States Chronicle - Latest Breaking World News

Saturday, January 16, 2021
Log in
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Authors
  • Investor Relations
  • Privacy
  • Terms of Use
  • Latest News
    • Right Colors for your Skin Tone
    • MOST ACTIVE NASDAQ After-Hours
    • iPhone 5C Release Date
    • Samsung Galaxy S5 Release Date
    • The History of the Atkins Diet

MIT Plans to Use Asteroids As Mars Colonization Stepping Stones

October 31, 2014 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Email, RSS Follow

mars

According to a planetary scientist from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, asteroids could aid NASA greatly in helping colonize Mars in the future.

Richard Binzel believes that asteroids could be used as stepping stones in reaching the Red Planet, which has been tagged by NASA as the “ultimate human destination”. Although the agency is continuously developing plans to make flyby’s, many scientists hope that we will finally be able to make a landing on Mars by 2030.

In hopes of preparing such a mission, NASA announced its intent to implement an Asteroid Redirect Mission by approximately 2025, where robotic probes would be used to drag an asteroid, or at least boulder-sized rocks from larger asteroids into the lunar orbit. After succeeding, NASA aims to send astronauts to the asteroid by using the Orion crew capsule.

The ARM (Asteroid Redirect Mission) represents, therefore, a preliminary goal for NASA’s Space Launch System rockets, in their attempt at bringing astronauts to Mars.

There are, however, voices harshly criticizing NASA’s ARM mission.

“There’s nothing about sending humans to Mars that requires us to capture an asteroid in a baggie. That’s a multibillion dollar expenditure that has nothing to do with getting humans to Mars,”

Richard Binzel, professor of Planetary Sciences said about the ARM mission.

As he views it, developing complex operations and hardware necessary to contain asteroids and place them in lunar orbit represents no value to NASA’s mission of sending a crew of astronauts to Mars. Instead, Binzel suggests scrapping ARM altogether and attempt another approach.

NASA could, in Binzel’s opinion, begin mapping all space rocks over 33 feet that are in orbit between Earth and the Red Planet. These are not documented by ground-based telescopes, however, after being mapped by NASA, a series of missions could be prepared that would send astronaut crews to soe of them.

The missions could progressively become longer, until the confidence and experience is built to undertake the years-long travel that would bring astronauts to Mars.

“We have to leave the cradle of Earth sometime. Asteroid missions could be a win-win for exploration and for safety.”

Binzel said.

As NASA currently has a budget of $17,8 billion, the agency could invest in a dedicated space telescope costing no more than $800 million, Binzel believes, which could then be used to map the space bodies in question. The mapping project could also have the added benefit of also detecting asteroids on collision courses with Earth.

Email, RSS Follow

Filed Under: Science Tagged With: ARM, Asteroid Redirect Mission, asteroids into orbit, astronauts, colonizing mars, lunar orbit, Mars, mars asteroids, mars colonization, mars landing, NASA, orbit

About Janet Vasquez

Janet hasn’t had the happiest of childhoods. Her parents shipped her off to a girl-only boarding school when she was merely a child. After a few years spent with the nuns she unexpectedly remained pregnant and was kicked from the school. But this didn’t hinder her.

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 30 other subscribers

Doom and MiniDoom 2

Volunteer-Based Mexican Studio Releases Sidescrolling Doom Clone

March 12, 2018 By Georgia Dawson Leave a Comment

Chinese Mom and locked iPhone.

Toddler Locks Chinese Mom Out of Phone for Half a Century

March 9, 2018 By James Faulkner Leave a Comment

Alexa laughing

Amazon Alexa Laughing out of the Blue Puzzles Engineers

March 8, 2018 By Jack M. Robinson Leave a Comment

Flippy and the Burgers

Meet Flippy, World’s First Fast-Food Robotic Chef

March 6, 2018 By Georgia Dawson Leave a Comment

System Shock

System Shock Remastered Delayed, Nightdive Studios CEO Announces

February 19, 2018 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Sea of Thieves.

Sea of Thieves Optimized for Low-End PCs

February 14, 2018 By Georgia Dawson Leave a Comment

Sony and VR

Sony Touts New Generation of VR Controllers

January 31, 2018 By Deborah Cobing Leave a Comment

YouTube

YouTube Stiffens Its Monetization Policy to Discourage Spammers and Bad Actors

January 18, 2018 By Georgia Dawson Leave a Comment

Google Art Doppelganger

Google App Can Now Show Your Art Doppelganger

January 15, 2018 By Troy Rubenson Leave a Comment

YouTube mobile app logo on a smartphone

YouTube Now Enables Vertical Videos on iOS

December 24, 2017 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Samsung Galaxy S2 with a shattered screen

Cracked Smartphone Screens Are a Thing of the Past – Self-Healing Polymer Gets Fixed Just by Pressing It

December 20, 2017 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Bing logo on a white background

Bing Improves Its Search Results with the Help of AI and Reddit Integration

December 16, 2017 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

White hashtag on a blue background

Follow Your Interests on Instagram by Directly Following Hashtags

December 14, 2017 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge on a leather seat

Samsung Galaxy Smartphones Make More People Happier as Compared to iPhones

December 13, 2017 By Janet Vasquez Leave a Comment

Related Articles

  • the Carina Nebula in space

    The Universe is Full of Space Grease (Study)

    Jun 29, 2018
  • St. George the dragon slayer

    Restoration Makes 16th-Century Spanish Statue Unrecognizable

    Jun 28, 2018
  • Elon Musk

    After Recent Alien Study, Elon Musk Thinks We Should Colonize Other Planets

    Jun 27, 2018
  • the red planet

    Large Blue Sand Dune Discovered on Mars

    Jun 27, 2018
  • two gibbon individuals

    Extinct Gibbon Species Found in Ancient Chinese Tomb (Study)

    Jun 26, 2018
  • Mars panorama

    Dust Storm on Mars is Only Getting Bigger

    Jun 25, 2018
  • asteroid approaching Earth

    America is Not Ready for an Asteroid Impact

    Jun 22, 2018
  • Christopher Columbus

    Real Christopher Columbus Letter Returns to Vatican, Mystery Persists

    Jun 20, 2018
  • sea with beach full of pebbles

    Fossil of Ancient Sea Creature Named After Obama

    Jun 20, 2018
  • Aztec turquoise

    Where Did the Aztec Turquoise Come From? (Study)

    Jun 18, 2018

Categories

  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Markets
  • National News
  • Nature
  • News
  • Politics
  • Science
  • Technology
  • Uncategorized
  • World

Copyright © 2021 statechronicle.com

About · Privacy Policy · Terms of Use · Contact

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Learn more.