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Space & Planetary Science

NASA's Mars Program Planning Group: Same Old Answers or Open To New Ideas?

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
April 16, 2012
Filed under , , ,

NASA Planning Group Takes Key Steps for Future Mars Exploration
“Starting today, the scientific and technical community across the globe can submit ideas and abstracts online as part of NASA’s effort to seek out the best and the brightest ideas from researchers and engineers in planetary science. Selected abstracts will be presented during a workshop in June hosted by the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston.”
Concepts and Approaches for Mars Exploration
“While we hope to accommodate all possible concepts, the workshop venue is limited to roughly 185-200 participants. If the number of submitted abstracts exceeds this limit, a NASA-designated program panel will review the abstracts and develop the final workshop attendee list. In order to encourage broad participation, industry and government laboratories (including NASA Centers) will be asked to limit participation to individuals presenting ideas/concepts. University research groups are encouraged to send principal investigators as their representatives, and to recognize that the number of attendees will be limited.”
Keith’s note: At today’s media telecon NASA representatives stressed that this review process and this meeting were going to be “transparent and open” and that people from outside NASA would be encouraged to attend. This does not synch with the meeting description that has been posted. It sounds like NASA is going to limit attendees and presentations. Moreover, instead of trying to encourage new ideas (younger participants) the older PIs are the ones who will attend. All too often these “independent” NASA activities are just the same old faces engaged in choir practice and Powerpoint generation. I asked if this event would be webcast in its entirety and Doug McQuiston said “yes”. I wonder if NASA will allow remote participation – you know, like everyone in the real world can now do. Stay tuned. Will this MPPG activity be yet another slow motion exercise resulting no real change in the status quo other than lowered budget reactions or will NASA really think outside the box this time?

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

25 responses to “NASA's Mars Program Planning Group: Same Old Answers or Open To New Ideas?”

  1. Gonzo_Skeptic says:
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    The whole point of going to Mars and spending so much money to get there was that it had the potential of hosting life that evolved independent of Earth.

    It doesn’t look like that is going to happen, so I don’t know how they can justify continued expenditures of billions of dollars just to study some interesting rock chemistry.  Mars is very likely a sterile world.  Most of the water that was there left the planet a long time ago, leaving only traces near the poles.  If anything, they should land one last spacecraft at a pole and use a microscope to see if there is anything swimming in those drops of liquid that form.  If not, it’s time to move on.

    It would be more rational to use the dwindling space budget resources at NASA to explore other planets that are not as well characterized.

    • Ainge Devyr says:
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      What are you talking about? Every time we looked more closely, evidence for past and present water has grown stronger. The amount of ice in the poles is massive, and likely extends as permafrost to much lower latitudes. If anything, it has made ISRU plans more realistic.

      • Gonzo_Skeptic says:
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        We know there is ice on Mars, but liquid water in large quantities hasn’t flowed on that planet in billions of years, and I think that is necessary for life to evolve from simple chemicals.

        At some point, NASA needs to admit that further missions aren’t worth the cost, although I expect that kind of honesty isn’t going to happen anytime soon.

        • kcowing says:
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          “but liquid water in large quantities hasn’t flowed on that planet in billions of years” Huh?  You clearly don’t pay attention to the news.  Water flow on Mars today and climate cycles operate in cycles of 10’s and 100’s of millions of years wherein a lot of water moves around.

          • dogstar29 says:
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            However it doesn’t seem logical to send people to Mars to see if there is life there. Hostile as the environment is, terrestrial microorganisms might well establish residence and it would be impossible to tell them from the natives. I think this would be a fine opportunity for NASA to push technology in robotics and autonomous AI systems; the intelligence of all the robots sent to date is less than that of a cell phone.

          • Gonzo_Skeptic says:
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            You clearly don’t pay attention to the news.

            Clearly.  I’ll be the first to admit that some space news could slip by me.

            Water flow on Mars today and climate cycles operate in cycles of 10’s and 100’s of millions of years wherein a lot of water moves around.

            I’ve been trying to Google on this, but the closest I could come was someone making vague guesses on the subject.  Not even NASA’s official Mars web site had anything on it.  One would think that something this remarkable would be at the front and center of any Mars conference.  But I just can’t find it.

