Mission to Mars (19 page)

Singer and I were accomplices in early Case for Mars conferences, staged in Boulder, Colorado, starting in 1981 and convened by maverick and passionate members of the “Mars Underground”—motivated largely by wanting to push the throttle forward on reactivating humans-to-Mars planning.

Singer has had an enduring enthrallment with Phobos and Deimos and yet he remains perplexed as to how and why the Mars moons came to be. He favors Deimos as the place to establish a human-tended laboratory. Being higher above Mars, it’s easier to get to and is nearly in synchronous orbit, a far better situation from which to observe and operate equipment on the planet below, he suggests.

We agree on the plan for teleoperation of Mars machinery from either Phobos or Deimos. The light-speed distance, even coupled with relay satellites circling Mars, is far shorter than what takes place now between Earth ground control and the NASA Curiosity and Opportunity rovers. Getting closer to Mars permits nearly real-time, fraction-of-a-second teledirection of robotic surface equipment on the planet. There’s very little delay, within human reaction time.

The grandest of canyons on Mars: Valles Marineris

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Illustration Credit 6.2
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An added bonus is that the moons of Mars are airless. It’s a free vacuum provided by Mother Nature, a real advantage as an environment in which to carry out scientific research on site. For one, specimens collected and rocketed off Mars could be assessed on a Martian moon, thereby curbing forward- and back-contamination worries. That is, you lessen the scene of humans fouling the samples snared on Mars and diminish the risk of nasty Martian biology doing harm to Earth’s biosphere when specimens are lugged back to a Mars moon only—in essence, it becomes a bio-barrier between the two planets.

By placing a crew-occupied laboratory/control station on either Phobos or Deimos, an assortment of probes, penetrators, and rovers can be controlled on Mars. Far more of the planet can be reconnoitered, more so than a landed crew could achieve.
After all, Mars is vast. It’s a huge planet with a lot of real estate, some of it very hazardous in terms of crevasses, caves, steep hills, giant canyons, and high mountains. Better to lose a robot or two than have a person face a deadly predicament.

This is exemplified by new research from the University of California, Los Angeles. In 2012 An Yin, a professor of earth and space sciences, unveiled new data that inform our understanding of plate tectonics on Mars. Using information and images from Mars orbiters, he announced that Mars is at a primitive stage of plate tectonics, pointing to two plates divided by Mars’s Valles Marineris, calling them Valles Marineris North and Valles Marineris South. That geologic feature is the longest and deepest system of canyons in our solar system. If the existence of plate tectonics on Mars holds true, it may well bolster the odds that the planet was an extraterrestrial address for life at some point in its past. Therefore, close-up study of this area is warranted, plausibly by low-flying robotic craft that could deploy seismometers, as the site may be rife with landslides, even Mars-quakes.

Setting up a lab/control center on one moon of Mars also allows humans to voyage to the other. This sortie by space taxi would be of great value scientifically, enabling a comparative sampling of both moons. Are they made of the same stuff? Do they have a common origin? As Singer suggests, we simply don’t know. Phobos and Deimos are probably the cheapest source of raw materials in the solar system, because the Delta-v penalty is so low. This means that a small, propulsive effort is needed to change from one trajectory to another by making an orbital maneuver. It takes relatively little rocket thrust to transport resources from these mini-worlds due to their small size and, therefore, low gravity.

In early August 2012 the one-ton, nuclear-powered Curiosity robot successfully made Mars its home. This car-size rover is NASA’s most advanced precursor mechanized system yet, factory equipped with scientific instruments, cameras, and a robot arm and ready to roll on six wheels for years.

Curiosity’s parts are parallel to what a human brings to Mars: body, brains, eyes, arms, and legs. The robot uses antennas for “speaking” and “listening.” The one-way communication delay with Earth varies from 4 to 22 minutes, depending on the relative position of our planet and Mars: 12.5 minutes is the average. Curiosity can attain a roaring top speed on flat, hard ground of 1.5 inches a second, equating to some 450 feet an hour.

On one hand, robots are able to cope with the surly climes of Mars while carrying out boring, risky, or dull jobs. On the other hand, humans bring perception, speed and mobility, dexterity, and an inquisitive nature.

Combining the two is opening up a new paradigm in space exploration. “Telepresence” makes use of low-latency communication links that can put human cognition on other worlds. Low-latency yields the appearance of “being there” in a way that is near real-time believable.

The ability to extend human cognition to the moon, Mars, near-Earth objects, and other accessible bodies helps limit the challenges, cost, and risk of placing humans on perilous surfaces or within deep gravity wells.

