We will soon be able to resolve Mars microbes from orbit. ;-)

On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.

Admittedly though, the JWST is a 4 billion dollar mission. Also it
uses a beryllium metal mirror for infrared astronomy only. The
beryllium makes the mirror lightweight but it is unclear if you can
achieve the much more stringent smoothness requirements at optical
wavelengths with a metal mirror.
As for the data storage and transmission of the large files for such
high resolution images, data storage capacity and costs are doubling
and halving each year, respectively:

Bye-bye hard drive, hello flash.
By Michael Kanellos
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Published: January 4, 2006, 10:00 AM PST
"Currently, NAND chips double in memory density every year. The
cutting-edge 4-gigabit chips of 2005, for example, will soon be
dethroned by 8-gigabit chips. (Memory chips are measured in gigabits,
or Gb, but consumer electronics manufacturers talk about how many
gigabytes, or GB, are in their products. Eight gigabits make a
gigabyte, so one 8Gb chip is the equivalent of 1GB.)
"Another driving factor in the uptake of the technology is cost: NAND
drops in price about 35 to 45 percent a year, due in part--again--to
Moore's Law and in part to the fact that many companies are bringing on
new factories."
http://news.com.com/Bye-bye+hard+dri...3-6005849.html

MRO uses the type of flash memory chips discussed here.

Also, interestingly NASA had planned a laser communication orbiter for
Mars for launch in 2010 before it was canceled:

Record Set for Space Laser Communication.
By Ker Than
Staff Writer
posted: 05 January 2006
02:11 pm ET
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches...aser_comm.html

Mars Telecommunications Orbiter: Interplanetary Broadband.
By Bill Christensen
posted: 05 May 2005
06:41 am ET
http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...om_050505.html

This would have allowed data transmission rates of a hundred times
greater than what is currently available.

It was the great cost overruns overruns that led to cancelling of the
Mars Telecommunications Orbiter, and great cost overruns also
threatened JWST as well.
That the costs for computer technology are dropping exponentially with
capacity increasing exponentially is no doubt fueled by the free market
in this sphere.
Conversely, that launch costs are staying static is no doubt because
the launches are controlled by large governments. When private
companies become the primary financer and purveyor of launches, the
launch costs will also drop dramatically.


Bob Clark

Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.
(snip)

I would rather the money be spent of building infrastructure
in orbit around Mars (the functional equivalent of cell
phone and GPS service, planet wide), and then drop hundreds
or thousands of small, self reliant rovers with lots of
different specialized sensors to comb the planet, get close
enough to actually find those microbes, if they exist, and
lots of other observations, and report back through the
overhead services. And this time, include on the rovers,
flea bots, that clean the lenses and solar cells of dust.

Robert Clark wrote:
snip
So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.

So how long until Mars orbiters will be better able to resolve atomic
and sub-atomic scale images from orbit better than Earth-bound
instruments do it today? ;-)

Austin

AustinMN wrote:
Robert Clark wrote:
snip
So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.

So how long until Mars orbiters will be better able to resolve atomic
and sub-atomic scale images from orbit better than Earth-bound
instruments do it today? ;-)

Austin

The required smoothness is no problem. I have a Be mirror flat that
was polished to about 10 angstrom roughness.

"John Popelish" wrote in message
. ..
Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.
(snip)

I would rather the money be spent of building infrastructure in orbit
around Mars (the functional equivalent of cell phone and GPS service,
planet wide), and then drop hundreds or thousands of small, self reliant
rovers with lots of different specialized sensors to comb the planet, get
close enough to actually find those microbes, if they exist, and lots of
other observations, and report back through the overhead services. And
this time, include on the rovers, flea bots, that clean the lenses and
solar cells of dust.

OK, you had me until the flea bots.

Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

Wow, from this it looks like it's going to be orbitting at the L2
Lagrangian Point, which would mean that it is stationary with respect to
the Earth and the Sun, and it will be behind the Earth on the night side
of the planet at all times, 1.5 million km's out. If it's behind the
Earth, wouldn't it automatically be shielded from the Sun's rays? Or is
the Earth's shadow not big enough out there?

