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Science Forum Index » Chemistry Forum » Permafrost discovered on Mars - SAVE THE MARTIAN...
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 Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 11:25 am |
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New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
By BOB CHRISTIE – 1 day ago
PHOENIX (AP) — Sharp new images received Saturday from the Phoenix
lander largely convinced scientists that the spacecraft's thrusters
had uncovered a large patch of ice just below the Martian surface,
team members said.
That bodes well for the mission's main goal of digging for ice that
can be tested for evidence of organic compounds that are the chemical
building blocks of life.
Team members had said Friday that photos showing the ground beneath
the lander suggested the vehicle was resting on splotches of ice.
Washington University scientist Ray Arvidson said the spacecraft's
thrusters may have blown away dirt covering the ice when the robot
landed one week ago.
On Saturday, scientists said a more detailed image taken under the
lander shows one of the craft's three legs sitting on coarse dirt and
a large patch of what appears to be ice — possibly 3 feet in diameter
— that apparently had been covered by a thin layer of dirt.
"We were worried that it may be 30-, 40-, 50-centimeters deep, which
would be a lot of work. Now we are fairly certain that we can easily
get down to the ice table," said Peter Smith, a University of Arizona
scientist who is the chief project investigator.
The spacecraft is equipped with a backhoe-like robotic arm that will
be used to dig into the ground and retrieve samples for testing in the
lander's small laboratories. The lander was sent to a spot on Mars'
northern regions in hopes of finding frozen water, but just how deep
underground it would be found was unknown.
The robot arm is expected to begin its first digging operations after
several more days of testing.
The final proof that the material is ice could take weeks, but close-
up color images that were being taken Saturday could improve the
researchers' confidence level, said Horst Uwe Keller, the scientist in
charge of the camera on the robotic arm. The initial image released
Saturday was in black and white.
Once the arm starts digging, dirt and ice it scoops up will be
deposited in several small ovens to be heated. Measuring devices will
test the resulting gases.
A short-circuit discovered Friday in one of the measuring devices was
still being worked on Saturday, Smith said. But engineers were more
confident they knew how to work around the problem and get the balky
instrument, a gas analyzer, back in operation.
The University of Arizona in Tucson is leading and NASA's Jet
Propulsion Laboratory is managing the three-month scientific mission.
Also Saturday, a spokeswoman for the mission said its public Web site
was back up after a hacker managed to change the site's lead story
overnight.
Sara Hammond said the University of Arizona-hosted site was taken down
for several hours Saturday while technicians worked to resolve the
problem.
She said the mission update posted Friday afternoon was replaced with
a hacker's signature and a link redirecting to the hacker's overseas
Web site. |
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| kT... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 3:11 pm |
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Guest
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On Jun 1, 7:58 pm, "Leon Trollski" <l... at (no spam) garyrock.com> wrote:
Quote: "kT" <cos... at (no spam) lifeform.org> wrote in message
news:ZiG0k.832$aP1.743 at (no spam) newsfe05.lga...
nicov... at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
Yawn. You're new to this science stuff, aren't you.
Yawn. Frustrating when your entire life philosophy is undermined by faulty
logic, isn't it? Yawn.
My perspective on reality is relatively intact. It will take more than
ice on the surface of Mars to shatter my worldview. If you would even
make a superficial effort to search the archive under my real name,
you would find that I have been promoting the idea of an early wet,
watery and now frozen stiff Mars, heavily glaciated over time, ever
since the original MOLA results. Where I was wrong, I admitted it.
Yes, they are dry dust avalanches and not water spraying onto the
surface, but yes, those avalanches are related to the sublimation of
the same ices of which I spoke, years before most of this went down.
They went looking for ice a few inches below the surface there, we
knew it was there since the original gamma ray spectroscopy results
from Odyssey, and there is nothing remarkable about finding it when
the rockets blasted away the thin covering soil. They were going to
dig for it anyways. This just simplifies things.
Try alt.sci.planetary. |
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| kT... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 6:34 pm |
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nicovar2 at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
Quote: New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
Yawn. You're new to this science stuff, aren't you. |
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| Richard Schultz... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 6:49 pm |
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In sci.chem Uncle Al <UncleAl0 at (no spam) hate.spam.net> wrote:
: Ooh... Maybe it is Dry Ice and Mars is all about xerobiotica. Or it's
: Ice-9 and Enviro-whiners will piss and moan about extinct Ices 1-8.
