colonists could be exposed to radiation which can result in cancer, brain damage, tumors, sickness, or death. Secondly, Mars has a lower gravity than Earth which means over time colonists would lose bone mass, have a weaker immune system, and have a weaker heart and body. Lastly, colonists would be in a closed environment for a long periods of time which could lead to mental problems according to NASA and Mars One.
There is no true guarantee that our intelligence and reason, which separates us from other animals, could help us survive for a very long time on Earth. Take dinosaurs for example, they are much less intelligent than human beings, yet they managed to reign supreme on this planet for sixty-five million years before a large steroid struck and wiped them out. Geological history shows that such extinction events are routine. Mammalian species, on average, last just a couple of million years. Our parent species, Homo erectus, lasted about 1.6 million years, while Neanderthals died out after only 300,000 years. We might have conquered the planet but it is just a tiny island in the universe, and species confined to a single island are often found on the endangered list (Burnham).
An alternative proposition to make Mars suitable for human habitation is terraforming Mars; to deliberately change it’s environment to provide Earth-like ecosystems and that are suitable for humans. Terraforming Mars would be a long time in the future, it would take more than 50,000 years to terraform Mars if we started now. Other sources state that “it would be hundreds of years before the thin Martian atmosphere could be transformed into an oxygen-rich cradle for life” (Livescience.com). Turning Mars’s cold atmosphere into a warm one, having a thick carbon dioxide atmosphere with oxygen for humans to breathe, and restoring its habitable state, is possible. And there is no reason to think that Mars is sterile or even hostile to life forms,
Technology Supporting Life on Mars Though the Martian terrain echoes similar features on earth, the overall atmosphere has dramatic differences in which the developed technology plays its role in making this science fiction a reality. The achievement of sustainable life on Mars would be a potential solution towards overpopulation restoring the natural resources, decreased global warming climate changes, reduced habitat loss, etc. Nasa scientist has developed technology that provides the fuel and energy to get to mars and renewable energy sources to power the astronauts need on the red planet, the necessities for living, Technology for Oxygen generation and water recovery, etc. In conclusion with development in technology, it bridges the gap needed
The recent events regarding the NASA Mars probes have renewed the debate of reinstalling manned space missions with the objectives of exploring and landing on foreign worlds such as the moon and the red planet Mars, rather than the use of solely robotic craft and machines. It is my belief that we should return to the days of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, those of manned lunar landings and manned space exploration. Robots simply cannot and should not be allowed to be the sole means of visiting these worlds, nor should humans only be able to witness new findings second hand through the use of computers and machines. It is human nature to be normally curious of one’s surroundings, and it is important that we send one of our own to new worlds. The effects that past missions have had on the world’s people, as well as our political and cultural climates are another valid reason for flesh instead of metal to lay claim to space. Also, the limitless applications and new education that manned flights can bring to us from on site human interactions could lead to another technological and industrial revolution like the original lunar programs had done for us during the Gemini and Apollo programs.
Humans can expect to face some major challenges on an expedition to Mars. It has been proven that humanity can travel in space for over two years. Cumulatively, Sergei Constantinovich Krikalev, a Russian cosmonaut, has spent over eight-hundred and three days in Earth orbit (Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, 2005). The expedition to Mars would require the crew to endure a six month journey to the planet, a year of living on the planet, and a six months journey back to Earth. Russian cosmonaut, Valery V. Polyakoz, clocking in at four-hundred and thirty-eight days for just one stay in Earth orbit, shows humanity is capable of a twelve month round trip to Mars (Schwirtz, 2009). Earth's orbit has provided some benefits to space exploration, like the magnetic field from cosmic radiation, and the proximity to Earth if an emergency were to arise (Jones, 2009). The further humans travel away from Earth the greater the risks become. The major risks to human health on a flight to Mars, living on Mars, and returning to Earth are: radiation exposure, biological problems induced by weightlessness, spacecraft malfunctions, and psychological problems brought on by isolation.
... The problem with the gravity of Mars is that weightlessness can make you sick. Meaning that because humans are so adapted to the conditions here on Earth, such a drastic change will make them sick. Adaptation will have to occur, meaning that the stations on Mars might have to somehow mimic the conditions of Earth. Works Cited http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraforming_of_Mars http://www.universetoday.com/9497/magnesium-could-be-a-source-of-fuel-on-mars/. http://www.mars-one.com/faq/health-and-ethics/will-the-astronauts-have-enough-water-food-and-oxygen.
There are many reasons that space exploration should continue. If Earth ever becomes too overpopulated or over polluted, then perhaps people can move to Mars. The world population in 1970 was approximately 4 billion people, and is currently nearly 6 billion people. The world population in 2015 is estimated to be 7 billion people. There is a possibility that there are useful resources on Mars. Scientists have found ice and some other clues, such as craters, volcanoes, and valleys, that have led them to believe that there was once life on Mars, and they believe that sometime in the future, should planet Earth need to be evacuated, humans will be able to live there (Jakosky 142). Many of the rocks on Mars appear to have been formed by gasses, breathable by humans and other creatures. A process called terraforming will allow astronauts to make use of the resources that are on the planet and create an atmosphere that will support life. One method for terraforming is that scientists would convert the gaseous rocks back into gasses, and use gas-eating organisms to eat the gas, which results in the formation of other gasses. If these organisms continue the cycle, then Mars would have a stable atmosphere for humans to live in (Getz 39).