DailyDirt: Colonizing Space
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
There have been several proposals for manned missions to Mars. Some proposals include a colony; most don't. It's obvious that animals have evolved to live on Earth and not in space, and it will take quite a bit of adjustment to get comfortable in a space colony of any kind -- whether it exists on the moon or Mars or just floats around somewhere in between. In any case, if we're serious about visiting other planets, we'll need to figure out how to survive the journey (and pay for it). Here are just a few links on the topic of colonizing space, even though no one has a complete plan for how to do so.- A NASA-commissioned study estimates that a mission to colonize the moon might be 90% cheaper than previously thought. Instead of $100 billion, a $10 billion price tag for a moon colony sounds like a great deal, but it would depend on several factors: partnerships with private companies and international space agencies, re-usable rocket technology, as well as the presence of lunar resources such as water and/or hydrogen in the lunar crust. [url]
- Creating a viable Mars colony is a daunting task, but if it's going to happen, a project has to start somewhere. JumpStartFund has a project that anyone can join, but it doesn't look like too many people are contributing to such a wild scheme without billion-dollar backing. [url]
- Mark and Scott Kelly are twin astronauts who are part of an experiment to document the effects on the human body spending a year in space. Scott Kelly will be orbiting the Earth in the ISS while his identical brother will be studied on Earth. Other astronauts have spent more time in space, but this will be the first American study of long-term health effects on an astronaut including an identical twin control. There are plenty of challenges for space colonies that haven't been solved yet, but knowing a few more details about long-term space exposure couldn't hurt. [url]
Filed Under: astronauts, iss, lunar base, manned missions, mark kelly, mars, scott kelly, space, space colonies, space exploration, valeri polyakov
Companies: jumpstartfund, nasa