: Or it is Icy Hot and will melt the lander. Or it's Vanilla Ice and
: there is no life on Mars.
So how did the results of your Nobel-prize experiment turn out?
-----
Richard Schultz schultr at (no spam) mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"an optimist is a guy/ that has never had/ much experience" |
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| Leon Trollski... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 7:58 pm |
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Guest
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"kT" <cosmic at (no spam) lifeform.org> wrote in message
news:ZiG0k.832$aP1.743 at (no spam) newsfe05.lga...
Quote: nicovar2 at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
Yawn. You're new to this science stuff, aren't you.
Yawn. Frustrating when your entire life philosophy is undermined by faulty
logic, isn't it? Yawn. |
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| Uncle Al... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 7:58 pm |
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nicovar2 at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
Quote:
New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
By BOB CHRISTIE – 1 day ago
PHOENIX (AP) — Sharp new images received Saturday from the Phoenix
lander largely convinced scientists that the spacecraft's thrusters
had uncovered a large patch of ice just below the Martian surface,
team members said.
[snip NASA crap]
Quote: The final proof that the material is ice could take weeks,
[snip rest of NASA crap]
The piece of shit robot lander can't identify M+ = 18 in its mass
spec? NASA idiots can't put a chunk in a heater bay, add constant
power, and see a temperature plateau at 0 C?
Ooh... Maybe it is Dry Ice and Mars is all about xerobiotica. Or it's
Ice-9 and Enviro-whiners will piss and moan about extinct Ices 1-8.
Or it is Icy Hot and will melt the lander. Or it's Vanilla Ice and
there is no life on Mars.
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/lajos.htm#a2 |
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| The Ghost In The Machine... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 8:44 pm |
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In sci.environment, Uncle Al
<UncleAl0 at (no spam) hate.spam.net>
wrote
on Sun, 01 Jun 2008 17:58:13 -0700
<484345A5.D5B11248 at (no spam) hate.spam.net>:
Quote: nicovar2 at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
By BOB CHRISTIE – 1 day ago
PHOENIX (AP) — Sharp new images received Saturday from the Phoenix
lander largely convinced scientists that the spacecraft's thrusters
had uncovered a large patch of ice just below the Martian surface,
team members said.
[snip NASA crap]
The final proof that the material is ice could take weeks,
[snip rest of NASA crap]
The piece of shit robot lander can't identify M+ = 18 in its mass
spec? NASA idiots can't put a chunk in a heater bay, add constant
power, and see a temperature plateau at 0 C?
They do have the TEGA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(spacecraft)#Thermal_and_evolved_gas_analyzer
Dunno how they can measure "how much water vapor and CO2 given off",
though temperature and pressure measurements would be easy enough.
There's also MECA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(spacecraft)#Microscopy.2C_electrochemistry.2C_and_conductivity_analyzer
Quote:
Ooh... Maybe it is Dry Ice and Mars is all about xerobiotica. Or it's
Ice-9 and Enviro-whiners will piss and moan about extinct Ices 1-8.
Or it is Icy Hot and will melt the lander. Or it's Vanilla Ice and
there is no life on Mars.
Little warm for it to be dry ice. The minimum temperature is -112F,
or -80 C. This is well to the vapor side of the sublimation line.
If it is dry ice the Lander's in trouble, though I'm not sure how
fast it will melt.
--
#191, ewill3 at (no spam) earthlink.net
Does anyone else remember the 1802?
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com ** |
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| Whata Fool... |
| Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 3:53 am |
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The Ghost In The Machine <ewill at (no spam) sirius.tg00suus7038.net> wrote:
Quote: In sci.environment, Uncle Al
UncleAl0 at (no spam) hate.spam.net
wrote
on Sun, 01 Jun 2008 17:58:13 -0700
484345A5.D5B11248 at (no spam) hate.spam.net>:
nicovar2 at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
New pics boost feelings Mars lander has bared ice
By BOB CHRISTIE ? 1 day ago
PHOENIX (AP) ? Sharp new images received Saturday from the Phoenix
lander largely convinced scientists that the spacecraft's thrusters
had uncovered a large patch of ice just below the Martian surface,
team members said.
