Forging the Future of Space Science The Next 50 Years (2010) / Chapter Skim
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Science Goes to the Moon and Planets: Celebrating 50 years since the IGY--Wesley T. Huntress, Jr.
Science Goes to the Moon and Planets: Celebrating 50 years since the IGY--Wesley T. Huntress, Jr.
Pages 41-59
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From page 41... ...
Geophysical Laboratory Carnegie Institution of Washington INTRODUCTION Werner Von Braun in magazine articles and on televi sion programs. In 1952, Collier's magazine began a This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the In- series of articles about Von Braun and his vision for ternational Geophysical Year (IGY )
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From page 42... ...
sions to the lunar surface -- perhaps not as dramatic After Apollo, the political will in the United States as astronautics walking on the surface, but certainly evaporated. In 1972 the United States abandoned the just as scientifically valuable, demonstrating the utility Apollo program and the future promise of lunar bases and excitement of robots traveling beyond Earth and and human flights to Mars.
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The development of powered flight and global air transportation in the 20th century created new eco nomic opportunities and ultimately connected societies all over the planet. So too will the exploration of space FIGURE 3.4 Venus (USSR/Venera 13)
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SCIENTIFIC EXPLORATION: WE ARE COMPELLED The exploration of space is a noble human enterprise with roots in the exploration of our own planet in the 20th century. At the beginning of the 20th century we were exploring the unknown polar regions of our own planet with ships and men.
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From page 45... ...
The answer will come from surveys of the Earth-crossing asteroid population in space and space missions that determine their c omposition and structure. Another form of this question asks what future humans have in traveling to and living on other planets.
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From page 46... ...
It is an archeological site there may be as much as 10 billion tons of water in the for understanding solar system history, especially the polar regions, potentially a valuable source of oxygen earliest phases where the evidence has been wiped out and rocket propellant for future human outposts on on Earth. It is also a close-by platform for conducting the Moon.
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From page 47... ...
The sive instruments in Earth laboratories with extensive lunar soil contains embedded solar wind particles; the ancient sample preparation by human laboratory technicians. stratigraphic record exposed on the Moon may reveal a hisW hile sample return can be done robotically, sample tory of the luminosity and state of the Sun over time.
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From page 48... ...
Resources: Materials and Energy for A Record of the Ancient Sun Space and Earth The Sun propels enormous amounts of material into The Moon's regolith contains resources that might be space in the form of hot tenuous plasma known as the useful for processing into materials and consumables solar wind. The solar wind is a sample of the composi for supporting human explorers on the Moon or for tion of the surface of the Sun.
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There will be a renaissance in In 1772, the French mathematician Joseph L Lagrange lunar scientific exploration in the next several decades showed that there are five positions of gravitational that the United States will not want to miss.
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In particu- beginning with the James Webb Space Telescope. lar, the Sun–Earth L2 point is the ideal location for It is conceivable to construct extremely-largespace telescopes, and it is an excellent stepping-stone to aperture telescopes at SEL2 because there is no gravity more distant destinations.
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a relatively benign and low-risk destination for human spaceflight. Its unique location at the edge of Earth's gravitational influence makes it an energy-efficient starting point for missions to deep space.
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All of these lower energy requirements than achieving lunar orbit objectives share a common thread -- water. When in in many cases, but require longer flight times on the the planet's history did liquid water exist?
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From page 53... ...
The layered polar deposits probably accomplished with an orderly procedure starting with contain as much as 20 to 50 percent water ice. a search from orbit for a set of promising sites, fol Liquid water in extensive aquifers could exist be- lowed by an in situ examination of the identified sites low the surface, and there is evidence of catastrophic to certify which is most suitable, and finally concluding
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From page 54... ...
Until that And fencing off the outer solar system from the inner time, robotic missions will play an important role in lays the asteroid belt, with Mars at its inner boundary defining the activities of human explorers, character- and Jupiter beyond its outer boundary. These regions izing the martian environment, searching for potential beyond Mars are out of reach for human exploration in resources, and emplacing assets on the surface.
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From page 55... ...
Jupiter and the Galilean Moons Beyond the main asteroid belt lies massive Jupiter with its large Galilean moons. There seems little doubt after the Galileo orbiter mission that Callisto, Ganymede, and Europa harbor subsurface oceans, but their fluidity, depth, and extent are unknown.
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While Jupiter has Microanalysis. four large Galilean moons, Saturn has seven somewhat FIGURE 3.19 E uropa and its subsurface ocean.
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Huygens landed on such a plain, and its Pluto-Charon, the Kuiper Belt, and Comets instruments indicated that the surface seems to have the consistency of a mud wet with methane and other Launched in January 2006, the New Horizons spacehydrocarbons. The Cassini radar has returned images craft will arrive in the vicinity of the dwarf double of large lakes of hydrocarbon fluid in the polar regions planet Pluto-Charon in July 2015, returning data and of Titan (see Figure 3.21)
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From page 58... ...
And in the meantime we will continue to explore and signs of life. This will be one of the most enduring and make new discoveries with our robotic spacecraft, products from space exploration in the 21st century, just extensions of our human senses, that can go where no as that first image of our own planet from Apollo 8 is human can ever go and where we have not yet seen fit one of the most enduring products of the 20th century.
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