MARSBUGS: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter Volume 8, Number 22, 10 June 2001. Editors: Dr. David J. Thomas, Science Division, Lyon College, Batesville, AR 72503-2317, USA. dthomas@lyon.edu Dr. Julian A. Hiscox, School of Animal and Microbial Sciences, University of Reading, Reading, RG6 6AJ, United Kingdom. J.A.Hiscox@reading.ac.uk Marsbugs is published on a weekly to quarterly basis as warranted by the number of articles and announcements. Copyright of this compilation exists with the editors, except for specific articles, in which instance copyright exists with the author/authors. While we cannot copyright our mailing list, our readers would appreciate it if others would not send unsolicited e-mail using the Marsbugs mailing list. The editors do not condone "spamming" of our subscribers. Persons who have information that may be of interest to subscribers of Marsbugs should send that information to the editors. E-mail subscriptions are free, and may be obtained by contacting either of the editors. Article contributions are welcome, and should be submitted to either of the two editors. Contributions should include a short biographical statement about the author(s) along with the author(s)' correspondence address. Subscribers are advised to make appropriate inquiries before joining societies, ordering goods etc. Back issues and Adobe Acrobat PDF files suitable for printing may be obtained from the official Marsbugs web page at http://welcome.to/marsbugs. The purpose of this newsletter is to provide a channel of information for scientists, educators and other persons interested in exobiology and related fields. This newsletter is not intended to replace peer- reviewed journals, but to supplement them. We, the editors, envision Marsbugs as a medium in which people can informally present ideas for investigation, questions about exobiology, and announcements of upcoming events. Astrobiology is still a relatively young field, and new ideas may come from the most unexpected places. Subjects may include, but are not limited to: exobiology and astrobiology (life on other planets), the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), ecopoeisis and terraformation, Earth from space, the biology of terrestrial extreme environments, planetary biology, primordial evolution, space physiology, biological life support systems, and human habitation of space and other planets. _____________________________________________________________________ CONTENTS 1) INTERSTELLAR SPACE A LIKELY SOURCE OF ORGANIC MOLECULES NASA/ARC release 2) MIT RESEARCHERS SEEK OCEAN ON JUPITER'S MOON THROUGH ITS SOUNDS Massachusetts Institute of Technology release 3) MARS INVADES EARTH By Bruce Moomaw 4) ARIZONA DUST DEVILS TARGETED FOR MARS EXPERIMENT By Lori Stiles 5) LUNAR HOTEL By Govert Schilling 6) HUMANS ON EUROPA: A PLAN FOR COLONIES ON THE ICY MOON By Don Lipper 7) GOLDIN TELLS GRADUATES HUMANS ON MARS IN 20 YEARS By Jeff Foust 8) PROTECTING BIOSPHERES BEYOND EARTH By Bruce Moomaw 9) NEW ADDITIONS TO THE ASTROBIOLOGY INDEX By David J. Thomas 10) CASSINI WEEKLY SIGNIFICANT EVENTS NASA/JPL release 11) ISS STATUS REPORTS NASA/JSC releases 12) MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR STATUS REPORT NASA/JPL release 13) STARDUST STATUS REPORT NASA/JPL release _____________________________________________________________________ INTERSTELLAR SPACE A LIKELY SOURCE OF ORGANIC MOLECULES NASA/ARC release 4 June 2001 Scientists today described how the interaction of hard radiation and ices in space leads to the production of complex organic molecules. The report is being presented to the American Astronomical Society meeting in Pasadena, CA by Drs. Louis Allamandola, Max Bernstein, Jason Dworkin, and Scott Sandford of the Astrophysics Branch of NASA's Ames Research Center, in Moffett Field, CA, Dr. David Deamer of the Biochemistry Department of the University of California, in Santa Cruz, CA, and Dr. Richard Zare and Ms. Jamie Elsila of the Department of Chemistry at Stanford University, in Stanford, CA. The production of organic compounds in space is of special interest to scientists since these molecules may have played a role in the origin of life on Earth. These scientists have been studying the chemistry of organic carbon compounds that occurs in dense molecular clouds in interstellar space, the locations where new stars and planetary systems are born. Such clouds consist of concentrations of dust, ice, and gas that screen out much of the light produced by outside stars. As a result, the interiors of these clouds can become very cold, sometimes attaining temperatures as low as 10 Kelvin (-263°C). At these temperatures, many of the molecules and atoms that are normally present as gases condense to form ice mantles surrounding the dust particles in the cloud, much as your breath condenses into frost on a cold window. These ices are primarily made up of simple molecules like water (H2O), methanol (CH3OH), carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), ammonia (NH3), and methane (CH4). At such low temperatures, these molecules would not normally be expected to react with each other, particularly when they are embedded in ice. However, the ice mantles are exposed to low levels of ionizing radiation in the form of cosmic rays and ultraviolet photons. This radiation can break apart the molecules in the ice and produce highly reactive ions and radicals that can recombine to form larger, more complex molecules. At NASA-Ames, Allamandola, Sandford, Bernstein, and Dworkin use cryogenically cooled vacuum chambers and UV lamps in their laboratory to form and irradiate interstellar ice analogs under conditions that simulate those found in dense interstellar clouds. "Basically, we freeze mixed gases onto an extremely cold window and then give the ices the equivalent of a good suntanning," says Allamandola. "After the sample is warmed up, we can remove any remaining organic