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Austere Human Missions To Mars
Austere Human Missions to Mars is a concept for a human mission to Mars by the United States space agency, NASA. Released in 2009, it proposed a modified and even less costly version of Design Reference Architecture (DRA) 5.0, itself a combination of nearly 20 years of Mars planning design work. The mission profile was for a conjunction class with a long surface stay, pre-deployed cargo, aerocapture and propulsive capture, and some In situ resource utilization, in-situ resource production. As of 2015, the concept had not yet been adapted to the Space Launch System that replaced NASA's Constellation program in 2011. Key measures Technologically and financially the concept remains conservative, with both peak yearly and total funding to be less than the International Space Station, ISS up to the first mission. The plan would use standardized systems to launch a crew of 4 every four years, but accomplish the same major goals as DRA 5.0, which included a crew of six. Scaled down f ...
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Mars Design Reference Mission
The NASA Mars Design Reference Mission ("DRM") refer to a series of NASA conceptual design studies of the missions to send humans to Mars.Portree, DavidHumans To Mars: Fifty Years of Mission Planning NASA-SP-2001-4521, Monographs in Aerospace History Number 2; Chapter 10, "Design Reference Mission", page 89-99 (accessed 29 Sept 2015). The related term, Design Reference Architecture (DRA), refers to the entire sequences of missions and supporting infrastructure. These are a reference baseline studies summarizing the current technology and possible approaches for a human mission to Mars, and are not actual mission program. According to NASA, the documents "represent a 'snapshot' of work in progress in support of planning for future human exploration of the Martian surface."Stephen J. Hoffman (ed.)The Mars Surface Reference Mission: A Description of Human and Robotic Surface Activities, NASA/TP-2001-209371 (accessed 29 Sept 2015) The design reference missions are used for technolo ...
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Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator
The advanced Stirling radioisotope generator (ASRG) is a radioisotope power system first developed at NASA's Glenn Research Center. It uses a Stirling power conversion technology to convert radioactive-decay heat into electricity for use on spacecraft. The energy conversion process used by an ASRG is significantly more efficient than previous radioisotope systems, using one quarter of the plutonium-238 to produce the same amount of power. Despite termination of the ASRG flight development contract in 2013, NASA continues a small investment testing by private companies. Flight-ready Stirling-based units are not expected before 2028. Development Development was undertaken in 2000 under joint sponsorship by the United States Department of Energy (DoE), Lockheed Martin Space Systems, and the Stirling Research Laboratory at NASA's Glenn Research Center (GRC) for potential future space missions. In 2012, NASA chose a solar-powered mission (InSight) for the Discovery 12 interplanetary ...
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Mars Orbit Rendezvous
Mars orbit rendezvous (MOR) is a space travel concept where two spacecraft meet up and/or dock in Mars orbit. Overview For example, one vehicle takes off from Mars, such as a Martian ascent stage, and does a rendezvous in Mars orbit with another spacecraft. Applied to a Mars sample return or human mission to Mars, it allows much less weight to be sent to the surface and back into orbit, because the fuel needed to travel back to Earth is not landed on the planet. Page 8-9 in Chapter 2 of David S. F. Portree's ''Humans to Mars: Fifty Years of Mission Planning, 1950 - 2000,'' NASA Monographs in Aerospace History Series, Number 21, February 2001. Available aNASA SP-2001-4521 It has also been proposed for uncrewed Mars sample return plans.Mars Sample Return: The Medium-Lift Approach
Morris Jones, Sydn ...
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In-situ Resource Utilization
In space exploration, in situ resource utilization (ISRU) is the practice of collection, processing, storing and use of materials found or manufactured on other astronomical objects (the Moon, Mars, asteroids, etc.) that replace materials that would otherwise be brought from Earth. ISRU could provide materials for life support, propellants, construction materials, and energy to a spacecraft payloads or space exploration crews. It is now very common for spacecraft and robotic planetary surface mission to harness the solar radiation found ''in situ'' in the form of solar panels. The use of ISRU for material production has not yet been implemented in a space mission, though several field tests in the late 2000s demonstrated various lunar ISRU techniques in a relevant environment. ISRU has long been considered as a possible avenue for reducing the mass and cost of space exploration architectures, in that it may be a way to drastically reduce the amount of payload that must be l ...
