Stephen Baxter collaborates with i4is on AI for interstellar travel — Andreas Hein and Stephen Baxter explore the potential of artificial intelligence for interstellar exploration and colonization in a brand-new arXiv preprint (Image: Adrian Mann)
https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.06526
As Mars colonization inches ever closer to becoming a reality, some have argued that the ability to afford a ticket to the Red Planet is a luxury afforded only to the wealthiest members of society. Billionaire Elon Musk has said it’ll run potential Mars inhabitants traveling with his company SpaceX hundreds of thousands of dollars to get there. But in a new interview, he rebuffed the assertion that a one-way ticket to Mars is an easy ticket out for the rich.
The comments were part of an interview with the SpaceX and Tesla CEO that will air Sunday evening in the final episode of Axios’ four-part limited documentary series on HBO. In a clip from the interview, Elon Musk hinted that advancements by his company for Mars colonization have been notable and said there’s a “70 percent” chance that he heads to the Red Planet himself.
One Russian poll found that 28% of respondents doubted the moon landing.
The head of Russia’s Roscosmos space agency has said that a proposed Russian mission to the moon will be tasked with verifying that the American moon landings were real.
“We have set this objective to fly and verify whether they’ve been there or not,” said Dmitry Rogozin in a video posted Saturday on Twitter.
Rogozin was responding to a question about whether or not NASA actually landed on the moon nearly 50 years ago. He appeared to be joking, as he smirked and shrugged while answering. But conspiracies surrounding NASA’s moon missions are common in Russia.
Our partners The Boeing Company and SpaceX are scheduled to launch two uncrewed and two crewed demo flights, beginning with the SpaceX Crew Dragon liftoff on Jan. 7, 2019. The latest: https://go.nasa.gov/2FBi6GI
Our NASA InSight lander just needs some peace and quiet to get its work done. After next week’s #MarsLanding, the spacecraft will study the entire Red Planet by… staying put. Learn how: https://go.nasa.gov/2FwIth3
Billionaire entrepreneurs are trying to create rockets fit for human travel, while government agencies spend billions furthering their explorations. But we are still a long way off from making our way to the red planet by Oliver Holmes.
JUST IN: Jezero Crater will be the landing site of NASA’s next rover being sent to Mars in 2020. This area, with a history of containing water, may have ancient organic molecules & other potential signs of microbial life from billions of years ago.
NASA has chosen Jezero Crater as the landing site for its upcoming Mars 2020 rover mission after a five year search, during which every available detail of more than 60 candidate locations on the Red Planet was scrutinized and debated by the mission team and the planetary science community.
The rover mission is scheduled to launch in July 2020 as NASA’s next step in exploration of the Red Planet. It will not only seek signs of ancient habitable conditions – and past microbial life — but the rover also will collect rock and soil samples and store them in a cache on the planet’s surface. NASA and ESA (European Space Agency) are studying future mission concepts to retrieve the samples and return them to Earth, so this landing site sets the stage for the next decade of Mars exploration.
“The landing site in Jezero Crater offers geologically rich terrain, with landforms reaching as far back as 3.6 billion years old, that could potentially answer important questions in planetary evolution and astrobiology,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate. “Getting samples from this unique area will revolutionize how we think about Mars and its ability to harbor life.”