Let me point out the advances in telerobotics here on Earth. Human cognition and dexterity are already reaching the deepest oceans, pulling out resources from dangerous mines, performing
high-precision surgery from a distance—all this as aerial drones, piloted by humans in far-off command centers, fly overhead.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover takes a self-portrait
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Illustration Credit 6.3
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My close friends Robert Ballard and James Cameron can attest to telepresence-enabled undersea exploration, operating vehicles outfitted with high-definition video cameras, sensors, and manipulator arms—run from a mission control. Teleoperation of underwater equipment is also a routine task performed by those maintaining deep-sea oil rigs.

The counterpart in space, albeit showcasing low-quality telepresence, was used decades ago by controllers in the Soviet Union. They wheeled about their automated Lunokhods on the moon. More recently, recall the plucky Spirit and Opportunity Mars rovers run by NASA, precursors to the now-on-Mars Curiosity mega-robot.

Telepresence, low-latency telerobotics, and human spaceflight are leading to redefining what constitutes an “explorer.”

A leading champion of exploration telepresence is Dan Lester of the Department of Astronomy at the University of Texas in Austin. Lester tackles the serious concern about how this strategy meshes with our historical concept of “exploration.” Telepresence may be effective, and it may be cheap, but if it’s not seen as “out there” exploration, it’s not going to take hold. Lester’s perspective, however, is that putting human cognition in faraway places—if not human flesh, boots on the ground—is a key new capability.

Lester has observed that decades ago when Neil Armstrong and I reached the moon’s surface, the only way to put human cognition there was to dig our boots into the ground. That’s what we did. But it’s no longer the only option.

A piloted craft designed for deep-sea exploration faces challenges similar to those of crafts designed for outer space
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Illustration Credit 6.4
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High-quality telepresence from an Earth-moon Lagrangian point allows a high degree of human cognition and dexterity to be expressed via lunar surface telerobotic surrogates. Lester sees even more significant advantages at Mars, due to the vastly longer two-way latency between Earth and the red planet. Putting humans close enough to an exploration site to ensure cognition—that is, in many respects, what human spaceflight is for.

What is more, telepresence/on-orbit telerobotics is not destination specific. We’ll first need to earn our telepresence stripes at the moon and on Mars, using these technologies to explore, scout out mining opportunities, and pre-position habitats without need of on-site, space-suited astronauts. That first Mars base built before human occupancy should not offer sparse living conditions. It should be regal, well thought out, fail-safe; and it should be assembled with care, thanks to distantly operated telerobotics.

Teleoperation at Mars will prepare us. Mars simply tops the list of future destinations to explore. There are plenty of spots ripe for human cognition to encounter, like roaming across hellish Venus and sunbaked Mercury—perhaps even “teleboating” across the liquid ethane and methane lakes of Saturn’s moon Titan.

We begin the challenge with our mission to Phobos or Deimos, then Mars.

Plans for the march to Mars have been percolating within the larger space engineering community. Lockheed Martin has shaped one, based on their Orion spacecraft design. The
result is a wished-for undertaking called Project Red Rocks to explore the outermost moon of Mars, Deimos. The aerospace firm sees the proposal as the penultimate stride before boot prints adorn the red planet.

A Project Red Rocks fact sheet from the firm suggests: “Sending astronauts to Deimos will demonstrate key technologies that will be needed for subsequent human Mars landings.” The best near-term opportunities to send humans toward Mars, based on Project Red Rocks, would be in 2033 and 2035, thanks to a melding of orbital mechanics, propulsion needs, and a lessening of crew exposure to cosmic radiation. For a 2033 mission, according to company experts, equipment and supplies can be launched in January 2031 and deployed to Mars orbit ahead of time. A Deimos-bound crew would then say goodbye to Earth in 2033, spend 18 months orbiting Mars, and then return to their home planet in November 2035.

Why Deimos? Lockheed Martin space officials see that moon as having a sweet spot, a site near the “arctic circle” on Deimos that offers ten months of continuous sunlight during the Martian summer, enabling the use of simple solar power systems. Astronauts would have direct line of sight to Earth and to rovers on the surface of Mars, simplifying communications, according to the aerospace company.

The view of Mars from Deimos would be stunning. For instance, Olympus Mons alone, the great volcanic mountain on the planet, would be roughly three times wider than the full moon seen from Earth.

Sending astronauts to Deimos will demonstrate key technologies that will be needed for subsequent human Mars
landings, such as reliable life-support recycling systems, long-term cryogenic propellant storage, and the biomedical technology to protect astronauts from the effects of microgravity and space radiation, according to Josh Hopkins, principal investigator at Lockheed Martin for advanced human exploration missions. There are things required for the interplanetary trip in space from Earth to Mars and back, he adds, and then there are the challenges specific to actually landing and operating on Mars itself. A journey to Deimos is very similar to the
in-space parts of a trip to Mars in terms of distance, duration, and environment.