The National Academies Press

Currently Skimming:

Summary
Pages 1-4

The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.

From page 1... ... report Preventing the Forward Contamination of Europa3 recommended that spacecraft missions to Europa must have their bioload reduced by such an amount that the probability of contaminating a Europan ocean with a single viable terrestrial organism at any time in the future should be less than 10–4 per mission.4 This criterion was adopted for consistency with prior recommendations by the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) of the International Council for Science for "any spacecraft intended for planetary landing or atmospheric penetration."5 COSPAR, the de facto adjudicator of planetary protection regulations, adopted the criterion for Europa, and subsequent COSPAR-sponsored workshops extended the 10 –4 criterion to other icy bodies of the outer solar system.6,7 In practice, the establishment of a valid forward-contamination-risk goal as a mission requirement implies the use of some method -- either a test or analysis -- to verify that the mission can achieve the stated goal. Read the entire page →
From page 2... ... Planetary protection decisions should not rely on the multiplication of probability factors to estimate the likelihood of contaminating solar system bodies with terrestrial organisms unless it can be unequivocally demonstrated that the factors are completely independent and their values and statistical variation are known. The second task given to the committee concerned the range of values that can be estimated for the terms appearing in the Coleman-Sagan equation based on current knowledge, as well as an assessment of conservative values for other specific factors that might be provided to the implementers of missions targeting individual bodies or classes of objects. Read the entire page →
From page 3... ... Areas of particular concern for which the committee recommends research include the following: • Determination of the time period of heating to temperatures between 40°C and 80°C required to inactivate spores from psychrophilic and psychrotolerant bacteria isolated from high-latitude soil and cryopeg samples, as well as from psychrotolerant microorganisms isolated from temperate soils, spacecraft assembly sites, and the spacecraft itself. • Studies to better understand the environmental conditions that initiate spore formation and spore germination in psychrophilic and psychrotolerant bacteria so that these conditions/requirements can be compared with the characteristics of target icy bodies. Read the entire page →
From page 4... ... Coleman, Decontamination standards for martian exploration programs, pp. 470-481 in National Research Council, Biology and the Exploration of Mars, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C., 1966. Read the entire page →

From page 1...

... report Preventing the Forward Contamination of Europa3 recommended that spacecraft missions to Europa must have their bioload reduced by such an amount that the probability of contaminating a Europan ocean with a single viable terrestrial organism at any time in the future should be less than 10–4 per mission.4 This criterion was adopted for consistency with prior recommendations by the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) of the International Council for Science for "any spacecraft intended for planetary landing or atmospheric penetration."5 COSPAR, the de facto adjudicator of planetary protection regulations, adopted the criterion for Europa, and subsequent COSPAR-sponsored workshops extended the 10 –4 criterion to other icy bodies of the outer solar system.6,7 In practice, the establishment of a valid forward-contamination-risk goal as a mission requirement implies the use of some method -- either a test or analysis -- to verify that the mission can achieve the stated goal.

Read the entire page →

From page 2...

... Planetary protection decisions should not rely on the multiplication of probability factors to estimate the likelihood of contaminating solar system bodies with terrestrial organisms unless it can be unequivocally demonstrated that the factors are completely independent and their values and statistical variation are known. The second task given to the committee concerned the range of values that can be estimated for the terms appearing in the Coleman-Sagan equation based on current knowledge, as well as an assessment of conservative values for other specific factors that might be provided to the implementers of missions targeting individual bodies or classes of objects.

Read the entire page →

From page 3...

... Areas of particular concern for which the committee recommends research include the following: • Determination of the time period of heating to temperatures between 40°C and 80°C required to inactivate spores from psychrophilic and psychrotolerant bacteria isolated from high-latitude soil and cryopeg samples, as well as from psychrotolerant microorganisms isolated from temperate soils, spacecraft assembly sites, and the spacecraft itself. • Studies to better understand the environmental conditions that initiate spore formation and spore germination in psychrophilic and psychrotolerant bacteria so that these conditions/requirements can be compared with the characteristics of target icy bodies.

Read the entire page →

From page 4...

... Coleman, Decontamination standards for martian exploration programs, pp. 470-481 in National Research Council, Biology and the Exploration of Mars, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C., 1966.

Read the entire page →

Next Chapter Skim →

This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More information on Chapter Skim is available.

Summary Pages 1-4

Summary
Pages 1-4