materials from the sample chamber and study them using a variety of analytical techniques," he continued. One of these is the technique of two step laser-desorption laser- ionization mass spectrometry. "That's quite a mouthful," says Stanford graduate student Elsila, "but essentially this is an analytical technique that allows us to measure the masses of the various compounds in the organic residue that results from the ice irradiation." "The surprise," says Zare, leader of the Stanford group, "is just how complex the population of organics is. Generally we see a peak at virtually every mass up to and beyond 500 atomic mass units!" This means that the residue must contain hundreds of distinctly different molecules, the vast majority of them being considerably larger than the molecules that made up the original ice. "We are only just beginning to identify all the compounds that are present," notes Dworkin. "One of the more interesting classes of compound we have identified in the residues are amphiphiles. These molecules have the interesting property that, if you add them to water, they can spontaneously form vesicles, that is, walled structures reminiscent of cells." This raises the possibility similar materials could have fallen on the early Earth and played a role in the formation of the first cellular structures. "There is some precedence for this idea," notes Deamer, a biochemist from UCSC and an expert on membranes. "Primitive meteorites are also known to contain amphiphiles that, when added to water, make structures that are very similar to those we make from the simulated interstellar residues," he continued. Other chemical compounds that the team has been studying include a class of molecules called "polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons," or PAHs for short. These molecules consist of small sheets of carbon atoms arranged in hexagons with hydrogen atoms around their edges, much like the shapes you would get if you cut out pieces of a chicken wire fence. PAHs are common molecules on the Earth and are a major component of auto exhaust and soot. PAHs are also very abundant in space, where they are thought to originate primarily in the outflows of gas given off by stars like our own Sun when they reach the end of their normal lives. Like the other molecules in space, PAHs should be frozen into the ice mantles that surround dust grains in interstellar clouds. When the team examined the chemistry that occurred when PAH- containing H2O ices were irradiated with ultraviolet light, they discovered that the PAHs were not destroyed, but that many of them did have their edges modified by the addition of extra oxygen and hydrogen atoms. The addition of oxygen atoms results in the formation of aromatic alcohols and ketones, i.e., PAHs where a peripheral H atom is replaced by an -OH group or a doubly bonded oxygen, respectively. The aromatic ketones are of particular interest. This class of compounds includes quinones, molecules that currently play critical metabolic roles in the biochemistry of all living organisms on Earth. "As with the amphiphiles, this raises the interesting possibility that the infall of materials made in the interstellar medium may have played a significant role in getting life started on Earth," notes Bernstein, who along with Dworkin, makes most of the residues. "However," Allamandola added, "the production of organics in space can't play a role in the origin of life on planets if the material is unable to safely survive transportation from the interstellar medium to the surface of a newly formed planet. Fortunately, meteorites provide us with evidence that organic materials can survive this transition." This evidence comes primarily from the detection of deuterium enrichments in many meteoritic organics. Deuterium is one of the heavier isotopes of hydrogen, having one extra neutron. "It turns out that most of the chemical processes that we think occur in the interstellar medium favor the heavier deuterium over normal hydrogen," says Sandford. "As a result, the presence of excess deuterium in meteoritic organics strongly suggests an interstellar connection. One of our current research activities is to try to understand how deuterium behaves during our ice chemistry simulations. We are discovering patterns to the placement of deuterium in the resulting organics and one of our plans for the future is to compare our results to meteoritic organics to see if the same patterns appear in them." Perhaps the most important point of all this, notes Sandford, is that this type of chemical activity is a universal process that should be happening in all interstellar dense clouds. "It appears that the universe is, in some sense, 'hardwired' to produce relatively complex organics," he quips. "Furthermore, since it is from these clouds that new planetary systems are made, it is reasonable to expect that essentially all new planets should have some of this material fall on them. Thus, interstellar organics may play a wider role in the formation of life on other planets, not just the Earth." The National Aeronautics and Space Administration funded this work. More information * The Astrochemistry Lab at NASA Ames http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/index.html * The equipment used to simulate space (center image) http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/equipment.html#Anchor-49575 * Related material in the July 1999 issue of Scientific American http://www.sciam.com/1999/0799issue/0799bernstein.html Related material in the scientific literature * Bernstein, M. P., Sandford, S. A., Allamandola, L. J., Gillette, J. S., Clemett, S. J. and Zare, R. N. (1999). UV Irradiation of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Ices: Production of Alcohols, Quinones, and Ethers. Science, 283:1135-1138. http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/Bernsteinetal1999.pdf * Bernstein, M. P., Dworkin, J. P., Sandford, S. A. and Allamandola, L. J. (2001). Ultraviolet Irradiation of Naphthalene in H2O Ice: Implications for Meteorites and Biogenesis. Meteoritics and Planetary Science, 36:351-358. http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/Bernsteinetal2001.pdf * Dworkin, J. P., Deamer, D. W., Sandford, S. A. and Allamandola, L. J. (2001). Self-Assembling Amphiphilic Molecules: Synthesis in Simulated Interstellar/Precometary Ices. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98:815-819. http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/Dworkinetal2001.pdf Images of vesicle research [Image 1: http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/drops.jpg (286KB)] These droplets (~10 microns across) show structures reminiscent of cells (although they are not alive). They are from a chemically separated fraction of the bulk residue. [Image 2: http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/fraction.jpg (167KB)] These droplets (small ones are ~10 microns across) glowing under black light in the microscope show internal structure and suggest chemical complexity. They are from a chemically separated fraction of the bulk residue. [Image 3: http://web99.arc.nasa.gov/~astrochm/vesicle.jpg (85KB)] This is a vesicle (~10 microns across) glowing under black light in the microscope made from the bulk residue. Proof that it is a hollow vesicle, rather than a simple drop of oil, is the green pyranine dye that we have trapped inside of it. Contacts: Dr. Louis J. Allamandola NASA-Ames Research Center 650-604-6890, lallamandola@mail.arc.nasa.gov Dr. Max P. Bernstein Astrophysics Branch, NASA-Ames Research Center 650-604-0194, mbernstein@mail.arc.nasa.gov Dr. David Deamer Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, UC Santa Cruz 831-459-5158, deamer@hydrogen.UCSC.EDU Dr. Jason P. Dworkin Astrophysics Branch, NASA-Ames Research Center 650-604-0789, jdworkin@mail.arc.nasa.gov Ms. Jamie Elsila Department of Chemistry, Stanford University 650-723-4318, jelsila@Stanford.EDU Dr. Scott A. Sandford Astrophysics Branch, NASA-Ames Research Center 650-604-6849, ssandford@mail.arc.nasa.gov Dr. Richard N. Zare Department of Chemistry, Stanford University 650-723-3062, zare@stanford.edu _____________________________________________________________________ MIT RESEARCHERS SEEK OCEAN ON JUPITER'S MOON THROUGH ITS SOUNDS Massachusetts Institute of Technology release 4 June 2001 Acoustic techniques used by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers to explore the Arctic Ocean may help determine whether there is a vast liquid ocean under the ice blanketing Jupiter's moon, Europa. MIT researchers report June 5 at the Chicago meeting of the Acoustical Society of America that they may be able to use a technique similar to ultrasound or the sonar navigation used by bats and dolphins to gather information about Europa. MIT ocean engineering professor Nicholas C. Makris said that implanting soda-can-sized sensors in Europa's icy exterior could provide researchers with information on the temperature and structure of the planet. Current sensor technology makes it possible to detect even tiny motions, and there is evidence that massive ice fractures on Europa's surface occur daily. While such an experiment may be a decade or more away, this unconventional approach to planetary exploration would have to begin to be developed now, Makris said. An array of geophones on the icy surface could simultaneously localize discrete events such as fractures and determine the moon's ice-layer thickness as well as the thickness of a potential ocean layer. Searching for water Europa may be the only entity in our solar system besides Earth that contains a great deal of water, researchers say, and this mission would represent the first time ocean scientists have been involved in planetary exploration. Gravity and magnetic data collected by the NASA Galileo Orbiter over the past five years have provided increasing evidence that an ocean exists underneath Europa's uniform, 10- to 100-kilometer thick coat of ice. The possible ocean on Europa may contain more liquid water than all the oceans on Earth combined. Magnetic studies have indicated that there must be a conducting layer in Europa. A salty ocean would fit the bill. Researchers hope to discover whether Europa is made up entirely of mushy ice or if it contains an ocean. Where there is water, there may be life. Using sound to "see" Pictures of the planet show odd, cusp-shaped cracks in the surface. Europa's numerous fractures and ridges are believed to have formed in response to tidal deformations generated by the moon's slightly eccentric 85-hour orbit around Jupiter. Inspired by evidence for these regularly occurring ice fractures, the MIT researchers propose probing Europa's interior by deploying an array of surface microphones that listen to naturally occurring sound. Knowledge of ice mechanics suggests that these propagating fractures would generate significant acoustic energy in the frequency range 0.1-100 Hz. Studying the ice sounds would allow researchers to see if there was a connection between the moon's orbital period and the ice fractures, which occur on Europa once every 30 seconds. Meteors impact Europa about once a month and these also could be used as sound sources. An arctic exploration MIT researchers led by Makris, Doherty Professor of Ocean Utilization in MIT's Department of Ocean Engineering, have used sound-based techniques to explore the Arctic Ocean. By inserting vibration- sensitive hydrophones in the water, researchers used ambient sound to listen for changes in noise levels. They found that noise levels increased when winds and currents put stresses on the ice. "Noise levels are like a thermometer for stress on the ice," Makris said. "The ice is very sensitive and conducive to sound." Sound waves made by large fractures go through the ice and penetrate into the ocean. These low-frequency sound waves, akin