The Dusty Concern for the Mission to Mars

eldavojohn writes "Astronauts sent to the red planet may find much of their job involving the task of dusting off their equipment and suits. The president says we're going there but the dusty planet has some obstacles and uncertainties for engineers because we don't have a sample of Martian dust. Is it toxic? Will it conduct electricity and short circuits? Will astronauts suffer from the triboelectric effect? How large is the average grain? Will humans be allergic to it? Will sinuses jeopardize a mission? Will a dust storm stop a take off and return flight? So many uncertainties from something as simple as dust but one thing is clear — we need samples!"

Not as big a problem as Luna...

[cupofjoe]

Actually, there's some body of work that describes a larger problem for Lunar explorers, although the Martian problem isn't anything to sneeze at, either. Pun intended.

As TFA points out, the lack of weathering processes on Luna leaves the dust/regolith mainly as sharp-edged grains, which actually gives them incredible abrasive power. This poses an enormous problem for mechanical assemblies that have any wear surfaces. The Apollo astronauts, IIRC, went through a couple pairs of suit gloves each simply from the wear of the dust on their metallic glove locking rings.

Martian dust might have a similar range of effects, but I hadn't heard of the "toxic dust" issue, yet; that's the interesting bit. Silicosis of the lungs and related disorders, yes; toxicity, no. Yikes.

Toxic dust makes me think of the blended iPhone. "Don't breathe this." Sorry, that's another article...

-joe.

Re:We'll never know.

[cupofjoe]

Technically, the Mars Sample Return http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/technology/samplereturn/i ndex.html [nasa.gov] is a precursor mission (i.e., before manned landings) that's been "on the books", so to speak, for a while. It's a developmental mission model, having been bounced back-and-forth between front and back burners for a while, now, but the technology is all there. It's very expensive, as you can imagine, so that's part of the reason why it's not "ready" yet. Other reasons have to do with local infrastructure - we'd like to have a handle on good surface communications on Mars - and the fact that the science community can't really decide on a reasonable surface target. That's being helped by MER, and will really get a
good kick in the pants by the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), which will be launching in 2009.

Of course, the public have very varied opinions about this...for example,when you Google "Mars Sample Return" you still get http://www.icamsr.org/ [icamsr.org] as your first hit. Sheesh.

Uphill battle, maybe.

--joe.

Re:Why??

[slew]

Apparently, there were many, many unanticipated problems with lunar "dust".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6460089. stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap980327.html [nasa.gov]
http://dailybeacon.utk.edu/showarticle.php?article id=51367 [utk.edu]

As expected, enginerds never seem to want to underestimate a problem especially when they've heard of a similar problem before...

Re:We'll never know.

[Original Replica]

From the parents link:NASA is seeking public opinion on ways to detect possible biohazards from Mars samples returned to the Earth.

Wouldn't any biohazard, bacteria or virius, culture fairly easily in a petri dish? If it could survive and breed in us, it could survive and breed in a lab. It's not like we don't already have experience with weaponized viriuses, what's another few grams of potential mass extinction added to the collection?

And for every who thinks we stopped biological weapons research in 1972, look at this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,821306 ,00.html [guardian.co.uk]

Re:We'll never know.

[cnettel]

Unfortunately, this is totally wrong. PCR detection studies (just try to copy all DNA found and then sequence it) finds lots of sequences from non-cultured organisms no matter where we try to do it, in the human colon, in soil, in ocean water. This could mean that they are rather slow-growing or some other aspects that would make them more benign, but the overall argument against the invasion from Mars is the simple observation that life on Earth has been going on for a long time in very hostile combinations. The chance that foreign life would somehow know a "backdoor" by chance seems remote.

(In that case, I would be more concerned about the effects on us when opening access to closed underground lakes on Earth, but those are still also far more susceptible to being destroyed by "our" biological environment, not the other way round.)