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-------------------- 2527 - MOON - Take Me to the Moon
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- Picture Scott Kelly Mark Kelly twin
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- In 1969, the year my son, Doug, was born, Neil Armstrong took the first steps on the Moon. In 2007, President Bush proclaims America should return to the Moon by 2020 and prepare for going on to Mars. In 1969 humans spent 3 days on the Moon. They could not have lasted any longer.
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- Their conclusion was it was a nice place to visit but I would not want to live there. The next trip is designed for astronauts to live on the Moon for 6 month intervals. Just like there trips to the International Space Station. The Space Station is in low Earth orbit just 224 miles away from mother Earth.
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- On the Moon they will be 3 days away. On Mars they will be 3 months away. Space travelers are going to have to learn how to be self-sufficient. The will have to survive on their own and they can’t take all of what they need with them.
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- Twin astronauts, Mark Kelly and Scott Kelly, part of a survival experiment. from March 2015 to March 2016. Scott spent a year on the International Space Station while his brother, Mark, remained on Earth. In April 2019, the results of the 3 year study was published of what changed between them with the two different year experiences.
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- The research team compared their metabolism, DNA replication, gene expression, cognition, immune response, and more. What changed? Scott’s body weight, gene expression, gut micro biome, cardioids artery thickness and telomeres ends of DNA strands did change.
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- But, within 6 months 90 % of these measurements all returned to normal. These test results are good for future astronauts.
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- When Neil Armstrong stepped on to the lunar soil everyone saw his footprint in the lunar dust, as one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. Did you notice how dusty his footprint was.
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- That dust is called regolith. It is dust created by 4,000,000,000 years of bombardment by high speed micrometers. The same ones that burn up in our atmosphere. The Moon at 1/6 Earth gravity has no atmosphere. There is no wind to blow the dust around but human activity can stir it up and with 1/6th the gravity it takes a while for it to settle back to the surface. Regolith covers the entire lunar surface from 7 to 100 feet deep. If astronauts are going to build a space station on the Moon they are going to have to deal with this dust.
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- Regolith is pulverized stone, minerals, and glass created by the heat from the tiny impacts. 4 billion years of melting, cooling , agglomerating have transformed the glass particles into jagged-edged abrasive powder that clings to everything. It will ruin hydraulics, freeze on-off switches, turn ball bearings into Grape Nuts.
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- The Apollo mission lasted only 3 days on the Moon and those few moonwalks caused zippers to clog, joints to stiffen, connectors to become plugged. Much longer and astronauts would grind to a halt like Dorothy’s Tin Man in Wizard of Oz.
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- Worst of all, breathing regolith dust causes pulmonary fibrosis, or black lung disease. The particles are one micron to 100 nanometers in size. The smallest ones would pass through the lungs and go directly into the blood stream. If enough dissolved in the blood it could also produce effects similar to carbon monoxide poisoning.
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- Astronauts will have to don dust proof overalls to work outside. They will need a porch to clean up before entering their living quarters. They will need special designed space suits. A space suit that weighs 200 pounds on Earth weighs only 33 pounds on the Moon.
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- Maybe rather than trying to avoid this dust we should try to figure out how to use it.
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- If 10 feet of regolith covered the living quarters it would protect astronauts from harmful radiation. If you microwave regolith dust it hardens into a pavement. Maybe we could send robots ahead to pave landing pads by micro waving the lunar soil like a Zamboni cleans up an ice rink. NASA is designing a regolith excavator about the size of a riding lawn mower that weighs less than 90 pounds.
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- Regolith is 42% oxygen by weight, and, liquid oxygen makes up 75% of the spacecrafts fuel mass when it leaves Earth. If launch did not have to carry oxygen for the return trip they would be lighter, cheaper, and still able to carry a bigger payload. NASA figures that if they could make 97 pounds of oxygen per day they could refuel 4 ascent vehicles per year.
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- A robot, mini bull dozer could travel around the surface and make oxygen all day long. One process to use is called hydrogen reduction process. It operates at 1300 F to “crack” oxygen away from iron oxides. Hydrogen percolates through hot iron oxides and combines with oxygen to form water. Astronauts need water too.
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- Or, the water can go through electrolysis in a second stage to separate the oxygen from the hydrogen. 100 square yards of regolith extracted to a depth of only 2 inches would produce 660 pounds of oxygen, enough to sustain 4 astronauts for 75 days.
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- In many ways Mars would be easier to live with than the Moon. Mars has an atmosphere, weather, and seasons. Its gravity is 1/3 Earth’s. But, the Moon is 3 days away from home and Mars is 3 months away.
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- The Moon can teach us to be self-sufficient. Living on the Moon will not only test our engineering systems. It will be school place for children and public education. It will test our social and political priorities. It will be a challenge that can unite nations.
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- Buzz Aldrin placed a 6 inch gold replica of an olive branch on the Moon’s surface. It was with a wish for peace for all humankind.
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- The first 15 years of the space age saw 95 spacecraft and 24 men reach the Moon. Since 1972 only 4 spacecraft have been back. There is much to learn on the Moon.
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- Radio telescopes on the far side would be shielded from Earth’s radio noise and could detect near Earth asteroids which remain undetectable from Earth. Temperatures at the equator vary from 250 F to - 240 F. However, an outpost near the lunar pole at Shackleton Crater the temperature is 50 F to - 50 F and there is sunlight for 80% of the year ( good for solar cells).
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- Helium-3 , common on the Moon and rare on Earth, is a potential fuel for power generating fusion reactors. The Moon is thought to have been caused by a Mars sized object colliding with Earth 4 billion years ago splashing the material into orbit. It was 3 Earth diameters away and now it is 60 Earth diameters away, and still receding. Seismology on the Moon would help confirm these theories of the Moon’s origin
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- The Moon is a great place to visit, but would I want to live there? The biggest concerns are the effects of radiation and the effects of isolation from the physiological perspective.
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- December 7, 2019 2527 741
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--------------------- Monday, December 16, 2019 --------------------
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