Re: The Mars Landing Approach: Getting Large Payloads to the Surface of the Red Planet


John Schilling wrote:
On Sun, 22 Jul 2007 18:16:22 -0700, Einar <einarbb@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:



According to, "biologists".

Thing is, when biologists actually have something important to say, they
have a process for that which is somewhat more rigorous and formal than
leaking it anonymously to a web-site columnist.

And on the other hand, when journalists of any sort report on scientific
or technical matters, they usually botch the job.

This is why, in scientific or technical matters, "cite" means something
fairly specific, and that is a reference to an article in a peer-reviewed
journal in an appropriate field. And if you didn't know this, I'm pretty
sure Bob Berman and the folks at astronomy.com do. So if that "13-40%"
number is real, and something they're willing to stand behind, they'd have
put a proper citation at the end of their article.

Since that appears to be in the subscription-only part of astronomy.com,
and since you apparently have access, could you go dig up the cite for us?


--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
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This is the complete article:

"Bob Berman's strange universe: Space-travel woes
October 2006: Will humans colonize other worlds? Many astronomers hate
the whole thing.
Bob Berman
Bob Berman
Will humans colonize other worlds? This science-fiction theme often
seems like our inevitable destiny. Acting on it, NASA now has specific
plans to return to the Moon, along with vague plans for Mars. But will
it really happen?

Many astronomers hate the whole thing.

Such astro-luminaries as Berkeley's Geoffrey Marcy and NASA's Fred
Espenak bemoan cuts to science programs to make room for expensive
manned missions.

As for the public, it lost interest in Apollo after the first Moon
landing in 1969. Returning to the Moon may ignite the same media
excitement as a seniors' Sudoku tournament. Will three future
administrations get on board, knowing that voters won't care even if
they slice Moon funding to match the government's budget for studying
pelicans?

Mars, on the other hand, remains exciting. It probably has underground
ice, which means water for astronauts. Solar panels could dissociate
ice into hydrogen and oxygen fuel. Let's go!

Not so fast. There's a dark side here, too. We've had major hints that
manned space travel might be a dangerous bummer.
We've had major hints hat manned space travel might be a dangerous
bummer.
"I found it extremely boring," assessed Wally Schirra after 11 days of
commanding the first Apollo spacecraft. Well, he was sort of a crank,
but what about the Russians who spent years in simulators and aboard
Mir? They often got seriously depressed. True, they're Russians: Ever
read a Russian novel? Nonetheless, they'd grow plants and then check
them a half dozen times a day, lovingly and obsessively touching the
only natural thing in their module.

"I suffered sadness and mental stress," said Anatoly Grigoriev after
438 days in space.

Vadim Gushin adds, "The plants helped us establish ties with Earth,
with nature. This is the essence with which the human mind is based."

Duh! Of course! Humans evolved to hear rustling leaves and interface
with wind and pollen, to be immersed in nature.

Isolate a person with bottled air, fluorescents, and plastics, and who
knows what psychological damage must follow? Spending years away from
Earth could drive astronauts loony.

But it's not just the mind. As results trickle in from the
International Space Station and elsewhere, astrobiologists grow more
concerned, not less, about the long-term consequences of space travel.

In orbit, bone and muscle vanish at 1 percent per month, and some of
this loss is irreversible. Hearts shrink in size, so cardiac capacity
goes steadily downhill. Astronauts might look like they're happily at
the gym up there, on the treadmill in their underwear, but it's
hopeless: Space is just not good for you.

Things really get bad when you leave orbit and pass outside Earth's
magnetosphere, the barrier against solar and cosmic radiation. Apollo
astronauts all saw flashes like meteors cross their visual fields
about once a minute, as heavy ions ripped through their brains. Their
radiation exposure was not trivial, and, years later, Alan Shepard
didn't deny that going to the Moon may have given him the leukemia
that eventually killed him.

Things could have been worse. A coronal mass ejection blasted the Moon
with charged particles just 1 month before the final Apollo 17
mission. Had the astronauts been on the surface - or in their capsule
going or coming - they would have died.

Okay, so we build a shielded "safe room" on the Mars-bound craft.
Problem is, the Red Planet has no magnetosphere. Gamma rays and X rays
from distant supernovae rain down on the surface, along with those
pesky charged particles from the Sun. The continuous ionizing
background flux disqualifies that planet as a health spa.

High cancer risk aside, brain neurons will be destroyed continuously
by the nonstop radiation. Biologists estimate that during a 2-year
Mars mission, an astronaut may lose between 13 and 40 percent of her
or his brain! Ouch! Even smart people can't afford that. It greatly
exceeds the 5 percent annual neuron necrosis suffered by some
Alzheimer's patients.

Once at the Red Planet, astronauts will have to fend for themselves:
There'll be no ride home for at least 18 months after arrival, when
Earth and Mars again align. You're on a place without breathable air.
It's always freezing. Radiation is giving you a splitting headache.
The pizza's terrible.

Still want to go?

Maybe nobody else will either.

Heroic astronauts are always willing to risk their lives for science.
But except for those with serious credit-card debt, ordinary folks
might not want to rush off-world if the hazards are too high.

Time will tell. But just in case Earth proves to be our only home,
maybe we should take care of it."


He didn´t bother to cite his source, that does not mean it doesn´t
exchist.

Cheers, Einar

.

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