Yousuf Khan

Yousuf Khan wrote:
Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

Wow, from this it looks like it's going to be orbitting at the L2
Lagrangian Point, which would mean that it is stationary with respect to
the Earth and the Sun, and it will be behind the Earth on the night side
of the planet at all times, 1.5 million km's out. If it's behind the
Earth, wouldn't it automatically be shielded from the Sun's rays?

I can't answer your question, but from my understanding, being cold
(i.e. shielded from the sun) is a good thing when studying infrared.
Is it nuclear powered?

Austin

El Guapo wrote:
"John Popelish" wrote in message
. ..
Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.
(snip)

I would rather the money be spent of building infrastructure in orbit
around Mars (the functional equivalent of cell phone and GPS service,
planet wide), and then drop hundreds or thousands of small, self
reliant rovers with lots of different specialized sensors to comb the
planet, get close enough to actually find those microbes, if they
exist, and lots of other observations, and report back through the
overhead services. And this time, include on the rovers, flea bots,
that clean the lenses and solar cells of dust.

OK, you had me until the flea bots.

Do you think they are a worse idea than sitting and waiting
for a tornado to pass directly over the panel to suck the
dust off, like Spirit and Opportunity do? Why not make a
little version of one of these to keep the solar panels
spotless?

http://www.vcdiscounter.com/01robotic.html

Robert Clark wrote:
On another space oriented forum I noted:

"It took 20 years to increase the resolution by a factor or 10 over
Viking with the Mars Global Surveyor mission. But only 10 years to
increase the resolution over that of MGS by a factor of 10 with Mars
Reconnassance Orbiter.
Could we increase the resolution over MRO by another factor of 10 to,
gulp, 3 cm per pixel in only 5 years this time?"

Funny though, that rather off-the-cuff estimate of mine is close to
what is possible.
To resolve 3 cm in the optical from say a 300 km orbit would require a
6 meter mirror. The James Webb Space Telescope will have a 6.5 meter
mirror and is scheduled for launch in 2013. But it was originally
scheduled for launch in 2011:

James Webb Space Telescope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope

So going by this rate, it'll be 3mm/pixel 2.5 years after that, and
300 microns 1.25 years after that, and ...
Hmm, in less than a decade then we should be able to resolve microbes
from space.

Admittedly though, the JWST is a 4 billion dollar mission. Also it
uses a beryllium metal mirror for infrared astronomy only. The
beryllium makes the mirror lightweight but it is unclear if you can
achieve the much more stringent smoothness requirements at optical
wavelengths with a metal mirror.
As for the data storage and transmission of the large files for such
high resolution images, data storage capacity and costs are doubling
and halving each year, respectively:

Bye-bye hard drive, hello flash.
By Michael Kanellos
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Published: January 4, 2006, 10:00 AM PST
"Currently, NAND chips double in memory density every year. The
cutting-edge 4-gigabit chips of 2005, for example, will soon be
dethroned by 8-gigabit chips. (Memory chips are measured in gigabits,
or Gb, but consumer electronics manufacturers talk about how many
gigabytes, or GB, are in their products. Eight gigabits make a
gigabyte, so one 8Gb chip is the equivalent of 1GB.)
"Another driving factor in the uptake of the technology is cost: NAND
drops in price about 35 to 45 percent a year, due in part--again--to
Moore's Law and in part to the fact that many companies are bringing on
new factories."
http://news.com.com/Bye-bye+hard+dri...3-6005849.html

MRO uses the type of flash memory chips discussed here.

I had a 1 GB computer with 600 Gb of memory
in my hand yesterday. It weighs about 5 pounds.
It is the size of a modem.
It is our new video producer.
Cost us $200.
Sells for $750.
Ka-ching!
John

John Popelish a écrit :
Do you think they are a worse idea than sitting and waiting for a
tornado to pass directly over the panel to suck the dust off, like
Spirit and Opportunity do? Why not make a little version of one of
these to keep the solar panels spotless?

http://www.vcdiscounter.com/01robotic.html

Thos are designed for a thick atmosphere and not a thin one,
but it is true that it should work!