Living Off The Land On Mars. What Can We Find On The Red Planet?
Extending humanity to other worlds in the Solar System is at the very limits of our modern technology. And unless there are dramatic discoveries in new propulsion systems or we learn how to build everything out of carbon nanotubes, the future of space exploration is going to require living off the land.
The technique is known as In-Situ Resource Utilization or ISRU, and it means supplying as much of your mission from local resources as possible. And many of our future exploration destinations, like Mars, have a lot to work with.
Let’s look at the raw materials on Mars that missions can use to live off the land and the techniques and technologies that will need to be developed to make this possible.
Watch the video here:
Living Off The Land On Mars. What Can We Find On The Red Planet? (YouTube)
Comments (2)
One facility that will be needed on Mars, at least by the time the population reaches 1000, will be a medical center/hospital. I'm sure it has been considered but has not been shown in any material I've seen.
I wonder how many of the methods we will find for mining the surface of Mars will be useful in mining our own landfills. New challenges cause growth in ability and any new ability can get applied much more extensively than the orignal intent. Just look at m&m's and thier original purpose and ultimate scope of use. (Actually I enjoyed a pack in the MRE I ate today, but a lot more get sold as regular candy. :-) BTW I love the LEGO-like perspective of taking inventory of each piece(isotope). Speaking generally, if you have a full set of parts, you can build the entier project. And new plans can be "uploaded" to Mars for the machnes to make. :-) Another great video!!