A Look At What Could be NASA's First Manned Planetary Explorer

From Dvice we get a look at NASA's Nautilus-X. The Non-Atmospheric Universal Transport Intended for Lengthy United States X-ploration is really NASA's first shot at what the future of deep space planetary exploration just may take the shape of.

Maybe not the prettiest thing going but does have some good ideas integrated into the structure. From the article:

• The craft is designed to support a crew of six in deep space for anywhere between one month and two years at a stretch. It's got an integrated centrifuge to provide artificial gravity for its occupants, and the habitation modules are mostly inflatable.

complete article

Got a spare 4 Trillion? Let's go to Neptune!

Check list:
magnetoplasmadynamic thrusters - Huh? what? What's that?
Oh about 4 trillion dollars....

Been yearning to visit the outer solar system planets? Well start saving now and when you get to about 4 trillion give the boys at Johns Hopkins a call. Seems they have been thinking about what it would take to make the trip. First thing on the agenda is a seriously improved thrusting system called magnetoplasmadynamic. Oh and set aside about 5 years for total mission time. Now before you start thinking that's way too long, look at how long it took earlier craft to make it that far. No, 2 years out to Neptune is fast.

From the Article:

• For example, the New Horizons probe currently en route to Pluto-the fastest man-made object in space-has reached the distance of 16.74 AUs from the sun as of this writing. That took about 4.5 years, and it's only a little more than halfway to Neptune

The head of the group formulating this plan is Ralph McNutt. His paper on the project can be read here.

Voyager 2 is confused....

The Voyager 2 prob has become somewhat confused in its old age. According to an article in Tech Republic the 30 year old explorer has begun sending back confusing data, almost certainly due to the result of cosmic rays hitting the probe's computer memory and causing it to report conflicting data. The good news is that the command and control sections of the craft are still functioning so trouble shooting should be able to figure out the area of malfunction. Voyager 1 and 2 are still of major interest to the scientific community mainly because they are due, in the next five years, to exit the solar system ( the solar system's boundaries are determined by the " heliopause " or the area where the sun's solar wind is equaled by that of stellar wind) .

The two craft have traveled apx 13 billion kilometers which means that it takes 26 hours to send a command and receive a reply. Think about that....in 30 years, the fastest craft that man ever built has only traveled 13 hours away and hasn't even left the back yard yet, let alone the neighborhood. Space is incomprehensibly vast. Even if we construct a craft to go a hundred times faster, it would still take thousands of years to leave "the neighborhood".

Four Reasons Not to Give Up on Interstellar Travel

Ahhh I knew someone else would jump at this. When rocket scientists recently concluded that humanity would never reach the stars, the comments started a firestorm of comments on this blog.( earlier article Man will never reach the stars ) Now IO9 lists four reason not to give up on the stars just yet:

1. We are likely to develop new propulsion methods.
   
2. Humans could figure out ways to endure long space journeys.
3. Earth is not the only source of fuel.
4. We may yet discover a way to achieve faster-than-light travel.

The IO9 article makes a good point on each number and follows our earlier discussion. It's still worth the read though. Check it out HERE

Dissent Grows as Scientists Oppose NASA’s New Moon Mission

As plans mount for NASA's push for a permanent base on the Moon, pressure mounts from many quarters, opposing the Moon missions.

Trouble is brewing as a growing group of former mission managers, planetary scientists and astronauts argues against any manned moon mission at all. One alternative, they say: Send astronauts to an asteroid as a better preparation for a Martian landing.

It should be noted that the group as a whole does not oppose plans to land astronauts on Mars, however, Robert Walker, a former congressman and a member of the Presidential Commission on the Implementation of the United States Space Exploration Policy, points out that “Having a U.S. presence on the moon at least gives us the chance to keep an eye on the standard of conduct,” In military terms, the moon can be seen as the ultimate high ground. A nation could set up hard-to-defeat microwave or laser weapons platforms aimed at in-orbit satellites or, in the best sci-fi tradition, to launch large rocks at the Earth with “mass drivers.” (These were the weapon of choice for Robert Heinlein’s revolutionary protagonists in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress.) Vocal opponents of the lunar base plan have two basic criticisms. First, the mission hasn’t sparked enthusiasm. Second is that a lunar base may not be practical. For instance, such an installation would require a lunar supply of water ice; probes have suggested the presence of water, but have not proven it. The argument is also made that the moon is too close to the Earth to provide a good practice run for a Mars mission. Scientists also point out the lack of reusable parts in the Constellation program, the high costs of which many claim NASA is underestimating.

Thanks to Shaun A. Saunders for the post from Popular Mechanics

Mars's tiny moons – one small step for mankind?

Forget Mars – the Red Planet's moons Phobos and Deimos could be the next stop in the solar system for humanity, according to planetary scientists. During a recent conference at the Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, in California, Scientists speculated that astronauts could make their first footprints on one of them within 10 years. As a counterpoint to a return mission to Earth's moon, some scientists believe that a manned mission returning to the moon is counter productive. Plus a robotic mission to either of Mars' moons is easier than one to Luna.

Granted, the Moon is only a short three-day spaceflight from Earth, whereas Phobos and Deimos are several months away using current propulsion methods.

But the Moon's gravity is one-sixth Earth's, strong enough that a landing craft has to fire retrorockets to slow its descent to the surface, and again to leave. This wastes tonnes of heavy, expensive fuel and adds millions of dollars to the cost of a mission.

Mars' two potato-shaped worlds, on the other hand, are tiny – Phobos is the size of Manhattan and Deimos is about a third as large, just 6.3 kilometres wide. So their gravitational pull is only one-thousandth that of Earth, making landing on them more like docking with another spaceship.

Estimates put a robotic or manned mission to Mars' moons at a tenth of the cost of a moon or Mars mission. Plus there are many unknowns about the makeup and origins of both of Mars' moons that such missions could help answer. Scientists have theorised that the moons may be asteroids captured by Mars's gravity, or that they may be remnants of a single moon that was blasted apart by a massive impact. But until we have missions that target these bodies, we will always have questions.

This image of Phobos, taken by Europe's Mars Express spacecraft from a distance of less than 200 km, shows the Mars-facing side of the moon (Image: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin/G Neukum)

Thanks to Shaun A. Saunders for the post