European Space Freighter Makes Docking Debut

WASHINGTON — Europe’s first space freighter, the unmanned cargo ship Jules Verne, made its docking debut at the International Space Station (ISS) Thursday with a graceful arrival after weeks of waiting in Earth orbit.

(Full Article: http://www.space.com)

Climate catastrophes in the Solar System

The contrast: Venus, Earth and Mars

26 April 2007

Earth sits between two worlds that have been devastated by climate catastrophes. In the effort to combat global warming, our neighbours can provide valuable insights into the way climate catastrophes affect planets.

Modelling Earth’s climate to predict its future has assumed tremendous importance in the light of mankind’s influence on the atmosphere. The climate of our two neighbours is in stark contrast to that of our home planet, making data from ESA’s Venus Express and Mars Express invaluable to climate scientists.

Venus is a cloudy inferno whilst Mars is a frigid desert. As current concerns about global warming have now achieved widespread acceptance, pressure has increased on scientists to propose solutions.

The key weapon in a climate scientist’s arsenal is the climate model, a computer programme that uses the equations of physics to investigate the way in which Earth’s atmosphere works. The programme helps predict how the atmosphere might change in the future.

	“It seems that both Mars and Venus started out much more like Earth”

“To members of the public it must seem like climate models are crystal balls, but they are actually just complex equations” says David Grinspoon, Denver Museum of Nature and Science, and one of Venus Express’s interdisciplinary scientists.

The more scientists look at those equations, the more they realise just how complicated Earth’s climate system is. Grinspoon puts the predicament like this: “In fifty or a hundred years, we will know whether today’s climate models were right but if they are wrong, by then it will be too late.”

To help increase confidence in the computer models, Grinspoon believes that scientists should look at our neighbouring planets. “It seems that both Mars and Venus started out much more like Earth and then changed. They both hold priceless climate information for Earth,” says Grinspoon.

The atmosphere of Venus is much thicker than Earth’s. Nevertheless, current climate models can reproduce its present temperature structure well. Now planetary scientists want to turn the clock back to understand why and how Venus changed from its former Earth-like conditions into the inferno of today.

Radiation from below the Venusian cloud deck

They believe that the planet experienced a runaway greenhouse effect as the Sun gradually heated up. Astronomers believe that the young Sun was dimmer than the present-day Sun by 30 percent. Over the last 4 thousand million years, it has gradually brightened. During this increase, Venus’s surface water evaporated and entered the atmosphere.

“Water vapour is a powerful greenhouse gas and it caused the planet to heat-up even more. This is turn caused more water to evaporate and led to a powerful positive feedback response known as the runaway greenhouse effect,” says Grinspoon.

As Earth warms in response to manmade pollution, it risks the same fate. Reconstructing the climate of the past on Venus can give scientists a better understanding of how close our planet is to such a catastrophe. However, determining when Venus passed the point of no return is not easy. That’s where ESA’s Venus Express comes in.

The spacecraft is in orbit around Venus collecting data that will help unlock the planet’s past. Venus is losing gas from its atmosphere, so Venus Express is measuring the rate of this loss and the composition of the gas being lost. It also watches the movement of clouds in the planet’s atmosphere. This reveals the way Venus responds to the absorption of sunlight, because the energy from the Sun provides the power that allows the atmosphere to move.

In addition, Venus Express is charting the amount and location of sulphur dioxide in the planet’s atmosphere. Sulphur dioxide is a greenhouse gas and is released by volcanoes on Venus.

	Fluvial surface features on Mangala Valles

“Understanding all of this will help us pin down when Venus lost its water,” says Grinspoon. That knowledge can feed into the interpretation of climate models on the Earth because although both planets seem very different now, the same laws of physics govern both worlds.

Understanding Mars’ past is equally important. ESA’s Mars Express is currently investigating the fate of the Red Planet. Smaller than the Earth, Mars is thought to have lost its atmosphere to space. When Martian volcanoes became extinct, so did the planet’s means of replenishing its atmosphere turning it into an almost-airless desert.

“What happened on these two worlds is different but would be disastrous for Earth”

“What happened on these two worlds is very different but either would be equally disastrous for Earth. We are banking on our ability to accurately predict Earth’s future climate,” says Grinspoon. Anything that can shed light on our own future is valuable. That is why the study of our neighbouring worlds is vital.

So, when planetary scientists talk of exploring other worlds, they are also increasing their ability to understand our own planet.

For more information:

David Grinspoon, Venus Express interdisciplinary Scientist and Curator of Astrobiology
Dept. of Space Sciences
Denver Museum of Nature & Science, Co. (USA)
Email: David.Grinspoon @ dmns.org

Håkan Svedhem, ESA Venus Express Project scientist
Email: Håkan.svedhem @ esa.int

(Source: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Venus_Express/SEM2EHMJC0F_2.html)

Space pioneers wanted for 520-day Mars experiment

This is an amazing project, but what makes me sad is that we most likely have technology, hidden in black projects to skip all this non-sense and travel to mars in a couple hours, if not under one hour. What a waste of time, energy, money and lives we have to endure.

LE BOURGET, France (AFP) – The European Space Agency (ESA) on Tuesday called for applications for one of the most demanding human experiments in space history: a simulated trip to Mars in which six “astronauts” will spend 17 months in an isolation tank on Earth.

Their spaceship will comprise a series of interlocked modules in an research institute in Moscow, and once the doors are closed tight, the volunteers will be cut off from all contact with the outside world except by a delayed radio link.

They will face simulated emergencies, daily work routines and experiments, as well as boredom and, no doubt, personal friction from confinement in just 550 cubic metres (19,250 cubic feet), the equivalent of nine truck containers.

Communications with the simulated mission control and loved-ones will take up to 40 minutes, the time that a radio signal takes to cross the void between Earth and a spaceship on Mars. Food will comprise mainly the packaged stuff of the kind eaten aboard the
International Space Station (ISS).

The goal is to gain experience about the psychological challenges that a crew will face on a trip to Mars.

Four of the crew will be Russian, and two will come from countries that are members of ESA, agency and Russian officials said at the Paris Air Show in Le Bourget.

In all, 12 European volunteers are needed.

A precursor 105-day study is scheduled to start by mid-2008, possibly followed by another 105-day study, before the full 520-day study begins in late 2008 or early 2009.

Backup for the two volunteers taking part in each of these simulations means that 12 Europeans are needed.

“The selection procedure is similar to that of ESA astronauts, although there will be more emphasis on psychological factors and stress resistance than on physical fitness,” ESA said in a press release.

Men and women who think they have the right stuff can download the application form on (http://www.spaceflight.esa.int).

The terrestrial Mars-stronauts will not get much glory for their confinement, nor will they get particularly rich.

They will get paid 120 euros (158 dollars) a day, said Marc Heppener of ESA’s Science and Application Division.

Viktor Baranov of Russia’s Institute of Biomedical Problems, where the experiment will take place, said his organisation had received about 150 applications, only 19 of which came from women.

“The problem is that it is very difficult to find healthy people for this kind of experiment,” he said.

Assuming that Mars and Earth are favourably aligned, with their closest distance of 56 million kilometres (35 million miles), it would take 250 days to get there, 30 days spent on site to conduct experiments and 240 days for the return, said Baranov.

A trip to Mars is not an early prospect. The United States has set plans to return to the Moon by 2018 and later head to Mars, but without setting a date.

The trip is fraught with many technical challenges, many of which are outranked by the question of keeping the crew healthy and sane.

(Source: http://news.yahoo.com)