        • mjwolff says:
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          It is great to be skeptical, but you should be an informed skeptic.  No where in your posts do you raise a valid objection to life having evolved in the very distant past (when water was much more plentiful on the surface) and adapted to the changing environment.

          As for “worth the cost,” what is your definition of this?  The goal of MER was to find chemical/geological signatures of a more water-rich past (distant or otherwise).  MSL is designed to look for more subtle (and potentially organic) chemical signatures of past, more favorable-to-life environments.  Albeit that it has seen an embarrassing and disheartening amount of project mis-management and cost-overruns, its instrumentation has the potentially to dramatically advance our understanding of these issues.

          So, if you are going to make deductions and conclusions, perhaps you could share with us your metrics.  …and NASA doesn’t really “admit that further missions…”; that is the job of Congress, etc. which uses input from taxpayers, NRC committees, etc.

          • Gonzo_Skeptic says:
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            No where in your posts do you raise a valid objection to life having evolved in the very distant past (when water was much more plentiful on the surface) and adapted to the changing environment.

            My post was not meant to be a definitive thesis on the possibility of life having evolved or being currently present on Mars. 

            Although it is possible that we could find some hardy lifeforms if we dug deep down or looked in a formed drop of water, we’re not trying to do that.  But I think Congress and the American tax payer are growing weary of scientific missions that only excite the geologists. More rocks?  Bah!  This is why we stopped sending men to the Moon. Not enough scientific bang for the buck.

            As for “worth the cost,” what is your definition of this?

            Just my common sense.  I don’t think there is a precise equation that can tell Congress when something is worth the cost.

            When you are spending a few billion dollars on a science mission, the results should be re-writing the textbooks.  A certain level of “Wow” is necessary.  This is why the public is so supportive of the Hubble mission, despite the huge price tag of the servicing missions.

            And when you consider the other planetary missions that can’t happen in our lifetimes because the money is going to study arcane rock chemistry on Mars, I say it’s time to move on.

    • Paul451 says:
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      “If anything, they should land one last spacecraft at a pole and use a microscope to see if there is anything swimming in those drops of liquid that form.”

      While I disagree with much of your sentiment, this however is an excellent idea. I think this experiment, of variations on it, should be on every probe that touches non-terrestrial soil, planet, moon, asteroid, comet. The implications of a positive result are so great that it’s a false economy to not do it.

  2. newpapyrus says:
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    The best way to explore Mars is to set up a permanent human outpost on the Martian surface and then use both human and teleoperated machines to explore and to collect samples for analysis and for eventual return to Earth.  The fastest and cheapest way to do this is  by testing similar manned outpost on the surface of the Moon while skipping expensive stunts like sending humans to asteroids.

    Our robotic program for Mars should actually focus on the moons of Mars to determine if there are substantial quantities of ice in the regolith of Deimos and Phobos that can be conveniently exploited for water, air, and fuel which could allow NASA to cheaply sustain  a permanent space station and reusable landing vehicles in Mars orbit as a prelude to deploying permanent habitat modules on the Martian surface.

    Marcel F. Williams

  3. DTARS says:
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    In another post dogstar said that Spacex had started developing the merlin 2 already? I was not aware of that. Did I miss it here? When did they start working on it? How soon till they might have something to put on a test stand?
    Someone also said in another post how hard it is to land a vehicle on Mars, do its thin atmosphere, which made me wonder how hard would it be to land a lander on mars if you had a fuel depot in mars orbit so that you could use thrust to slow you down? Can’t just a little fuel make mars landing Much easier?
    Shouldn’t all future missions LEO moon mars and beyond , from this day on be designed to put inner solar system Railroad structure in place and or test future railroad structure systems.
    Obvious mission that comes to mind is a human lander  proto type that makes part of its fuel on mars and then launches or hops while there.
    I realize that missions have been cut and it seems to me the time to re think them and include them into  “semi commercial inner solar system railroad building plan”.
    Inner  Solar System Railroad Inc.
    Your Space transportation provider
    PSOh and I thought the Idea of NASA using its exiting office/and work space  FOR R AND  D could sure be wonderful if it was used to help create cheaper flight /fuel to leo.

