[meteorite-list] NASA May Put Greenhouse on Mars in 2021

From: Galactic Stone & Ironworks <*meteoritemike_at_meteoritecentral.com*> Date: Thu, 8 May 2014 21:37:04 -0400 Message-ID: <CAKBPJW-8-kJYUQ_b2uDEsCE=M5jpeDB2PWOF7vsnj18-A1CRwQ_at_mail.gmail.com> · meteoritemike_at_meteoritecentral.com

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On 5/8/14, Carl Agee via Meteorite-list
<meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> wrote:
> NASA's Planetary Protection Officer will have to approve it!
>
> -Carl Agee
> *************************************
> Carl B. Agee
> Director and Curator, Institute of Meteoritics
> Professor, Earth and Planetary Sciences
> MSC03 2050
> University of New Mexico
> Albuquerque NM 87131-1126
>
> Tel: (505) 750-7172
> Fax: (505) 277-3577
> Email: agee at unm.edu
> http://meteorite.unm.edu/people/carl_agee/
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 8, 2014 at 6:10 PM, Mendy.Ouzillou via Meteorite-list
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> wrote:
>> Just watched an old Dr. Who episode about that very project. Did not turn
>> out well ...
>>
>> Mendy Ouzillou
>>
>> On May 8, 2014, at 4:44 PM, Ron Baalke via Meteorite-list
>> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> http://www.space.com/25767-nasa-mars-greenhouse-rover-plant-experiment.html
>>
>> NASA May Put Greenhouse on Mars in 2021
>> By Mike Wall
>> space.com
>> May 6, 2014
>>
>> Plant life may touch down on Mars in 2021.
>>
>> Researchers have proposed putting a plant-growth experiment on NASA's
>> next Mars rover, which is scheduled to launch in mid-2020 and land on
>> the Red Planet in early 2021. The investigation, known as the Mars Plant
>> Experiment (MPX), could help lay the foundation for the colonization of
>> Mars, its designers say.
>>
>> "In order to do a long-term, sustainable base on Mars, you would want
>> to be able to establish that plants can at least grow on Mars," MPX
>> deputy
>> principal investigator Heather Smith, of NASA's Ames Research Center in
>> Mountain View, California, said April 24 at the Humans 2 Mars conference
>> in Washington, D.C. "This would be the first step in that - we just send
>> the seeds there and watch them grow."
>>
>> The MPX team - led by fellow Ames scientist Chris McKay - isn't
>> suggesting
>> that the 2020 Mars rover should play gardener, digging a hole with its
>> robotic arm and planting seeds in the Red Planet's dirt. Rather, the
>> experiment
>> would be entirely self-contained, eliminating the chance that Earth life
>> could escape and perhaps get a foothold on Mars.
>>
>> MPX would employ a clear "CubeSat" box - the case for a cheap and tiny
>> satellite - which would be affixed to the exterior of the 2020 rover.
>> This box would hold Earth air and about 200 seeds of Arabidopsis, a small
>> flowering plant that's commonly used in scientific research.
>>
>> The seeds would receive water when the rover touched down on Mars, and
>> would then be allowed to grow for two weeks or so.
>>
>> "In 15 days, we'll have a little greenhouse on Mars," Smith said.
>>
>> MPX would provide an organism-level test of the Mars environment, showing
>> how Earth life deals with the Red Planet's relatively high radiation
>> levels
>> and low gravity, which is about 40 percent as strong as that of Earth,
>> she added.
>>
>> "We would go from this simple experiment to the greenhouses on Mars for
>> a sustainable base," Smith said. "That would be the goal."
>>
>> In addition to its potential scientific returns, MPX would provide
>> humanity
>> with a landmark moment, she added.
>>
>> "It also would be the first multicellular organism to grow, live and die
>> on another planet," Smith said.
>>
>> The 2020 Mars rover is based heavily on NASA's Curiosity rover, which
>> landed in August 2012 to determine if the Red Planet has ever been
>> capable
>> of supporting microbial life. Curiosity has already answered that
>> question
>> in the affirmative, finding that a site called Yellowknife Bay was,
>> indeed,
>> habitable billions of years ago.
>>
>> NASA wants the 2020 rover to search for signs of past Mars life, and
>> collect
>> rock and soil samples for eventual return to Earth. But the space agency
>> is still working out the details of the robot's mission - for example,
>> figuring out what instruments it will carry.
>>
>> NASA received 58 instrument proposals for the rover during its call for
>> submissions, which lasted from September 2013 until January of this year.
>> Final selections should be made by June or so, NASA officials have said.
>>
>> Curiosity totes 10 instruments around Mars, so the 2020 rover may end
>> up with a similar amount of scientific gear.
>>
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