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ESA Aiming for Martian Probe in 2011

Posted by Zonk on from the round-trip dept.

allanj writes "According to the BBC, the ESA is set to send a robotic probe to Mars around 2011. They apparently want to return samples of Martian soil with the probe - cool idea if it works better than Beagle 2 did..." From the article: "They still require a great deal of further detail and the agency's member states will also have to sign off the mission. Ministers will have their say when the Esa Council meets in December."

6 of 131 comments (clear)

  1. Is this it? by QuantumG · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Is our current level of technology the end state for space probes? It seems we hear about a new mission every week built with the same old technology. I mean, SMART-1 was a different story, it was new technology and the mission was simply to test fly it. That's what we should be doing isn't it? Flying new technology so we can get to Mars in two weeks instead of two years.

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    How we know is more important than what we know.
    1. Re:Is this it? by fsh · · Score: 2, Interesting
      If you assume that you're going from Earth's orbit to Mars' orbit (1AU to 1.5AU) straight out (about 75 million km), then it would indeed take about 48 hours the way you describe.

      In the real world you also have to get out of Earth's gravity, fight against the Sun's gravity, and then push against Mars' gravity to avoid crashing.

      You also have to consider that when leaving Earth, you still have Earth's tangential velocity, which is much greater than Mars' (via Kepler's third law). The best way to go from Earth's orbit to Mars' orbit is a Hohmann transfer (about 400 million km). Say an object in orbit needs to go to a higher orbit. You don't fire your thrusters against gravity, you fire them in the direction of your orbit. Of course it's impossible for a chemical rocket to fire that long; the heat buildup would destroy the engine. That's why all current missions get the necessary velocity in one quick push.

      And of course the new technologies will be better, but they either don't exist or they are being tested (SMART-1 had several problems in it's 14 *month* journey to the moon). While NASA hasn't launched an ion-drive mission they most certainly *have* tested such engines, as well as the nuclear thermal propulsion engines. The problem is, as I said, economics. There's absolutely no reason to get a scientific mission to mars in a two week timeline.

      Finally, when you say We should be testing new technologies, you make it seem like we aren't testing new technologies. For a list of just the projects that NASA is funding, check out the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts That page shows projects working on all of the propulsion technologies you mentioned. Other independent researchers are looking into all of the concepts you mentioned, and more.

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      fsh
  2. Re:Metric by MouseR · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Although it's widely speculated that they had estimated the martian atmospheric pressure in PSIs for Beagle II.

  3. Re:Is it me, or are we as humans wasting time... by QuantumG · · Score: 3, Interesting

    If the mars rovers were to discover proof that there is still life on Mars it would be in the interest of every pharmaceutical company on earth to get that sample into their lab before their competitor. One alien microbe would be worth more than a zillion times its weight in gold. The ability to study a new form of life would give us so much insight into the life sciences that we could help many more "folks" than if we shut our eyes and turn our back on the universe.

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    How we know is more important than what we know.
  4. Re:Yep, that's it. by QuantumG · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Well commercial interests are supposed to push this, but there's simply no market for it yet, so we're dependant on government funding. Hopefully that will change in the next 20 years. Here's some cool space propulsion technology. When will we see a flight test of this stuff?

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
  5. Re:The next logical step by Seumas · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The next logical step is to just close the space agencies and start worshipping sun-gods. Seriously, we went to the moon in 1969. As of almost 36 years later, we haven't touched won on any other surface again - including the moon.

    Thing of all the advances we've made in 36 years. And in 1969, the advances we'd made since 1933. Sure, we've advanced a few other aspects of space and astronomy - but not the most basic of exploratory measures. Man.

    I was born after the moon landing. I currently wonder if I will actually live to see man go anywhere else in my life time. And if I do, will it be a one-shot thing that doesn't happen for the rest of my life time? Considering nothing has happened in almost four decades, what cause is there to believe anything will change in the next four? Especially with the direction, management and attitude by, of and regarding the various space agencies?

    In retrospect, it's a bit sad that the biggest moment of the generation or two before me was putting a man on the moon while the biggest moment of mine was watching a bunch of civillians blow up on launch a couple decades ago and a bunch of people blow up on re-entry a couple years ago.