Beyond 2030: stepping stones to the future
27 November 2011Only intense international cooperation will make a success of missions such as sending humans to Mars or near-earth asteroids says Chris Culbert of NASA.
At the recent International Astronautical Congress held in Cape Town, Culbert sketched the basics: the International Space Station will be the jumping-off point for all future deep-space missions. Yes, the American said, the ISS is only in Low Earth Orbit. But there is much that can be developed using it as a jumping-off point.
Culbert developed scenarios – detailed descriptions of the possible and the probable, based on principles such as ‘‘robustness’’ and ‘‘affordability.’’
In one NASA scenario: the sequence of deep-space missions will start in the Earth- Moon system and move on to deep-space habitat at one of the Lagrangian points. In turn, this could be followed by a 28-day robotic mission to a near-earth asteroid, with an exploratory test module sent to an asteroid in order to lay the foundations for possible human habitation later.
Such plans require a lot of good science, not to mention advanced propulsion systems, was what delegates at the ninth symposium on Stepping Stones To The Future heard.
As for a Moon-next mission, the final decision is still a long way off, but the ‘‘architecture’’ - a very specific space term referring to the components of the mission - is in place.
Maria Perino of Thales Alenia Space Italia warned of bottlenecks that threaten mission development – especially the ISS cargo re-supply systems after the demise of the Shuttle.
She lifted the covers on novel technologies being developed by Thales and their partners: inflatable habitat modules, even an inflatable cargo transporter. George Schmidt of NASA’s Glenn Research Center is working on a human-like or ‘‘quasi-android’’ robotic mission scenario for the exploration of Mars beyond 2030.
This would need to be preceded by orbiter missions, perhaps even manned missions to Phobos and Deimos, as the moons of Mars are so small they can be ‘‘docked with’’ rather than ‘‘landed on,’’ he said.
The human-like robotic missions – paving the way for real human explorers – will comprise landers and a control ‘‘truck’’ which will carry out wide-ranging exploration across the Martian terrain, up to 100 kilometres or more.
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