[snip NASA crap]
The final proof that the material is ice could take weeks,
[snip rest of NASA crap]
The piece of shit robot lander can't identify M+ = 18 in its mass
spec? NASA idiots can't put a chunk in a heater bay, add constant
power, and see a temperature plateau at 0 C?
They do have the TEGA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(spacecraft)#Thermal_and_evolved_gas_analyzer
Dunno how they can measure "how much water vapor and CO2 given off",
though temperature and pressure measurements would be easy enough.
There's also MECA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(spacecraft)#Microscopy.2C_electrochemistry.2C_and_conductivity_analyzer
Ooh... Maybe it is Dry Ice and Mars is all about xerobiotica. Or it's
Ice-9 and Enviro-whiners will piss and moan about extinct Ices 1-8.
Or it is Icy Hot and will melt the lander. Or it's Vanilla Ice and
there is no life on Mars.
Little warm for it to be dry ice. The minimum temperature is -112F,
or -80 C. This is well to the vapor side of the sublimation line.
If it is dry ice the Lander's in trouble, though I'm not sure how
fast it will melt.
Uncle Al spoke too fast, he should know too well that Mars,
while cold, is still well above the boiling point of CO2 in many
if not most locations.
And that Mars is cool enough so that water should not have
all disassociated. |
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| BradGuth... |
| Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2008 12:11 pm |
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Guest
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On Jun 1, 2:25 pm, nicov... at (no spam) hushmail.com wrote:
Quote: New pics boost feelingsMarslander has bared ice
By BOB CHRISTIE – 1 day ago
PHOENIX(AP) — Sharp new images received Saturday from thePhoenix
lander largely convinced scientists that the spacecraft's thrusters
had uncovered a large patch of ice just below the Martian surface,
team members said.
That bodes well for the mission's main goal of digging for ice that
can be tested for evidence of organic compounds that are the chemical
building blocks of life.
Team members had said Friday that photos showing the ground beneath
the lander suggested the vehicle was resting on splotches of ice.
Washington University scientist Ray Arvidson said the spacecraft's
thrusters may have blown away dirt covering the ice when the robot
landed one week ago.
On Saturday, scientists said a more detailed image taken under the
lander shows one of the craft's three legs sitting on coarse dirt and
a large patch of what appears to be ice — possibly 3 feet in diameter
— that apparently had been covered by a thin layer of dirt.
"We were worried that it may be 30-, 40-, 50-centimeters deep, which
would be a lot of work. Now we are fairly certain that we can easily
get down to the ice table," said Peter Smith, a University of Arizona
scientist who is the chief project investigator.
The spacecraft is equipped with a backhoe-like robotic arm that will
be used to dig into the ground and retrieve samples for testing in the
lander's small laboratories. The lander was sent to a spot onMars'
northern regions in hopes of finding frozen water, but just how deep
underground it would be found was unknown.
The robot arm is expected to begin its first digging operations after
several more days of testing.
The final proof that the material is ice could take weeks, but close-
up color images that were being taken Saturday could improve the
researchers' confidence level, said Horst Uwe Keller, the scientist in
charge of the camera on the robotic arm. The initial image released
Saturday was in black and white.
Once the arm starts digging, dirt and ice it scoops up will be
deposited in several small ovens to be heated. Measuring devices will
test the resulting gases.
A short-circuit discovered Friday in one of the measuring devices was
still being worked on Saturday, Smith said. But engineers were more
confident they knew how to work around the problem and get the balky
instrument, a gas analyzer, back in operation.
The University of Arizona in Tucson is leading and NASA's Jet
Propulsion Laboratory is managing the three-month scientific mission.
Also Saturday, a spokeswoman for the mission said its public Web site
was back up after a hacker managed to change the site's lead story
overnight.
Sara Hammond said the University of Arizona-hosted site was taken down
for several hours Saturday while technicians worked to resolve the
problem.
She said the mission update posted Friday afternoon was replaced with
a hacker's signature and a link redirecting to the hacker's overseas
Web site.