to those created by whales, get trapped and can propagate hundreds of kilometers through the water. Even if they can't be heard, instruments can pick up their vibrations from a distance. In addition to Makris, the research team includes ocean engineering post-doctorate associates Aaron M. Thode and Michele Zanolin and graduate students Sunwoong Lee, Purnima Ratilal and Joshua Wilson. The Office of Naval Research funds this work. Makris is the Secretary of the Navy/Chief of Naval Operations Scholar of Oceanographic Sciences. An additional article on this subject is available at http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0106/06europasound/. Contact: Deborah Halber, MIT News Office Phone: 617-258-9276, e-mail: dhalber@mit.edu _____________________________________________________________________ MARS INVADES EARTH By Bruce Moomaw From SpaceDaily 4 June 2001 In the wake of the latest report on preparing for samples from Mars, the old arguments for and against have again taken center stage in this perennial debate. The basic argument against returning Mars samples is that the chances that "extant" microbes still exist on Mars are higher than NASA is making out, and that there is a genuine and serious chance that such microbes might prove harmful to Earth's biosphere--and perhaps to human beings themselves. How accurate is this? ...In short, while I am convinced that [some writers] have tremendously exaggerated the risks that alien organisms might present to Earth, I also think that some other writers... are much too blithely sanguine about the risk. Get the full story at http://www.spacedaily.com/news/life-01p1.html. _____________________________________________________________________ ARIZONA DUST DEVILS TARGETED FOR MARS EXPERIMENT By Lori Stiles University of Arizona release 4 June 2001 A University of Arizona-led international team of 20 space scientists and engineers this week are conducting an ambitious field test of equipment to study dust devils swirling over the Santa Cruz flats near Eloy, AZ. The "Matador" experiment, led by Peter Smith of the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and funded by NASA's Human Exploration and Development of Space enterprise, will help define instruments needed for studying much larger dust devils on Mars later in this decade, possibly in 2007. Mars dust is a major potential threat to both robotic and human exploration of the Red Planet. Enormous Martian dust devils--100 times larger than those on Earth--churning tons of electrically charged dust particles could cause lightning bolts and discharges that might fry computers and delicate electronics, interfere with radio communications, or rip apart pressurized human habitat. Earth dust devils can be 10 meters to 20 meters in diameter and 1,000 meters (a kilometer or six-tenths of a mile) high, Smith said. Mars dust devils are typically a kilometer in diameter and 10 kilometers (6 miles) high. Martian dust devils are so big that they dust the planet's atmosphere, giving the atmosphere its reddish-brown hue, and so big that Mars Global Surveyor cameras have photographed them from orbit. Smith, whose Imager for Mars Pathfinder camera returned a trove of famous photos from the surface of Mars where it landed July 4, 1997, was among a group of scientists who recently briefed the National Research Council on hazards to humans on Mars. He also is co- investigator for Beagle 2, the lander part of the 2003 "Mars Express" mission, Europe's first mission to the Red Planet. "We are going to get experience in measuring the physical and electrical properties of dust devils," Smith said. "We want practice tracking dust devils with LIDAR. And we may find that we'll need to make measurements that we haven't thought about yet." Starting today (June 4), the Matador team will conduct daily operations near plowed but uncultivated agricultural fields in desert near Eloy. Using LIDAR at their fixed station, researchers will track speed and direction of the moving dust storms, then drive their instrument-laden pickup "mobile station" into the paths of any dust devils they can intercept. Video crews in another vehicle and at the fixed station will record dust devils as they hit the instruments deployed from the pickup. LIDAR, which bounces a laser beam to measure distance to the dust storm, will be used to track moving dust devils and get density profiles of dust in the twisters. The suite of instruments for the field test also includes cameras, a laser doppler anemometer for gauging wind speed, temperature and pressure sensors, magnets, high frequency and low frequency radios and electric field antennae, a dust counter, an "electric field mill" made by Global Atmospherics of Tucson (it measures changes in Earth's electric field that averages around 100 volts per meter but shoots up to 2,000 or 3,000 volts per meter, e.g, during lightning strikes), and MAOS, the Mars Atmospheric Oxidant Sensor, a chemistry experiment to discover the source of oxidation (corrosion) on Mars. Portable GPS units are attached to the scientists' rugged field laptop computers. Team scientists include Smith and others from the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab; John Marshall of NASA Ames Research Center, an expert on dust properties; William Farrell of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, an expert on the electrical properties of dust devils; Greg DeLory of the University of California-Berkeley, who is managing the data system during the experiment; Allan Carswell of Optech, Ontario, Canada, who will operate the LIDAR; Barry Hillard of the NASA John Glenn Research Center, who will be using the electric field mill; Nilton Renno of the UA departments of atmospheric sciences and planetary sciences, an expert on Earth's dust devils, and others. An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-atmosphere-01a.html. _____________________________________________________________________ LUNAR HOTEL By Govert Schilling From New Scientist, http://www.newscientist.com 6 June 2001 Dennis Tito made do with the space station, but future space tourists will expect more fun. Welcome to your holiday destination: the Moon. After landing at the spaceport, a surface shuttle will whisk you to your hotel, the Moon's first. Its two needle-like towers soar over the rim of a deep canyon, and between them you'll see Earth rising. Enjoy the view. Enjoy low gravity. Enjoy your stay. It's still fantasy, but maybe not for long. Hans-Jurgen Rombaut of the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture in the Netherlands has designed a lunar hotel that for the first time exploits the unique conditions on the Moon--and the building materials available there. The hotel could be up and running by 2050. "Taking into account all the weird circumstances on the Moon was a tremendous challenge," Rombaut says. "This has never been done before at this level of detail." Rombaut's hotel is a far cry from your average establishment--in fact, he prefers to call it a "sensation engine". The hotel's two slanting towers, each 160 meters high, will provide tourists space to indulge in "low-gravity games" such as indoor mountaineering, abseiling and "flying" using special suits with bat-like wings. Suspended from the Moon-rock backbones of the towers will be teardrop-shaped "habitation capsules" designed to look like small spaceships, so that guests will feel as if they're still travelling, says Rombaut. Each capsule will have its own supply of fresh water and a rubbish and sewage disposal unit that will be changed every day by the hotel staff. Visitors will be encouraged to walk to the restaurants at the top of the towers instead of using elevators, helping avoid muscle deterioration during their two-week stay. Cosmic rays The low gravity--one-sixth of the Earth's--and the absence of wind were a boon for the architect: he was able to design a much more slender and fragile-looking building than would have been possible on Earth. But keeping the harsh lunar environment out was quite another matter. Temperatures vary between 100°C and -150°C, and lethal cosmic rays and solar particles bombard the lunar surface, unimpeded by the ultra-thin atmosphere. To shield the interior from this onslaught, Rombaut designed a 50- centimeter-thick hull. It consists of two outer layers of Moon rock and a 35-centimetre layer of water held between glass panes. The water absorbs energetic particles and helps keep the temperature constant, and the Moon rock provides further protection. Windows are formed simply from holes in the Moon-rock layer. Thanks to the low gravity, the hull will weigh less than a 7-centimeter-thick layer of concrete on Earth, says Rombaut. The cost of launching tons of steel and water to the Moon is clearly a hurdle. "As much as possible has to be manufactured on the Moon itself, using existing minerals and ores," says Rombaut. It is possible that there are large amounts of water on the Moon, stored as ice in craters near the south pole that stay permanently in shadow. Bernard Foing at the European Space Research and Technology Centre in Noordwijk says Rombaut's design is the most detailed proposed so far. "The most recent knowledge about the Moon has been taken into account," he says. Foing is also chairman of the Lunar Explorers Society, a group of space buffs who hope to construct a robot Moon base by 2015, followed by a manned base by 2020 and a real lunar village by 2040. "This hotel would fit very well in our scheme," he says. Rombaut hopes that millionaire Dennis Tito's recent tourist flight to the International Space Station will kick off the era of space tourism. But even half a century from now, visitors will still need deep pockets, Rombaut says, as a two-week stay in his low-gravity leisure center will probably cost as much as a mortgage on a house. New Scientist issue: 6th June 2001 An illustration supporting this story is available at http://www.newscientist.com/ns_images/9999/9999839F1.JPG. Additional information on this article is available at http://www.newscientist.com/dailynews/news.jsp?id=ns9999839 . Contact: Claire Bowles, New Scientist Press Office, London Phone: +44(0)20 7331 2751, e-mail: claire.bowles@rbi.co.uk _____________________________________________________________________ HUMANS ON EUROPA: A PLAN FOR COLONIES ON THE ICY MOON By Don Lipper From Space.com 6 June 2001 ...Frigid and ice-covered, Europa is believed to harbor a giant liquid ocean beneath its crusty arctic surface, a primordial sea whose tidal motions are driven by Jovian gravity and warmed by intense radiation given off by the giant planet. Yet despite the planet's fearsome environment, members of the Artemis Society, a private venture dedicated establishing a permanent, self-supporting community on the Moon, also have set their sites on the creation of a human colony at Europa. The group has planned almost everything from how to build communities in subsurface air pockets, to how to program the colonist's digital watches. Some folks at NASA are skeptical. "Europa is right in the middle of an incredibly deadly radiation belt around Jupiter," said Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Rich Terrile, deputy project scientist for the Europa Orbiter. "A fairly well shielded human being on the surface of Europa, and even in the vicinity of Europa, would die in about 10 minutes. It would be like standing 30 feet (9 meters) away from the unshielded core of a 10- gigawatt nuclear reactor. It's just where you really don't want to be." Get the full story at http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/missions/europa_colonies_010606- 1.html. _____________________________________________________________________ GOLDIN TELLS GRADUATES HUMANS ON MARS IN 20 YEARS By Jeff Foust From Spaceflight Now 10 June 2001 NASA administrator Dan Goldin told graduates of one of the