Why we need to go back to Mars Joel Levine
I want to talk about 4.6 billion years
of history in 18 minutes that’s 300
million years per minute let’s start
with the first photograph NASA obtained
of planet Mars
this is flyby Mariner 4 it was taken in
1965 when this picture appeared that
well-known scientific journal the New
York Times wrote in its editorial Mars
is uninteresting it’s a dead world NASA
should not spend any time or effort
studying Mars anymore
fortunately our leaders in Washington at
NASA headquarters knew better and we
began a very extensive study of the red
planet one of the key questions in all
of science is there life outside of
Earth
I believe that Mars is the most likely
target for life outside the earth I’m
going to show you in a few minutes some
amazing measurements that suggest there
may be life on Mars but let me start
with the Viking photograph this is a
composite taken by Viking in 1976 Viking
was developed and managed at NASA
Langley Research Center we sent two
orbiters and two Landers in the summer
of 1976 we had four spacecraft around -
around Mars - on the surface an amazing
accomplishment this is the first
photograph taken from the surface of any
planet this is a Viking Lander
photograph of the surface of Mars yes
the red planet is red Mars is half the
size of the earth but because two-thirds
of the earth is covered by water the
land area on Mars is comparable to the
land area on earth so Mars is a pretty
big place even though it’s only it’s
half the size we have obtained
topographic measurements of the surface
of Mars we understand the elevation
differences we know a lot about Mars
Mars has
the largest volcano in the solar system
Olympus Mons Mars has the Grand Canyon
of the solar system Valles Marineris
very very interesting planet Mars has
the largest impact crater in the solar
system Hellas Basin this is 2,000 miles
across if you happen to be on Mars when
this impactor hit it was a really bad
day on Mars
this is Olympus Mons this is bigger than
the state of Arizona volcanoes are
important because volcanoes produce
atmospheres and they produce oceans
we’re looking at Valles Marineris the
largest canyon in the solar system
superimposed on a map of the United
States 3,000 miles across one of the
most intriguing features about Mars the
National Academy of Science says one of
the 10 major mysteries of the space age
is why certain areas of Mars are so
highly magnetized we call this crustal
magnetism there are regions on Mars
where for some reason we don’t
understand why at this point the surface
is very very highly magnetized is there
water on Mars the answer is no there is
no liquid water on the surface of Mars
today but there is intriguing evidence
that suggests that the early history of
Mars there may have been rivers and fast
flowing water today Mars is very very
dry we believe there’s some water in the
polar caps there are polar caps of North
Pole and South Pole here are some recent
images this is from Spirit and
Opportunity these images that show at
one time there was very fast flowing
water on the surface of Mars why is what
are important water is important because
if you want life you have to have water
water is the key ingredient in the
evolution the arch and evolution of life
on a planet here’s some picture of
Antarctica and a picture of Olympus Mons
very similar features glaciers so this
is frozen water this is ice water on
Mars
this is my favorite picture this has
we’ve just taken a few weeks ago it has
not been seen publicly this is European
Space Agency Mars Express image of a
crater on Mars and in the middle of the
crater we have liquid water we have ice
very intriguing photograph we now
believe that in the early history of
Mars which is 4.6 billion years ago 4.6
billion years ago Mars was very
earth-like Mars had rivers Mars had
lakes but more important Mars had
planetary scale oceans we believe that
the oceans were in the northern
hemisphere and this area in blue which
shows a depression of about four miles
was the ancient ocean area on the
surface of Mars where did the oceans
worth of water on Mars go well we have
an idea this is a measurement we
obtained a few years ago from an Mars
orbiting satellite called Odyssey
subsurface water on Mars frozen in the
form of ice and this shows the percent
if it’s a blueish color it means 16
percent by weight 16 percent by weight
of the Interior contains frozen water or
ice so there is a lot of water below the
surface the most intriguing and puzzling
measurement in my opinion we have
obtained of Mars was released earlier
this year in the magazine science and
what we’re looking at is the presence of
the gas methane ch4 in the atmosphere of
Mars and you can see there are three
distinct regions of methane why is
methane important because on earth
almost all 99.9% of the methane is
produced by living systems not little
green men but microscopic lights below
the surface or at the surface we now
have evidence that methane is in the
atmosphere of Mars a gas that on earth
is biogenic in our
produced by living systems these are the
three plumes a b 1 b 2 and this is the
terrain it appears over and we know from
geological studies that these regions
are the oldest regions on Mars in fact
the Earth and Mars of both 4.6 billion
years old the oldest rock on earth is
only 3.6 billion the reason there is a
billion-year history logical
understanding is because of plate
tectonics the the crust of the earth has
been recycled
we have no geological record prior for
the first billion years that record
exists on Mars and this terrain that
we’re looking at dates back to 4.6
billion years when Earth and Mars were
formed it was a Tuesday this is this is
a map that shows where we put our
spacecraft on the surface of Mars here
is Viking one Viking two this is
opportunity this is spirit this is Mars
Pathfinder this is Phoenix we just put