“Martian Soil Sample Clogs Phoenix Probe's Oven”
Good grief and what a pathetic joke, of having that Phoenix sample
screen that’s allowing merely those1 millimeter bits worth of frozen
Mars soil to enter their oven is purely and utterly stupid and simply
further proof positive as to how technically incompetent or rather
mission failsafe our DARPA/NASA actually is, to think that a dry-ice
kind of frozen to death surface of that Mars reddish soil is not going
to be of any frosty tundra like binder, seems to be asking for a whole
lot of trouble in River City (so to speak).
Seems of the under-surface realm of dry-ice as snowy flakes or
whatever icy crystals in that kind of vacuum are likely larger than 1
mm, especially if stuck to that reddish soil. I’d have elected for as
tight as 4 mm screening, although 6 mm seems sufficient unless that’s
allowing in too much individual item mass for the laser oven to
vaporize. The brief daytime of high noon thawing that upper most
reddish soil out to a toasty –22F, seems capable of representing
something other than frozen CO2 as the particle binder. However,
unless there’s an underground aquifer/reservoir as wick like feeding
that icy soil, it’s unlikely of representing common water, but more
than likely of a mineral saturated ice that’s highly acidic (though
still better than nothing).
Obviously their all-knowing expertise failed to take such a common icy
tundra or permafrost kind of frozen terrain into account, especially
of getting further nailed by those extremely cold nighttimes of –115F
(a whole lot worse yet at the poles).
In my direct experience, the wicking or evaporation of moisture
migrating out of terrestrial soil only further drops the surface
temperatures to forming a layer of frost, with the local above surface
ambient atmosphere as high as +40F (it’s also called black ice). In a
near vacuum environment such as Mars, is where that kind of natural
thermal/refrigeration via evaporation pull-down can become fairly
extreme, enough to keep the Mars tundra as packed extensively with dry-
ice crystals.
That otherwise nifty remote digging arm that’s certainly long enough,
and of its way-over-sized shovel capacity is also further proof
positive as to how dumb and dumber, as well as totally dumbfounded
those supposed R&D wizards actually are. Half of that shovel width
should have been overkill. If this mission wasn’t such another
clownish ruse and yet another waste of valuable time and resources to
begin with (not to mention having once again spent those hundreds of
millions of our hard earned loot), you’d certainly be hard pressed to
tell otherwise.
Unless that frozen to death and godforsaken planet has marsquakes,
lets hope that a whole lot of shaking does the trick, and that fresh
delivered pile of all that surplus Mars soil doesn’t foil or degrade
the use of those other sample testing ovens. Other than waiting
around for another good Mars wind storm, what’s the best plan of
action for clearing their side by side multiple oven deck?
Is there a simple broom attachment or forbid any CO2 blowing nozzle
for that spendy robotic arm? (didn’t think so)
How about a gram worth audio feedback technology? (does our half
billion dollar Phoenix got audio?)
Brad Guth Brad_Guth Brad.Guth BradGuth |
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| V for Vendicar... |
| Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 3:37 am |
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"BradGuth" <bradguth at (no spam) gmail.com>
Quote: “Martian Soil Sample Clogs Phoenix Probe's Oven”
Presumably the screens are there to provide a consistant sample particle
size. This may be important in setting the surface area of the sample,
which will determine outgassing rates and bake times.
You have to remember that this is part of NASA's Faster, Better, Cheaper
strategy which has not been proven to be particularly Better, although
certainly Faster and Cheaper. The rasp on the end of the arm was purchased
from a local hardware store for example. So you aren't looking at thousands
of years of development for the sample arm.. And of course they <DO> have
the MARS VIKING lander data as reference. The soil where they landed is
clearly different.
The arm was able to dig through it without too much difficulty so it would
appear to be a thin crust of dust grains that are weakly welded together -
just enough to allow them to form those hexagonal patterns on the surface.
And on top of that there is typical martian dust.
There is a picture of a spring that has fallen off the lander. It is
interesting because it has clearly fallen through the surface of the soil,
and appears to have compactified some of it along the edge. It is as if the
thin crust has been punctured and a fluffy, easily compacted material is
below.
One would hope that the sample screens can be retracted if needed. But
since this hasn't been mentioned as a possibility I presume it's not
possible.
At worst they should be able to run the rasp over the surface, and
pulverize some of the material before scooping it up.
Live and learn.
Concerining the "permafrost" below the lander... Claiming that it's
permafrost is premature of course. |
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