Title: The Red Planet
1The Red Planet
- Possibility of life, exploration and beyond
2Introduction
- The Myth and the civilization
- The Exploration
- Life on the Red planet?
- The Future
- Conclusion
3The Myth and the Civilization
- The canals, the face and the civilization that
our imagination created
4The Canals
- In 1876 Italian priest Pietro Secchi observed
straight line pattern on the surface of Mars - 1877, Giovanni Schiaparelli published a map of
Mars, assigning names and called the feature
canali, or Channel - The popular notion that intelligent life form
constructed the canals was argued persuasively by
Percival Lowell in his 1895 book
5The face on Mars
- In 1976, spaceship Viking 1 spotted the shadowy
likeness of a human face - What could it be for? Does it signify some kind
of Alien presence?
6The Civilization
- There was a wide believe that Mars is populated
by Intelligent life form
7Life Came From Mars?!
- Can an asteroid from Mars possibly contaminated
Earth with bacterial life form?
8The Exploration
- The Russian and USAs Mars exploration effort
9The Russian Attempts
- The Soviets, being a player in the space race,
sent more then a dozen of spacecrafts to Mars - http//www.svengrahn.pp.se/histind/Soviemar/soviem
ar.htm
10The US Launches
- The US also began its own Mars exploration
projects, including the Mars Global Surveyor, the
Pathfinder rover, and the recently launched
Spirit and Opportunity - http//mars.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/
11Mars 1-6 Orbiter/Lander
- The U.S.S.R.s Mars project is the first attempt
to send a space craft to Mars - Mars 2 Lander became the first artificial object
on Mars when it crashed onto the surface
12Mariner1-9 Orbiter/Lander
- Mariners are the first probes that successfully
sent back data of Mars with 4 successful missions.
13The Mars Global Surveyor
- In 1998, the Mars Surveyor was sent in Mars orbit
with its camera pointed towards the face. Another
mission in 2001 showed clearly that the face is
no more then mesas.
And no, the face doesnt open up, and no, open
sesame does not work on Mars (just a stupid
comment made on Mission to Mars, its better if
you never saw the movie)
14Mars Pathfinder Mission
- Mars Pathfinder is the first rover sent to Mars.
It was designed as a technology demonstration of
a way to deliver an instrumented Lander and a
free-ranging robotic rover to the surface of the
red planet
15Spirit/Opportunity Mission
- In 2004, when the distance between Earth and Mars
is at its minimum, twin rovers are sent over to
Mars in the Delta rocket. - Their mission is to look for signs of liquid
water and evidence of life.
Spirit
Opportunity
16Life on the Red planet?
- Can life exist on this dry and hostile planet?
17The Building Block of Life
- As we have learned in class, the four essential
elements for life are H,O,N,C. - Weve also learned that water, as far as our
knowledge can tell, is the single most important
solvent for life to form - If water exists, or existed on Mars, then there
is a possibility of life
18Water?!
- "We have concluded the rocks here were once
soaked in liquid water," ---Steve Squyres ,
Opportunity mission, 2004 - As we all know, water is one f the most important
bases of life, providing solvent and enabling
chemical reactions
The bedrock in which Opportunity took its sample
from
19But How??
- There was a high concentration of water soluble
salts in the bed rock, which, at least on Earth,
can only be formed by evaporation of salted
water. - Previous missions by Mars Global Surveyor also
provides evidence by picturing possible seabed
accumulation.
20A Race with Time and Battery Life
- There is a lot more to be discovered, and more
question to be answered, but we dont have much
time left with Spirit and Opportunity - The rovers have a design life of 90 Martian days,
and 90 days was a long time ago
Okthis is actually the picture of a Lander
returning sample to Earth, not an overworked
rover explodingso?
The overworked, underpaid rover
21The Future
- 2050 Men on Mars? The possibility and expectation
22The Moon, and the Mars
- With the experience and knowledge gained on the
moon, we will then be ready to take the next
steps of space exploration human missions to
Mars and to worlds beyond. - ---President Bush, January 2004
23Taking Baby Steps
- The first step towards manned mission to Mars is
the completion on the ISS( International Space
Station) which in only staffed with two emergency
crew at the moment - With the shuttle fleet grounded, the only link
between ISS are the Russian launchers. - To replace the shuttle and get astronauts back
into space, NASA has been instructed to produce
the Crew Exploration Vehicle, a heavy duty
reusable vehicle.
24The CEV
25Back on the Moon
- The Second step is the returning to moon
- The moon is a perfect place to test technology
for human habitat station that will be used for
long term stay on Mars, and the ability to
transport such module from Earth to space
26Modified CEV For Mars
http//boeingmedia.com/images/one.cfm?image_id886
4releaset
27Man on Mars!!
- With the technology proven and the ability to
transport crew through space, a manned mission
will be sent on Mars - A manned mission will accomplish more in the way
that the experts sent there will know what they
are looking for and can perform a smarter
analysis on the samples found
28Conclusion
29InconclusiveAgain?!
- Ok, so nothing is solid on the evidence of life
on Mars yet, but at least were sure theres no
intelligent life form there, I mean, being a bad
neighbor like us who crashes space crafts onto
their planet every once in a whileId have been
pretty annoyed.
The fact is that we dont have enough information
to prove or disprove that life existed on Mars or
not. Sending a space craft over might look easy,
but truth be told, even NASA screwed up half of
the mission. One little mistake, even a single
degree of an error in the navigational system,
can send the space craft into some weird orbit
that will never reach Mars.
30Questions?