That would be both unethical and unscientific, Lynch said. After all, she said, one of the main reasons we're exploring Mars is to determine if Earth is the only world to host life. Follow him on Twitter michaeldwall.
Follow us on Twitter Spacedotcom or Facebook. Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: community space. View Deal. Mike Wall. See all comments We can't even manage our own planet. We don't belong on other worlds until we can live on our own without destroying it. I suspect this is pretty typical. The massive new tonne SLS, combined with the Orion capsule, will enable astronauts to explore beyond the safety of low Earth orbit for the first time since the end of the Apollo Moon programme in Although any long duration mission is also likely to employ a habitation module, giving the crew a bit more room to move around in, the nine month trip to Mars is going to be uncomfortable and boring.
It could also be extremely dangerous. If humankind is to reach Mars, we will need rockets more powerful than anything built before Nasa. Quite apart from the risks of launch the recent Antares rocket explosion proves we should never take this for granted , during the transit to Mars the crew will be exposed to damaging levels of radiation that will significantly increase their risks of developing cancer.
For anyone looking to have healthy Martian children see below , cosmic radiation could also harm sperm and eggs. Landing safely on Mars is also a challenge. Nasa used an innovative skycrane to lower its one-tonne Curiosity rover onto the surface in The Orion capsule weighs almost 10 tonnes and that is before you factor in any service module or landing rockets.
The agency is currently developing giant inflatable heatshields designed to slow spacecraft as they approach Mars, making landing larger craft feasible.
The good news is that getting to Mars in one piece is essentially an engineering challenge but, speaking at the BBC Future World-Changing Ideas Summit, former Nasa astronaut Jeff Hoffman put his finger on a far bigger issue. Having successfully landed on Mars you need air, water, food and power to survive. In the short term you could rely on supplies brought from Earth or sent on supply missions but eventually you are going to have to produce your own.
Evidence suggests that Mars was once awash with water — with lakes, rivers and oceans. Today, it is highly likely there is still water at the ice caps and possibly under the surface. Extracting water from urine and sweat through an efficient recycling system — pioneered on the International Space Station ISS — will certainly help, but will not be enough to sustain a community, so tapping into a local water source will be essential.
Producing food on Mars could be much more difficult. The non-profit Mars Society has been experimenting with growing food in its isolated desert research station in Utah. One of the big challenges will be growing food away from Earth Getty Images. This dramatically illustrated the increasing launch capability for future missions made available by partnerships between commercial and government agencies.
But six months later, the plans have started to look more like fantasy. The lake would be 1. This was found from analysis of subsurface radar data from the Mars Express spacecraft. The water is thought to be briny, with the likely magnesium, calcium, and sodium perchlorate salts acting as an antifreeze down to temperatures of perhaps K This is exciting as it is the first definitive detection of liquid water on Mars, and it is possible that there may be further deep lakes elsewhere on the planet.
This means there is a real possibility of current life on Mars. We already knew life could have existed on Mars in the past. There are several pieces of evidence indicating that Mars was habitable 3. Genetic modification would be supplemented by cyborg technology—indeed there may be a transition to fully inorganic intelligences. Indeed, modifying humans to make them adaptable to living on Mars will require dramatic changes. Our DNA would have to be tailored specifically to enable a long, healthy life on Mars, including genetic tweaks for good muscle, bone, and brain health.
These traits could be made heritable, such that Martian colonists could pass down the characteristics to their offspring. In cases where biology is not up for the task, scientists could use cybernetic enhancements, including artificial neurons or synthetic skin capable of fending off dangerous UV rays.
Nanotechnology in the form of molecular machines could deliver medicines, perform repair work, and eliminate the need for breathing and eating. Collectively, these changes would result in an entirely new species of human—one built specifically for Mars. Synthetic biologist and geneticist Craig Venter believes this is a distinct possibility—and a tantalizing prospect. And it may not even happen. Which brings a rather discouraging prospect to mind: We may be stuck on Earth.
As Friedman pointed out, this carries some rather heavy existential and philosophical implications. Which is a good point. That we may eventually become an interplanetary or interstellar species remains an open question.
We must work to make this futuristic prospect a reality, but until then, we have to make sure that Earth—the only habitable planet we know of—remains that way.
I think humans will out-breed our ability to feed ourselves long before colonies outside our biosphere become independently viable. Humans are an evolutionary experiment.
An experiment that had vast possibilities but has the fatal flaw of hubris. We think we are in charge, but Nature herself is a cruel mother. She only provides us with a limited amount of resources, and we are burning through them at an enormous rate. In the interim billions will die. The A.
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