    • dogstar29 says:
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      AFAIK they have built no hardware yet but have done considerable design work and licensed the needed technology. The design looks quite solid, a traditional F-1 class lox/kerosene engine updated with modern channel wall construction and other changes that facilitate manufacturing. It uses the relatively straightforward gas generator cycle and nozzle extension film cooling of the F-1. Despite its size it appears to be a relatively low risk and low cost design compared with the combination of segmented solids and LH2 engines used on the SLS.
      http://images.spaceref.com/… 

      • DTARS says:
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        • Thanks dogstars and since that engine will most likely fly from earth to mars in the fairly near future. I would say it’s near the topic. Doesn’t NASA need to be concidering human man lander design now to know how to build their robot landers. Shouldn’t the designs be one and the same or easliy modified?
        From the Spacex Texas posts, it seems to me that Spacex will end up doing most all the mission applied R and D as they try to attain their goal. NASA better get off the SLS Orion pork truck pretty soon and start doing smart R and D soon or they will soon be behind in that too!
        Seems to me Steve that we need that Inner Solar Railroad plan now to make smart mars plans! Mars program planning SHOULD be married to the grand plan every one seems scared to write I guess because they are scared to say NASA is trying to settle space.

        Sure wish I knew how!

        Inner Solar System RailRoad Inc.
        Partners with Spacex
        home office and launch based in Texas

        Denise said in global warming post, what we should have done in space to help global warming. Well no time like the present to start doing something right. I think that Spacexs struggle to create a profitable little business may in fact be the spark that one day saves earth from a Venus future.

        Elon Musk is critical path to mars.

        Plan on it NASA

    • Steve Whitfield says:
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      DTARS,

      With respect to Mars landing, it is both easier and harder to land on Mars than on Earth. Because the atmosphere is very thin (its maximum density/pressure is about 0.6% of that at Earth’s surface) a parachute (the cheapest and simplest method) is extremely inefficient. On the other hand, the surface gravity of Mars is much less than that of Earth (about 37.6%), so less decelerating thrust is required, and the landing impact at any velocity will be less. There is a handful of much lesser factors, some plus, some minus, that affect a Mars landing as well, like much higher surface temperature and altitude ranges, with may effect materials requirements and ECS, and therefore mass.

      Parachutes have been used on robot landers and so has rocket thrust. The biggest difference between landing on Mars and Earth is that landing on Mars does not use a single method for deceleration and landing, but a combination of methods (more than one combination has been used) which adds complexity and mass, whereas landing on Earth can (so far) be done on parachutes alone. Generally speaking, to land on Mars you need one or more “slow down” methods and a separate “landing” method.

      I think it’s fair to say that until we develop something that we can think of as anti-gravity, a combination of methods will always be the answer. One consequence of this is that until we have anti-gravity, a Mars mission will require separate vehicles for landing on the two planets (no Millennium Falcon).

      A manned Mars lander will certainly be a bigger challenge than the unmanned robot landers because it will be more massive, and because it won’t tolerate the deceleration and impact rates that the robot landers will. Although a manned lander will be more difficult and less forgiving, there’s really nothing required that we don’t know how to do. It will be the same old force vs. mass trade-offs that have challenged every space mission.

      I hope this helps.

      Steve

      • dogstar29 says:
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        Landing with just parachutes on Earth becomes challenging as mass increases, particularly on land. Soyuz is pretty rough if the decelerator rockets fail. The SRBs have occasionally been dented even landing in water.

        • Steve Whitfield says:
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          DS3,

          Yes, sir. I completely agree. I’m trying to get into the habit of not writing posts that are so long (mine typically ramble on too long), so I had to stop somewhere.

          As for the SRBs being dented (I assume we’re talking Shuttle SRBs), in my opinion, denting them is about the best thing that can happen to them. I consider them to have been a big mistake; a huge stalling point in HSF LV development (although, to be fair, they were chosen and designed long before the Shuttle actually starting flying and much has been learned since then). There is a limit to which you can reasonably scale up any technology, everything considered, and I think Shuttle SRBs were well over the line for an HSF LV. The GEM boosters used on the Delta II were wonderful, a perfect booster for an LV of that size launching unmanned missions, and the fact that you could use none, or one, or anything up to nine (if I remember correctly) was brilliant — for an unmanned mission.

