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The Mars Mission Case

Essay by   •  September 25, 2012  •  Essay  •  865 Words (4 Pages)  •  1,613 Views

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Is there any possible way for the planet Mars to habitable by humans sometime in the near future? Well the scientists at National Aeronautics and Space Administration, (also known as NASA), have been researching this possibility for quite some time now and seem to have made some discoveries along the way to make this dream a reality.

The rover, Curiosity, made it's landing on Mars on August 7th, 2012. It's course of action is to examine the Gale Crater of which it landed in. It is a 97-mile wide crater and NASA doesnt plan to explore any further than that range. Scientists at NASA have set eight objectives and four main goals for the mission to Mars to try and determine if it truly is sustainable for the human species to live on and thrive. One of the four main objectives of the mission is to see if the biosphere and surface of Mars is biologically and geologically/geochemically safe. Another main goals is to look for hot springs, geothermal geysers, and find a to why that if such a planet could hold water at one point, which there is evidence to prove that there has been, but that poses more questions as to if the planet once had water, what made it come to it's dry, sandy environment we know today?

On the biological level, scientists must determine the surroundings and compound makeup of the land, take samples and inventory of the chemical building blocks of life and to observe any elements that may provide any information with current or past biological processes. This will inform us whether or not organisms can, or used to live on Mars surface, one of the questions that has been posed for years. Given the evidence that water has once been part of Mar's ecosystem, scientists are still in high hopes to find life on Mars.

On the geological and geochemical base, the NASA scientists want to take back samples from the planet and try to determine the composition of the surface and other materials. The rover will continue its work upon its landing at Gale Crater, researching and gathering samples of mineral deposits of where water once was, or supposedly was and take samples of the soil and it will analyze the rocks itself and send the results back via radio waves The rover is equipped with a drill for such tasks. The only concern by scientists are is that when they had installed the drill on there, it wasn't in a fully sterile environment and before the decision was finalized on whether or not it should be sent into space and land on Mar's surface, it was already too late and Curiosity had taken off. (3)"If they accidentally drill into water, which they believe that the part of the planet they are excavating and collecting samples from does not contain water, there are some 250,000 microorganisms believed to have survived on that drill." This could cause a drastic change to the conditions of Mars if these organisms were to survive and live.

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