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NASA Needs Prize Contest Ideas
Michael Huang writes "If you like the idea of tech contests--think ANSARI X PRIZE and DARPA Grand Challenge--and you also like space, then NASA wants you. It needs ideas (and rules) for the Centennial Challenges, prize contests with $20 million funding in 2005. Current ideas (download Excel spreadsheet) include: Mars and asteroid microspacecraft missions, lunar robotic landing, robotic triathalon, rover survivor, Antarctic rover traverse and extreme environment computer. Wikipedia has good coverage."
Artificial Intelligence. I mean robots, space missions, even just regular things are all cool, but Artificial intelligence would enhance them all. It would allow for more unmanned space flights, and lessen the amount of direct attention necessary for some given projects. Not to say that we are to rely on AI solely, but that it can be a great aide in what NASA is trying to do, and it would help other realms of science as well.
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Part of the problem about using AI is that it is kind of an umbrella term which covers everything from expert systems, neural nets, adaptive computing, machine vision. Also AI techniques aren't always the best way to approach large engineering type tasks like space missions. While getting neural nets to perform intelligent behavious is helping our understanding what intelligence is and how it works most of these technologies just aren't ready for prime time yet
I have discovered a truly remarkable sig which this post is too small to contain.
how about a prize to the group that clears out all of the dead fodder and restructures them?
Here's what I would do if I were to design a space contest: I would establish a contest so that the first person to collaborate with Dr. Robert Zubrin and get a human to Mars within 5 years would not only be rich beyond the dreams of avarice, but would become the most famous person on the planet. I would also sell ads like crazy, since that would get the funding needed - corporations would love to sponsor the first human Mars landing. It might be a tad tacky or crass, but it would get the job done. And then we would have a human on Mars within three years. ;)
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duh. that is so 50's-era.
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So weird. "Satellite Cameras" are the reason you can buy a cheap CCD at Fry's for $15, right next to the snap-dried ice cream
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
The Navy has been using submarines with nuclear power sources and life support systems for decades.
... ain't no room for grow rooms in those torpedo bays, aaiiighht!
... ;)
Yeah. That is true. But are they growing their own food?
The Navy isn't self-sustaining. U-boots still need a supply convoy and system if they wanna stay out there
yo. just imagine your grow room scenario on a trident-class submarine
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Innovations which address obstacles which have stood in the way of technological development in science would be of highest priority, were I to enter. Barriers in science such as the claim that NASA don't have the technology to fit a de-orbit module onto the Hubble so that it's eventual re-entry into earth doesn't threaten human lives, could be avoided. It would save a lot of time, money and other valuable resources including human labour if future obstacles were addressed in the design of new scientific material, instead of attempting to tackle the problem when its too late.
You mean by including their schedule on the NASA web page as a web page rather than a downloadable Excel file?
I see one of the biggest things holding back the computer industry is the lack of a good battery. I want a battery that can power a laptop for a couple of years. We need more power!
These challenges are not the same as X-Prize, as they have shifted from ones directly competing with NASA (e.g. independent, private launch capabilities) towards ones more complimentary to NASA (e.g. better Astronaut gloves, robotic insects).
If the US Government wants to encourage more independent space resarch, the Congress and President must work together to establish goals INDEPENDENT of NASA. One possibility is to simply have the Congress double the prize money for the next few X-Prizes once those details are finalized.
NASA will NOT spend its money to pay for the development of a competing private space industry.
The world will not get better through technology. We must seek to be better people.
Easy contest to define, but maybe not so easy to win. Just specify the material properties needed for a practical space elevator, and offer a sizeable prize to the first group to present a sample of a certain size.
Also, you could offer annual prizes for the best results each year, even if they don't meet the final prize criteria. At least that'd give the research groups a short-term goal to reach for.
Also, nuclear submarines generate their Oxygen by splitting watter into H2 and O2.
Unless someone's found a decent source of water on Mars, the technology doesn't apply.
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What I think makes the most sense is a skinsuit worn under a hardsuit. This way, you're protected from impacts, but if your suit should get holed you're still protected. Seal the helmet away from the rest of the suit, of course, so that if your chestplate gets holed you can still breathe.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Even if the exit of the railgun was on top of Mt Everest, you are still deep within the sensible atmosphere, and miles and miles below where boosters normally add their speed. (Boosters normally go more-or-less straight up, then bend their trajectories over to add the horizontal velocity needed to reach orbit.) Given the amount of atmosphere you have to traverse after leaving the railgun, you need to leave it at much higher than orbital speed, to offset for drag, that you have a truly frightful thermal problem.
Another issue often handwaved away by EM launcher supporters is the need for a propulsion system for the circularization burn. Lunar surface-Lx railguns don't need these systems because they are not going into orbit around the launching body. Earth-to-orbit systems however do and generally end up being around half the total throweight at the launch systems muzzle. (Just having a projectile traveling at orbital velocity is meaningless. The *direction* of the velocity vector is all important, and EM launchers cannot produce the proper vector.)
The final problem is the extreme G factor typical of EM launches. This causes structural weight to dominate total throweight, to the great detriment of payload fraction and total payload throughtput of the launcher. (In theory the structure can be recovered as raw material at the target, but in practice you end up with more raw material than you can use.)
Why would you be so convinced? EM launchers are simply not practical in the near term, and are likely to remain so indefinetly to Earth-to-Orbit operations. There are simply too many practical problems.I do like the original poster's comments about using a railgun as an assist to get some initial velocity onto a rocket using a railgun right at launch. As he pointed out, a not insignificant percentage of the fuel is burned just trying to clear the launch tower itself... if the tower were a railgun instead, you could get some initial velocity from the launch system, just like aircraft carriers give some initial airspeed to jet fighters through a steam catapult system aboard ship. This isn't to say the fighters couldn't get airborne on their own, unassisted, but it does help to reduce costs of the carrier (they can have a smaller runway for launching fighters) and helps to get the fighters up to speed necessary to begin combat engagements earlier (this protects the ship as well).
Keep in mind that the reason NASA launches spacecraft from Florida instead of New York is in part because the rotational energy of the Earth itself can be added to the orbital delta-v of the rocket to achieve orbit. The Russians put their launch complex in Kazakstan for the very same reason (instead of near Murmansk and launching over the Arctic Ocean).
EM launchers as weapons I'm sure are being investigated. Getting a hunk of Lead or Uranium up to Mach 15-20 has many very good uses in trying to defend against other object that are also travling at Hypersonic speeds (like ICBMs). If that chunk of metal melts from atmospheric drag, it really doesn't matter.
I would have to agree though that EM launchers are more pratical in a vacuum environment (like the Moon) or some extraterrestial mining application rather than something that comes from a planet with an atmosphere. A man-rated vehicle that can be launched from the moon would also be interesting.
An alternative approach I have seen is to have a very powerful laser system help supply the energy of a launch system, where the laser is at the launch site and the ship only has mirrors and limited attitude thrusters. The problem with this approach is that the energy requirements to get this to work are incredible, and really havn't been work out that well. It gives a bonus that you can control rather precisely the acceleration of the vehicle, and the energy production is on the ground, not on the craft being accelerated. Even if this were only the 1st stage of the rocket, it would significantly cut costs.