          I have to assume that I’m not the only one who thinks this way since the Atlas V version 402, which has no SRBs, is said to currently be the forerunner in the EELV selection for man rating. Also consider that a human-rated Delta IV Heavy, with the much more powerful USRM solid boosters, has fallen back in the human rating race in spite of its greater lifting capability and the fact that NASA determined that it would be cheaper than any other EELV in the necessary thrust range.

          Putting people on top of massive solid fuel boosters is something I consider to be an inexcusable danger, and yet Constellation was going to do it again (with the most offensive pair of LVs that I’ve ever seen proposed) and its direct descendant, SLS, is planning to do it yet again.

          Well, I guess that’s enough divergence from the topic for one day.

          Steve

      • Ralphy999 says:
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        The Curiosity landing coming up August 6, 2012 will be the largest parachute deployment ever attempted by NASA. Curiosity only weighs one ton but it must be slowed down to 400 knots or less so that the retro/landing rockets can kick in and hover long enough for Curiosity to be lowered down to the ground via cables. *If* this thing works correctly, we will have witnessed one of the most complicated landings since the Eagle landed on the moon.

        It is envisioned that ultimately we want to land *50* tons or more on Mars and still maintain unit integrity. Trust me, this will be just as significant act as the Eagle’s and Curiosity’s landings. A regular parachute just won’t do it. Maybe something like a deployable skirt that is in the same shape as a badminton shuttlecock might work but we just don’t know. We haven’t got that far yet.

        I avidly (and nervously) await August 6.

        • Gonzo_Skeptic says:
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          *If* this thing works correctly, we will have witnessed one of the most complicated landings since the Eagle landed on the moon.

          It had better work.

          People at JPL should have their resumes up to date just in case it doesn’t.  Mars is the god of war and has a nasty history of successfully repelling invaders.

      • DTARS says:
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        Thanks Steve  That helped some.

      • Anonymous_Newbie says:
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        I’d say the 100 times less atmosphere is a substantially bigger penalty than the roughly 2/3 less gravity is a benefit and that Mars EDL is considerably more challenging than Earth EDL.

  4. DTARS says:
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    Use a merlin 2 rocket engine to do Newpapyrus mission sooner and cheaper! 🙂

    Another question dogstar said in another thread that spacex will most likely go to a bigger core with their merlin two to stay simple.

    Can a 7 core rocket be smaller using less fuel. I know fuel is cheap but building BIG rockets is not so wondering about that one.

    Another question I have raised which i don’t think was answered is if you fly a rocket and jet on the same booster/plane and you throttle that rocket engine to keep pressure on the jet engine do you get a plus or is it not enough to over come the drag price of not flying a normal vertical flight path.

    I think this mars re thinking is nice but still think it should be thought of as a part of an inner solar system building plan.

    musk is thinking grand goal cheap flight to another rock. NASA should structure their planning the same way.

  5. dontaskme says:
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    I think the workshop is more related to the $700 mil directed Mars mission for 2017.

    The NASA/OMB decision to go for the directed mission is really a puzzle. It forces us to kill our cooperation with ESA and ExoMars and forgo recommendations by the PSDS. We’re reducing the cadence of our Discovery and New Frontiers missions only to support a mission that the PSDS didn’t recommend and doesn’t have grassroots support (yet) from the science base. (It’s important to mention this is SMD not HEOMD).

    John Grunsfeld & Jim Green’s rationale at LPSC really just tried to cover up how this actually came about. I wish there were a way to democratize the budgeting process like the NAS Decadals…

  6. dannsci says:
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    Do tigers really change their strips?   Can a person that has been in the habit of talking to themselves really have a conversation with person other than themselves?  Can those involved in the status-quo really reformulate a new status-quo?

  7. Doug Booker says:
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    Hmmmm.  Reminds me of a couple weeks ago and all the planning I did for my Powerball winnings.  Oh wait, i didn’t win…

  8. Ricardo Díaz says:
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    I believe younger participants are encouraged to attend: “Student participation in the meeting is encouraged. Ten graduate students who are principal authors of abstracts will be selected to receive travel stipends to attend the meeting.”