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Mars Direct
Mars Direct is a proposal for a human mission to Mars which purports to be both cost-effective and possible with current technology. It was originally detailed in a research paper by Martin Marietta engineers Robert Zubrin and David Baker in 1990, and later expanded upon in Zubrin's 1996 book '' The Case for Mars''. It now serves as a staple of Zubrin's speaking engagements and general advocacy as head of the Mars Society, an organization devoted to the colonization of Mars. History Space Exploration Initiative On July 20, 1989, US President George H. W. Bush announced plans for what came to be known as the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI). In a speech on the steps of the National Air and Space Museum he described long-term plans which would culminate in a human mission to the surface of Mars. By December 1990, a study to estimate the project's cost determined that long-term expenditure would total approximately 450 billion dollars spread over 20 to 30 years. The "90 ...
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Stirling Radioisotope Generator
Component of Stirling radioisotope generator is heated by induction during testing A Stirling radioisotope generator (SRG) is a type of radioisotope generator based on a Stirling engine powered by a large radioisotope heater unit. The hot end of the Stirling converter reaches high temperature and heated helium drives the piston, with heat being rejected at the cold end of the engine. A generator or alternator converts the motion into electricity. Given the very constrained supply of plutonium, the Stirling converter is notable for producing about four times as much electric power from the plutonium fuel as compared to a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG). The Stirling generators were extensively tested on Earth by NASA, but their development was cancelled in 2013 before they could be deployed on actual spacecraft missions. A similar NASA project still under development, called Kilopower, also utilizes Stirling engines, but uses a small uranium fission reactor as the hea ...
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Rover (space Exploration)
A rover (or sometimes planetary rover) is a planetary surface exploration device designed to move over the rough surface of a planet or other planetary mass celestial bodies. Some rovers have been designed as land vehicles to transport members of a human spaceflight crew; others have been partially or fully autonomous robots. Rovers are typically created to land on another planet (other than Earth) via a lander-style spacecraft,tasked to collect information about the terrain, and to take crust samples such as dust, soil, rocks, and even liquids. They are essential tools in space exploration. Features Rovers arrive on spacecraft and are used in conditions very distinct from those on the Earth, which makes some demands on their design. Reliability Rovers have to withstand high levels of acceleration, high and low temperatures, pressure, dust, corrosion, cosmic rays, remaining functional without repair for a needed period of time. Autonomy Rovers which land on celesti ...
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Inflatable Space Habitat
Inflatable habitats or expandable habitats are pressurized tent-like structures capable of supporting life in outer space whose internal volume increases after launch. They have frequently been proposed for use in space applications to provide a greater volume of living space for a given mass. The first formal design and manufacture of an inflatable space habitat was in 1961 with a space station design produced by Goodyear (although this design was never flown). A proposal released in 1989 by Johnson Space Center's Man Systems Division outlined a diameter spherical habitat lunar outpost which was partially buried in the lunar surface. An inflatable module called TransHab (a portmanteau of ''Trans Habitation'') was proposed for the International Space Station, and later the private company Bigelow Aerospace revived the design for use in a number of potential civil and commercial applications. Construction The construction of an inflatable space habitat is determined by i ...
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Retrorocket
A retrorocket (short for ''retrograde rocket'') is a rocket engine providing thrust opposing the motion of a vehicle, thereby causing it to decelerate. They have mostly been used in spacecraft, with more limited use in short-runway aircraft landing. New uses are emerging since 2010 for retro-thrust rockets in reusable launch systems. History Rockets were fitted to the nose of some models of the DFS 230, a World War II German Military glider. This enabled the aircraft to land in more confined areas than would otherwise be possible during an airborne assault. Another World War II development was the British Hajile project, initiated by the British Admiralty's Directorate of Miscellaneous Weapons Development. Originally a request from the British Army as a method to drop heavy equipment or vehicles from aircraft flying at high speeds and altitudes, the project turned out to be a disaster and was largely forgotten after the war. Although some of the tests turned out to be succe ...
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Heat Shield
In engineering, a heat shield is a component designed to protect an object or a human operator from being burnt or overheated by dissipating, reflecting, and/or absorbing heat. The term is most often used in reference to exhaust heat management and to systems for dissipating frictional heat. Heat shields are used most commonly in the automotive and aerospace industries. Principles of operation Heat shields protect structures from extreme temperatures and thermal gradients by two primary mechanisms. Thermal insulation and radiative cooling, respectively isolate the underlying structure from high external surface temperatures, while emitting heat outwards through thermal radiation. To achieve good functionality the three attributes required of a heat shield are low thermal conductivity (high thermal resistance), high emissivity, and good thermal stability (refractoriness). Porous ceramics with high emissivity coatings (HECs) are often employed to address these three characteristic ...
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