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More Water Out There — Ice Found On an Asteroid
Matt_dk writes "For the first time, astronomers have confirmed that an asteroid contains frozen water on its surface. Analysis of asteroid 24 Themis shows evidence of water ice along with organic compounds widespread across the surface. The scientists say these new findings support the theory that asteroids brought both water and organic compounds to the early Earth, helping lay the foundation for life on the planet."
And it makes me wonder where we were looking a few years back.
The Augustine commission reporting to President Obama recommended that we skip LANDING on the Moon and Mars and instead consider progressively deeper space voyages (first to L1 earth moon point, then perhaps L2 earth sun point, then Mars flyby/orbit or asteroid visits). For example astronauts in Mars orbit could send robotic probes to land on Mars which could be much more effective without the 10 minute time lag to earth. (Can you say telepresence?). Visiting comets and asteroids would be a major goal not just for scientific knowledge (and the knowledge as to how to eventually prevent them from hitting us) but ultimately in-situ resource exploitation.
They feel that this approach would lead to "the most steady cadence of steady improvement." and keep us from inconsistent achievements in space (like not leaving earth orbit for 40 years!). Some would say that this approach would be lacking in the photo-ops necessary to maintain interest in the space program (no footprints on Martian soil) but I think there would be plenty of cool vistas (rendezvous with a comet or even orbiting one of the moons of Jupiter assuming they figure out radiation shielding) to keep the taxpayer dollars flowing. The science return would be much greater because it would hopefully utilize both man and machine at their best (robots on one way trips down a gravity well while the humans provide the intuition and flexibility from orbit). If you can figure out radiation shielding and bone loss from zero-g, we could go just about anywhere in the solar system (with a good ion drive and nuclear power plant). Now with the presence of water confirmed on at least (some) of these smaller bodies, they could stay there for long periods of time.
In his 200X books, Arthur C Clarke suggested that China would do space travel on the cheap. But he always had to imagine a (nonexistent) nuclear drive to overcome the energetic considerations of getting to Mars and beyond.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Earth is 70% water or so
No, about 71% of the Earth's surface is covered in water, the total mass of which is about 1.38E18 tons. The Earth weighs about 6E21 tons, so the Earth is about 0.00023% water.
Also:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_water_on_Earth
"Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley
Er... there is a *slight* problem of distance - given that the nearest star is about 8 light years away and we can't even get near light-speed. The furthest object ever made by man is currently dead in terms of power and not that far outside the solar system - but still moving at phenomenal rate.
So, looking for any planet isn't even worth the effort until we solve that problem. In the meantime, we're not caring about *life*, we're caring about *fuel*. Water is (or can be made to be, if you happen to have a large, bright sun nearby or a finite power resource) potential fuel... which means less fuel taken with you, which means more and cheaper space missions to start reaching further places, more "refuelling depots" and a lot less effort expended on space travel in general. The best way to achieve something is to commercialise it. When we're all able to zip to the moon for a few hundred grand, then we can think about visiting other places with probes.
The stable temperature? Not that big an issue in most circumstances - humans have invented a range of devices to control temperature on everything from deep-space satellites to their garden shed. We can't handle the extremes, but the moon is actually quite receptive to us... not as much so as the Earth but a damn sight more so than any other body in the solar system and the vast majority of those yet seen (or their presence indicated) anywhere in the universe (but admittedly, we know only a little about what's out there).
The long-term, fantasy plans should always be looked at. But they should quite rightly be overshadowed by the possibility of actually making local space travel somewhat more convenient... one will breed the other, but it only works that way around.
Get me to the moon, then funding to get me Mars will appear, then funding to get me to Jupiter will appear, then funding to send me to another system will appear. But even the first is almost financially impossible at the moment without some pretty basic technology / base there to help us along.
Thing is that they do have water on them.
Europa
Mars
Neptune
If you go and look up the planets in our solar system, you will notice that most if not all of them list water as part of their composition. It's just that on most of them it's either so cold that the water exists as ice or it's so hot that the water is permanently steam. What's special about the Earth (at least for the moment) is that we have the right temperature for the water to be liquid.
Nuclear energy plus plasma rocket equals nuclear drive.
There's a good chance given the history of Chinese information gathering that they have enough details to get it done. Now the question is, do they want the prize badly enough?
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