nation's leading universities Friday that humans would walk on Mars within the next 20 years. In a commencement address at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Goldin, whose tenure as NASA administration may soon come to an end, described the unofficial but widely-accepted long-term goal of the agency's human spaceflight program. "A spacecraft will land, a hatch will open, a ladder will drop," Goldin said. "Then, the world will watch as an astronaut, in a white suit with an American flag on the shoulder, steps down and crunches her boot down on the dusty red surface of Mars." Get the full story at http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0106/10goldinmit/. _____________________________________________________________________ PROTECTING BIOSPHERES BEYOND EARTH By Bruce Moomaw 11 June 2001 June 11, 2001 A new era in space exploration is slowly opening up as we prepare for the return of samples beyond the Moon: from comets, Mars and Europa. But there is a downside to this glorious new age of exploration--two downsides, actually. Firstly there is a good deal of apprehension among the general public that samples returned from other worlds such as Mars--just might-- contain alien germs capable of turning into a worldwide plague, or at least wreaking havoc with the Earth's natural environment. Beside this fear of "back contamination", there is also a fear of "forward contamination"--the possibility that spacecraft might contaminate the worlds they land on with Earth microbes, destroying scientifically priceless alien life-forms before we even have a chance to study them. Get the full story at http://www.spacedaily.com/news/life-01q1.html. _____________________________________________________________________ NEW ADDITIONS TO THE ASTROBIOLOGY INDEX By David J. Thomas http://www.lyon.edu/webdata/users/dthomas/astrobiology/astrobiology.h tml 11 June 2001 Articles about astrobiology, exobiology and terraformation http://www.lyon.edu/webdata/users/dthomas/astrobiology/online_article s1.html R. A. Kerr, 2001. Are Martian 'pearl chains' signs of life? Science, 291(5510):1875. R. A. Kerr, 2001. Returning alien rocks right the second time. Science, 292(5523):1817. A. Lawler, 2001. Canada eyes front-row seat in Mars program. Science, 292(5523):1813. B. Moomaw, 2001. Mars invades Earth. SpaceDaily. B. Moomaw, 2001. Protecting biospheres beyond Earth. SpaceDaily. Articles about human space exploration and the microgravity environment http://www.lyon.edu/webdata/users/dthomas/astrobiology/online_article s3.html J. Foust, 2001. Goldin tells graduates humans on Mars in 20 years. Spaceflight Now. D. Lipper, 2001. Humans on Europa: a plan for colonies on the icy moon. Space.com. G. Schilling, 2001. Shoot for the Moon: a Dutch architect designs a hotel that exploits the unique conditions on the Moon. New Scientist. L. Stiles, 2001. Dust devils at Arizona targeted for Mars experiment this week. SpaceDaily. Articles about evolutionary biology and chemistry http://www.lyon.edu/webdata/users/dthomas/astrobiology/online_article s5.html R. A. Kerr, 2001. Beating up on a young Earth, and possibly life. Science, 290(5497):1677. R. A. Kerr, 2001. Rethinking water on Mars and the origin of life. Science, 292(5514):39. _____________________________________________________________________ CASSINI WEEKLY SIGNIFICANT EVENTS NASA/JPL release 31 May - 6 June 2001 The most recent spacecraft telemetry was acquired from the Goldstone tracking station on Wednesday, June 6. The Cassini spacecraft is in an excellent state of health and is operating normally. Information on the spacecraft's position and speed can be viewed on the "Present Position" web page at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/cassini/english/where/. Recent spacecraft activities included an Attitude Control Subsystem (ACS) high water mark clear, a CDS error log clear, a Reaction Wheel Assembly (RWA) momentum unload, and an ACS Catbed Heater test. For this test the heaters on both thruster branches were powered on to verify that the SCO thermal heating model was correct. The test executed nominally. In addition, the Radio Frequency Subsystem began solar conjunction testing. The tests began on Thursday May 31 and will continue through the end of superior conjunction in the first week in June. For these tests commands are uplinked at 250 and 500 bits per second. The results will help the Spacecraft Operations Office (SCO) plan for Saturn Orbit Insertion, which occurs near superior conjunction. Sequence development is under way for the Probe S-band carrier signal test to be carried out during C26 in mid June. All inputs from SCO, RSS and the Probe have been received. The sequence products will be released for review at the end of this week with a command approval meeting set for the following week. The Huygens Recovery Task Force held a two-day meeting in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. Excellent progress is being made in finding a solution for the relay link problem, and a summary report will be made to the full PSG at the Oxford meeting later this month. The C28 SPVT Project Briefing was given by Science Planning. The project has approved the integrated plan for implementation. Science turns on thrusters needed to accomplish interplanetary cruise fields and particles data collection will be performed at slower turn rates in order to minimize hydrazine usage. The current sequence has four 90 degree and one <1 degree turns on thrusters to accomplish these measurements. Working group meetings and telecons were held for the Titan Orbiter Science Team (TOST), the Satellite Orbiter Science Team (SOST), the Atmosphere Working Group (AWG), and the Rings Working Group (RWG). The TOST focused on finalizing the integration of the first 10 Titan flybys and preparation of the TOST report to the Planetary Science Group (PSG). The TOST is looking for PSG approval of these plans at the Oxford meeting to be