Could Mars-bound astronauts use a passing asteroid to help shield them on the way? See also this posting at Technovelgy.com. Who is that Fred fella, anyway?
It looks like NASA will be asking industry for designs for the space suits to be used with Project Constellation. They'll have to be a lot more versatile than those used for space walks on shuttle or ISS missions:
The Constellation Program will require the following space suit capabilities: 1) Crew protection and survivability during LEA scenarios (including spacecraft depressurization, egress mobility and water survival), 2) Zero-gravity EVA for in-space EVA (including contingency crew transfer between vehicles), 3) Surface EVA capability for lunar sortie missions (less than two weeks), 4) Surface EVA capability for lunar outpost missions (up to six months), and 5) EVA capability for Mars missions.
One suit? Many suits?
NASA is considering a single space suit system to provide the space suit capabilities outlined above. A single space suit system has the potential for savings in development, certification, and sustaining engineering costs, as well as reductions in required upmass and volume through commonality between the various elements of the space suit system. The development of the space suit system will require several trades between use of common elements versus use of hardware designed uniquely to meet specific performance objectives.
It'll be interesting if they can pull this off!
A Mars sample return mission has been on the books at NASA for a long time, always seemingly "in ten years". The mission continues to languish. Too much risk? Technology not ready for prime time? Cost?
The success of the Stardust mission has led to a new interest in sample return missions. Leonard David takes a look at several. How about a sweeping sample of the martian atmosphere? Or some of Titan's surface material?
Paleobiologists have produced three-dimensional images of fossils preserved in rocks. The process, confocal laser scanning microscopy and Raman spectroscopy, could enable scientists to look at microscopic fossils inside the rocks to search for signs of life, such as organic cell walls. Most importantly, these techniques would not destroy the rocks...very useful for rare or fragile fossils, or rocks from other planets like Mars!
Anybody near Bournemouth University in Bournmouth (United Kingdom)? On March 2, 2006 at 6:30 PM (for tea and coffee) or 7:00 PM (for the presentation, Allsebrook Lecture Theatre, Wallisdown Road) you can hear amateur radio expert Paul Marsh talk about how he built and used a home made receiver to receive signals from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter when it was 45 million miles from Earth. The lecture is being presented by the Institute of Electrical Engineers. How far will amateurs be able to track NASA's New Horizons craft on its journey to Pluto? For further details, you can contact Richard Atkinson (richard.atkinson@clickairport.com).
Will swarms of tennis-ball-sized robots be deployed on Mars to search for life in underground caves? We should see prototypes of this unique probe within a year or so.
This excellent site provides an introduction to...well...rocket science. Once you've mastered Rocket Science 101, consider moving on to Project Rho's Atomic Rocket pages.
NASA and JPL have released some new images of Spirit in the "Columbia Hills". It combines actual imagery plus some image processing and special effects to give you shots as if you were looking at Spirit.
