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New Kind of Orbit Could Ease Mars Communications
japan_dan writes "An interesting way to enable Earth-Mars communication when the Sun occludes the direct radio line-of-sight: ESA proposes placing a pair of continuous-thrusting relay satellites, using a solar electric propulsion system — one in front and ahead of Mars, the other behind and below — with both following non-Keplerian, so-called 'B-orbits'. This means the direction of thrust is perpendicular to the satellites' direction of flight, allowing them to 'hover' with both Earth and Mars in view. Quoting from the Q&A: 'We found that a pair of relay satellites would only have to switch on their thrusters for about 90 days out of every 2.13-year period, and this solution would only increase the one-way signal travel time by one minute, so it could be effective.'" Here is the paper describing non-Keplerian orbits (PDF).
That's good news for the diplomatic Human / Martian relations.
... to park such a device at L4 or L5, where you wouldn't require *ANY* fuel to keep it in position?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Houston> We haven't talked for a day, what's up?
Mars rover> Hey, I moved one meter!
Houston> No shit!
I agree, even 6 year-olds are doing it.
Yeah nothing that NASA has done has affected your life in the positive. Lets just wait for private enterprise to go there.
The only reason private enterprise is able to *think about* real space travel is because they are using the ~40 years of NASA knowledge and research.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/ten-nasa-inventions.htm
Ok so this is really basic, but also aerogel, and a laundry list of other things.
Being on Mars is really cool, and we have learned a lot about it. But as for usefulness it tells us maybe mining Mars wouldn't be that profitable (but did we know that before). But all the stuff they used to get to Mars, that shit trickels down FAST. I mean I personally believe that SSDs on the rovers are wat put them into the main stream. They lasted in a super harsh enviroment orders of magnitude longer than they were supposed to. So keep thinking all NASA produces is cool photos.
My addiction: Arguing with idiots. AKA Slashdot!
This is slightly tangential, but worth noting I think:
This will be handy when we can't afford to lose contact with Mars for even a few days, but there's a bigger problem lurking in inter-planetary communications: bandwidth. We don't really have enough Deep Space Network dishes (particularly, the large 70-m ones) to talk to all of our missions as much as we should. We're sacrificing data collection on billion-dollar missions on a daily basis on the grounds that we don't have enough bandwidth to get it back. When we put people or even just more missions on Mars, that'll only get worse.
Sorry, I tried to read the summary but I didn't make it past 'continually-thrusting'.
What are you doing at a nerd site? Money is the LAST thing a nerd is thinking of when (s)he thinks of space. Space is for technological and scientific advancement. Sue, there will be money made in the future, but private enterprise operates on the next fiscal quarter.
NASA is doing ot because (duh) THERE'S NO MONEY IN SPACE EXPLORATION and money is the only reason for private enterprise to even exist.
Free Martian Whores!
Would it?
Mars has an aphelion (maximum distance from sun) of 250 Gm, and the Earth has an aphelion of 150 Gm. So when the sun is occluding their line of sight, they are on opposite sides of the sun and are separated by at most 400 Gm. If you had a satellite in the Earth's L4 or L5 point, then this would form a 150,350,400 Gm triangle with Mars. Thus the total signal distance would be 500 Gm. This would add 100 Gm, increasing the transit time by 5.5 minutes (from 22.2 to 27.7 minutes). Not as good as the solution presented but not twice as long.
Placing these in the Earth's orbit, rather than Mars', would have the added advantage of solving the solar occlusion problem for anything we send out into the solar system, not just for things on Mars.
"Surely there is a stable point somewhere above the sun?"
No.
Gravity is always pulling you down, but there are places in the solar system where gravity balances out. These are called Lagrange points and space agencies use them as stable places to put spacecraft. If you're not in one of those places, you're happily going to fall on/in-to the object or end up in some sort of orbit going around the object, but you're not going to be motionless or synced up with anything.
All stable points within our solar system (L1/L5) are on the ecliptic plane iirc.
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
Hey, ISP is in seconds, it's an industry standard.
But it shouldn't be. N*s/kg is the correct unit for specific impulse. "Seconds" is only used by American engineers who don't understand the difference between weight and mass.
When I was a kid I was deeply interested in space, but it wasn't until years later that I understood the meaning of Isp because of the idiotic convention of designating it in seconds, rather than force*time/mass, which makes its meaning completely obvious.
If you want to turn people off an understanding of the most basic aspects of space travel, by all means go ahead and keep using seconds for Isp. But it's really time for the United States to get with the rest of the world and abandon Imperial units, although I guess as an imperial power they seem like a natural fit.
[Ok, now wondering if this'll get more "troll" or "flamebait" mods. It should probably lean toward "flamebait", as the story is true: Isp in seconds really did confuse me for years. The egregious America-bashing is, well, egregious, so probably warrants a flamebait mod. But really, what's with the Imperial units, kids?]
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.