held on June 18-22. Instrument Operations (IO) and the Multi Mission Image Processing Laboratory processed and delivered 238 ISS Photometric Calibration and Dark Frame images produced in the C26 sequence. Mission Planning activities this week included kick off of a task to assemble and manage the propellant budget for cruise and tour, completion of Revision M of the Mission Plan, and publication of the "Mission Plan Quick Reference Guide." The reference guide is being published for the first time and is a very useful document providing all the updated tables and charts from revision M of the Mission Plan. Both documents will soon be available from the Cassini Electronic Library (CEL). Mission Assurance and Systems Engineering signed off the updated Anomaly Reporting Plan. This plan documents the process by which Cassini uses the Institutional Problem Reporting System for anomaly documentation, resolution, corrective action, and verification. The Program recently approved changes to the existing process and has begun using the updated process. Revision G of the Cassini Anomaly Response Operations Plan has been signed off. The document will be available from the CEL next week. More than 20 scientists presented preliminary results from last winter's Jupiter flyby during meetings of the American Geophysical Union in Boston this week. Among them were sixteen scientific papers about Cassini results from that encounter. Cassini flew past Jupiter in December 2000 for a gravity assist to reach Saturn. Researchers took the opportunity to study the giant planet from different vantage points by also using NASA's Galileo spacecraft, plus other spacecraft and ground-based telescopes, in coordination with Cassini's Jupiter observations. A list of the papers presented is available at http://agu.org/cgi-bin/sessions?meeting=sm01&part=P51A&maxhits=100. More information about the joint Cassini and Galileo studies of Jupiter is available at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/jupiterflyby . Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, CA, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. _____________________________________________________________________ ISS STATUS REPORTS NASA/JSC releases 6 June 2001 The Expedition Two crew this week busily prepared for the first station-based spacewalk planned for Friday and continues to assist the ground with troubleshooting of the complex's robotic arm in the backup mode. Commander Yury Usachev and Flight Engineer Jim Voss will open hatches in the Zvezda module beginning Friday morning about 9:30 to reposition a docking mechanism in preparation for the arrival of a Russian docking module later this year. They climbed into their Russian spacesuits Tuesday, entered the transfer compartment and conducted a practice session for the task, which is budgeted to take about 30 to 40 minutes. As a precaution, hatches will be closed at various locations on the station so that the small, ball-shaped transfer compartment can be depressurized. Flight Engineer Susan Helms will remain in the Zarya module throughout the Extravehicular Activity (EVA). Meanwhile, the Canadian Space Agency today planned to send computer commands to the station's robot arm, called Canadarm2, to attempt to pinpoint the cause of a problem with one of its seven joints in the redundant, or backup mode. Though the primary system of the arm works perfectly, the arm must have a prime and backup operating system functioning prior to the launch of Atlantis delivering the Joint Airlock to the complex. The Canadarm2 is required for the grapple of the airlock in Atlantis' cargo bay and its installation on a docking port of the Unity module. The 25,000-pound airlock will allow future station-based spacewalks to be conducted in U.S. and/or Russian spacesuits. The Shuttle robot arm cannot reach the Airlock installation location. In parallel, a software patch is being developed that actually can mask, or inhibit, the use of the suspect shoulder pitch joint allowing operation of the arm in six of the seven degrees of freedom. Again, the arm works fine on its primary string and, in fact, yesterday was maneuvered to what likely will serve as its stowed, or cradled position, with each end firmly attached to a grappling pin on the outside of the Destiny laboratory and one on the tunnel adapter leading to Unity. Until the Canadarm2 evaluation is completed at week's end, shuttle and station managers will not firmly decide on the launch dates for the next two assembly missions. However, at present the next flight is tentatively slated for launch in early July pending resolution of the shoulder pitch joint problem and the conduct of a "dry-run" of the airlock installation. The follow-on flight remains scheduled for early August carrying a replacement crew for Expedition Two. The Expedition Three crew of Commander Frank Culbertson and Flight Engineers Vladimir Dezhurov and Mikhail Turin today completed training at Star City outside Moscow. Science investigations continue onboard under the guidance of the Payload Operations Center at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL, except for the Human Research Facility, which is monitored and controlled from the Telescience Support Center (TSC) at the Johnson Space Center, Houston. For details on ISS science, visit http://www.scipoc.msfc.nasa.gov. 8 June 2001 Expedition Two Commander Yury Usachev and astronaut Jim Voss performed their first spacewalk on the International (ISS) on Friday, completing all of their scheduled tasks smoothly and ahead of schedule. Usachev and Voss entered the small, spherical transfer compartment at the forward end of the Zvezda Service Module to begin the first spacewalk at the ISS without the presence of a shuttle. They removed a hatch at the bottom (Earth-facing part) of the compartment to open it to the vacuum of space and officially begin the spacewalk at 9:21 AM. After lashing the hatch cover to