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Mars Rover: Tumbleweed Models
An anonymous reader writes "A North Carolina State project has prototyped a wind-blown Mars exploration rover. It draws its inspiration from the lowly tumbleweed, to cover large distances with low-power requirements. For collecting atmospheric, thermal or geological samples across great distances, the 'single-wheel' tumbleweed has some advantages over the usual four-wheeling approach to tough terrain."
I quickly read over the article, and I failed to see any reference to direction of this thing. Now, it would seem to me that it could get blown into a place that it could not get out of. Without some sort of steering mechanism how do they ever plan to work this thing? And of course, since there are no GPS satellites around Mars they couldn't even determine the location, especially if it was picked up by the wind or something. It sounds like a good idea in theory, but it seems to me that the data would be nearly irellivent without positional data to accompany it.
In order to be immortal you must be organize
This is an interesting idea.... but its entire basis for movement -- the wind on Mars -- seems to limit its usefulness to gathering data only on the areas of Mars where winds blow the strongest. Not that there isn't valuable information to be gathered there, but aren't windy areas somewhat of a scientific dead-end? I mean, if this thing ends up following the prevalent wind currents, wouldn't it just sort of follow a relatively smooth path worn away by centuries of wind erosion? The "juicy bits" of Mars are those that have been left more or less untouched for millenia -- those are the areas that give us the greatest insight into the history of the planet... which are precisely the areas that this thing won't be blown to -- and I suspect, where one would find just the sort of rough terrain this probe is built for. Wind has a bad habit of mixing things up -- ie. are these mineral samples native to the area, or have they been carried from the other side of the planet by this wind system?
Optical mouse technology might be the key in atleast determining speed. Assuming there is enough in the way of magnetics on mars, atleast some means of determining direction, in conjuction with an altermeter to determine it's relative height based on known factors. And provided you did some form of arial recon to verify it's position in reality at any given time, the location of such a device can be determined on a planet and (just about) any given time, assuming you have adquate maps to begin with.
Steering, or some form of manual control to actually get this device into or out of a specific location seems somewhat vague to me... but one *could* do it with gyros.
Seems like a great means of getting a land scanner about, provided you happy with where the wind takes you.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
By knowing the landing location, you can extrapolate where you have gone if you have am original bearing and known travel direction.
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A link about things like this:
http://www.nasatech.com/Briefs/Nov01/NPO21235.h
Also you could remote view it if a non landing craft kept track of it
On the other note, the winds are lacking on mars:
Perhaps a solar wind collector?
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast31ja
If you could put 50 of these things down at once, scatter them around.... (They are terribly light-weight, right? Supposed to be blown around by the thin martian wind?) You sprinkle them on mars from orbit, and they expand to catch the wind for re-entry. They bounce a few times, then start tumbling along.
So what if a few get stuck in a crevasse here and there? As far as location tracking, I'd assume they would each have their own radio frequency, and the orbiter would only be able to pick them up when it was over the horizon. Shouldn't be too terribly hard to get a rouch idea where the thing is. (Data sent back from the probe, compared against current mapping images ought to tell the rest of the story)
I like this idea better than building one (or two) big clunky rovers that have a 50/50 chance of surviving Nasa's re-entry math.
That kind of makes me nervous. I don't really like the idea of any sort of "seed" probing like that. For one, it seems like an invasion of sorts. Two, its a recipe for spreading bacteria all over the planet -- despite NASA's stringent cleanliness, the fact of the matter is that some bacteria CAN survive space flight and reentry -- if that happens, and 20 years after we send these things to fly willy-nilly around Mars, how can we tell if these bacteria or whatever are originally from Mars or from Earth? It just seems a wee bit risky to me. *shrug*
This kind of thing has been done since the 1960s at NASA's JPL. See http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/adv_tech/rovers/tmblweed.h tm
SegFault
Seriously, you don't need to control it. After all, you would get much more data if this thing would last for years being blown in random locations then say....the rover having limited access next to base an only lasting for a short period of time. In the end, it amounts to data and cost effectiveness of getting it. I'm all for this concept.
Life is not for the lazy.
...until it gets stuck in a fence or run over on the interstate.
Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.
The plan is to fool the Martians into thinking they are beach balls so they take them home and thus provide lots of useful information.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Kinda weird, but the article claims that "While working as a 2002 summer intern at NASA Langley, team leader David Minton initiated the idea to study a "Mars Tumbleweed" for the class project." Well, that'd be all great and everything if JPL hadn't already come up with the idea: Exploring Mars: Blowing in the Wind?. The JPL article is dated August 10, 2001.
Someone probably should have told David Minton about Jack A. Jones' research at JPL. "Jack A. Jones...is leading JPL's research into various inflatable machines for exploring space. JPL's Inflatable Technology for Robotics Program aims to create rugged, all-terrain vehicles and other devices with low mass and low-packing volume."
Either these are geniune female geeks...
or these guys have groupies!
Picture here and here!
Now I respect their project!
AC
She doesn't seem to mind.
NASA girls rock.
Couldn't they try a cluster bomb approach? have tiny little sensors communicating to a main section using radio. When the device is falling into the atmosphere, these sections could be ejected over a large area.
Design the tumbleweed sphere with a helium bottle inside. Add a valve to vent the helium to the outside. If there has been no detected movement of the sphere for a day or two, inflate with helium until it attains slightly positive bouyancy. Drift off for a few hours and then open the vent, settling back to the ground. Let the wind blow it around in tumbleweed mode until it stops.
Rinse.Repeat.
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
I don't really like the idea of any sort of "seed" probing like that
/.
Too late; it's been going on for a couple of billion years already.
In the 1960's (and probably earlier) a number of astronomers did detailed studies of the Earth's dust tail, which is formed by the solar wind blowing off the outermost atmosphere. It's pretty thin, but it's thick enough that it interferes with some sorts of astronomy.
They basically reported that the Earth's tail does contain particles of dust up to the size of bacterial spores. Tests had already shown that many bacterial spores can survive for long periods in space, the conclusion was obvious: The Earth has been spraying the outer solar system with bacterial spores for as long as bacteria have been making airborn spores, probably several billion years.
So there is life on all the outer planets in the solar system, and it came from Earth. Whether any of those spores can survive elsewhere isn't known. But conditions on Mars are not all that dissimilar to conditions in the dry valleys in Antarctica, and some bacteria do survive and grow there. So it's possible that some of the bacteria from Earth are surviving and growing there, though probably not very well. OTOH, some have been there for a couple billion years, so there has been time for natural selection to do its thing.
Some of the astronomers also pointed out back then that the Earth's dust tail doesn't stay within the solar system. It eventually reaches interstellar space. Considering that the Earth orbits the galaxy about 4 times per billion years, and bacteria have been here for around 4 billion years, the dust tail of Earth has pretty much permeated the galaxy with spores. Similar calculations would apply to any other Earth-like planet in the galaxy.
This sort of calculation is part of the basic of the "panspermia" hypothesis that has gotten a bit of discussion in some circles. Of course, it's a bit difficult to collect real evidence on such a topic.
But if we do find living bacteria on Mars or Titan that have chemistry similar to bacteria on Earth, it will be weak supportive evidence.
This isn't the first time this topic has come up on
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.