two years ago notice all of our Rovers
on all of our Landers have gone to the
northern hemisphere that’s because the
northern hemisphere is the region of the
ancient ocean basin there aren’t many
craters and that’s because the water
protected the the basin from being
impacted by asteroids of meteorites and
but not look in the southern hemisphere
in the southern hemisphere their impact
craters their uh volcanic craters here
is Hellas Basin a very very different
place geologically look where the
methane is the methane is in a very
rough terrain area what is the best way
to unravel the mysteries of Mars that
exists we asked this question ten years
ago we invited ten of the top Mars
scientists to the Langley Research
Center for two days we addressed on the
board
the major questions that have not been
answered and we spend two days deciding
how to best answer this question and the
result of our meeting was a robotic
rocket-powered airplane we call Ares
it’s Ariel regional scale environmental
surveyor there’s a model of Ares here
this is a 20% scale model this airplane
was designed at the Langley Research
Center if any place in the world can
build an airplane to fly on Mars
it’s the Langley Research Center for
almost a hundred years a leading center
of Aeronautics in the world we fly about
a mile above the surface we cover
hundreds of miles and we fly about 450
miles an hour we can do things that
Rovers can’t do and Landers can’t do we
can fly above mountains volcanoes impact
craters we fly over valleys we can fly
over surface magnetism the polar cap
subsurface water and we can search for
life on Mars but of equal importance as
we fly through the atmosphere of Mars we
transmit that journey the first flight
of an airplane outside of the earth we
transmit those images back to earth and
our goal is to inspire the American
public who’s paying for this mission
through tax dollars but more important
we will inspire the next generation of
scientists technologists engineer and
mathematician and that’s a critical area
of national security and economic
vitality to make sure we produce the
next generation of scientists engineers
mathematicians and technologists this is
what Ares looks like as it flies over
Mars we pre-program it we will fly where
the methane is we will have instruments
aboard the plane that will sample every
three minutes the atmosphere of Mars we
will look for methane as well as other
gases produced by living systems
we will pinpoint where these gases
emanate from because we can measure the
gradient where it comes from and there
we can direct the next mission to land
right in that area how do we transport
an airplane to Mars in two words very
carefully the problem is we don’t fly it
to Mars we put it in a spacecraft and we
send it to Mars the problem is the
spacecraft largest diameter is 9 feet
Ares is 21 feet wings with 21 foot
wingspan 17 feet long how do we get it
to Mars we fold it and we transport it
in a spacecraft and we have it in
something called an aeroshell this is
how we do it and we have a little video
that subscribes rain board 5 4 3 2
this is
this is the spacecraft taking nine
months to get to Mars it enters the
atmosphere of Mars a lot of feeding
frictional eating it’s the babies
applause our parish it opens up to slow
it down the thermal tiles fall off the
airplane is exposed for the atmosphere
for the first time it unfolds
we believe that in a one-hour flight we
can rewrite the textbook on Mars by
making high-resolution measurements of
the atmosphere looking for guests as a
biogenic origin looking for gases of
volcanic origin studying the surface
studying the magnetism on the surface
which we don’t understand as well as
about a dozen other areas practice makes
perfect
how do we know we can do it because we
have tested Ares model several models
and a half a dozen wind tunnels at the
NASA Langley Research Center for eight
years under Mars conditions and of equal
importance is we test Ares in the
Earth’s atmosphere at a hundred thousand
feet which is comparable to the density
and pressure of the atmosphere on Mars
where we’ll fly now a hundred thousand
feet if you fly cross-country to Los
Angeles you fly 37,000 feet we do our
tests at a hundred thousand feet and I
want to show you one of our tests this
is a half scale model this is a
high-altitude helium balloon this is
over Tillamook Oregon we put the folded
airplane on the balloon it took about
three hours to to get up there and then
we release it on command at one hundred
and three thousand feet and we deploy
the airplane and everything works
perfectly and we’ve done high altitude
and low altitude tests just to perfect
this technique we’re ready to go I have
a scale model here but we have a full
scale model in storage at the NASA
Langley Research Center we’re ready to
go all we need is a check from NASA
headquarters to to cover the costs I am
prepared to donate my honorarium for
today’s talk for this mission
there’s actually no one or Orion for
anyone for this thing this is the Aries
team we have about 150 scientists
engineers we’re working with Jet
Propulsion Laboratory Goddard Space
Flight Center Ames Research Center and
half a dozen major universities and
corporations and developing this it’s a
large effort it’s all all Duvall a lead
at NASA Langley Research Center and let
me conclude by saying not too far from
here right down the road in Kitty Hawk
North Carolina a little more than a
hundred years ago history was made when
we had the first powered flight of an
airplane on earth we are on the verge
right now
to make the first flight of an airplane
outside the Earth’s atmosphere we are
prepared to fly the Sun Mars rewrite the
textbook about Mars if you’re interested
in more information we have a website
that describes this exciting and
intriguing mission and why we want to do
it thank you very much