the top of the compartment, they replaced it with a docking cone assembly that had been temporarily stowed on a transfer compartment wall. Using a rotating handle, they secured it firmly with the twelve roller-like hatches around its perimeter at 9:40 AM, marking the official end of the spacewalk. With help from fellow crewmember Susan Helms, who stayed in the Zarya module and helped coordinate the spacewalk, the activity went very quickly. The 19-minute spacewalk had been expected to take 30 to 40 minutes. The docking cone was installed to prepare for the arrival of the Russian docking compartment, scheduled for later this year. Meanwhile, managers have postponed the launch of the Space Shuttle Atlantis on the STS-104 mission to no earlier than July 7. Atlantis will take the Joint Airlock to the ISS. The ISS's new Canadarm2 will be used to install the airlock, and engineers are continuing to troubleshoot an intermittent problem in the arm's secondary power and control string. They also continue to try to evaluate why brakes in the arm's wrist joint came on without being commanded during an earlier test run. The STS-105 flight of Discovery, taking the Expedition Three crew to the ISS and returning the Expedition Two crew to Earth, will be launched no earlier than August 5. The next ISS status report will be issued on Wednesday, June 13, or as events warrant. _____________________________________________________________________ MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR STATUS REPORT NASA/JPL release 6 June 2001 Launch/Days since Launch = November 7, 1996/1673 days Start of Mapping/Days since Start of Mapping = April 1, 1999/797 days Total Mapping Orbits = 10,043 Total Orbits = 11,726 Recent events The spacecraft is operating nominally in performing the beta- supplement daily recording and transmission of science data. The mm144 sequence executed successfully from 01-151 (5/31/01) through 01-153 (6/02/01). The mm145 sequence has performed well since it started on 01-154 (6/03/01). It terminates on 01-157 (6/06/01). The mm146 sequence, successfully uplinked on 01-156 (6/05/01), begins executing on 01-158 (6/07/01). Ten more Roll Only Targeted Observations (ROTOs) were performed since the last report. MGS has completed a total of 117 ROTOs to date. Spacecraft health All subsystems report good health and status. The Sun Monitor Ephemeris fault protection is disabled to prevent another C-Mode entry due to sun-sensor shadowing by the HGA. Sun-sensor shadowing is the most likely cause of the 5/2/01 entry into C-Mode. The shadowing was caused by a combination of planetary geometry and beta- supplement HGA positioning. The 35-degree Solar Panel offpoint caused the SAM sun-sensor instead of the SAP sun-sensor to be selected for sensing sun position. Flight software could not accurately compute sun position when the SAM sun-sensor became shadowed by the HGA. Other fault protection routines continue to protect MGS from losing its attitude knowledge. Uplinks There have been 13 uplinks to the spacecraft during the past week, including instrument command loads, the background sequences cited above, and ROTO mini-sequences mz104, mz105, & mz106. There have been 5,419 command files radiated to the spacecraft since launch. Upcoming events DOY 01-172 (6/21/01) marks the end of the beta-supplement phase and the beginning of the nominal mapping phase of the mission. Planetary and orbital geometry will allow the HGA to auto-track the Earth without impacting the HGA boom. Nominal mapping sequences will not be as command intensive as the beta-supplement sequences. Therefore, 28-day background sequences will be the norm instead of the 3- and 4- day beta-supplement sequences. Another MGS Mars Relay On-orbit UHF Test will be conducted with Stanford University between 01-177 (6/26/01) and 01-179 (6/28/01). MOLA Polar Scans are scheduled for 01-193 (7/12/01) and 01-194 (7/13/01). _____________________________________________________________________ STARDUST STATUS REPORT NASA/JPL release 8 June 2001 There were three Deep Space Network (DSN) tracking passes this past week and all subsystems are performing normally. The Cometary and Interstellar Dust Analyzer instrument continues to observe the interstellar dust stream with an optimal spacecraft attitude when not in communication with Earth. The weekly navigation camera images, monitoring camera performance, were taken. The image quality remains excellent. The Stardust spacecraft is in that part of its orbit where it will encounter Comet Wild 2 during the next orbit loop. We are taking advantage of this orbital geometry, one orbit early, and are taking images of the exact stars that will be used to navigate the spacecraft past Comet Wild 2 2.5 years from now. We are placing the spacecraft in the comet flyby RAM attitude, just as we would during flyby, to take the guide star images as well as look for any stray light throughout the entire mirror range of over 180 degrees. The Comet Wild 2 background guide star and stray light images were scheduled early this week, however DSN ground problems prevented a reliable uplink to the spacecraft. These images were successfully taken at the end of the week and will be downlinked next week. The navigation camera is expected to be less active by early next month. The contamination process that occurred twice is well known and we have demonstrated that we can remove it easily. The camera is now clean, has been characterized in detail, and its range of performance at Comet Wild 2 is well known and will meet all requirements. Therefore future image activities will be for only routine monitoring as planned before launch. For more information on the Stardust mission--the first ever comet sample return mission--please visit the Stardust home page at http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov. _____________________________________________________________________ End Marsbugs, Volume 8, Number 22.