Another day, another chance at nuclear fusion. A group at the Plasma Dynamics lab at the University of Washington have come up with a variation on the z-pinch version of plasma confinement fusion. In other words, they take some fusible material (usually a light atom like hydrogen/tritium/deuterium and or helium), and then squish it (in this case, using aluminium or lithium ringlets of plasma) until the nuclei of the material fuses together, releasing energy.
The way they’re selling this method is to reduce the amount of time it takes to get to Mars. Using current methods, it takes about 8-9 months each way. The way in which this method achieves fusion also propels plasma out of the fusion chamber, providing thrust. They estimate that by triggering a fusion event once a minute, that thrust would be enough to shorten the trip to Mars to between 1-3 months, which would be much easier on any human crew that might decide to go along.
This summer, they intend to put all the parts of their fusion implementation (which appear to work fine on their own) together, and hopefully it’ll help move humanity forward if it works.
Posts Tagged ‘Mars’
Faster to Mars?
April 6, 2013Curiouser and curiouser
December 3, 2012So, we finally had the Curiosity rover talk at the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting, where they outlined what had been found, as I talked about here, and the update here. There were some interesting insights, not least that Martian soil contains water with a very high percentage of deuterium(“heavy” hydrogen, which with oxygen makes “heavy water”), which is hydrogen with a neutron as well a proton in its nucleus (normal hydrogen just has a proton).
Curiosity Rover having a look at some rocks.(Artist’s impression – Credit: NASA)
Deuterium is quite useful as a neutron moderator in nuclear fission reactors, but if we can get nuclear fusion off the ground, it would become far more useful, as it can be used as fuel for both deuterium-tritium fusion and deuterium-deuterium fusion (you can make tritium from heavy water too).
The other news from that talk was that some carbon-chlorine compounds(the slide at 21 mins 17 secs in the talk linked above) were found, which are, strictly speaking organic molecules. The reason NASA are not confirming whether the organic molecules are from Mars is because they’re not quite sure where the carbon came from – was it native to Martian soil, did it come from meteorites or some other form of contamination? This is why they were being rather cagey about their find.
As I’ve said before, this is just the beginning of Curiosity’s mission, so hopefully we’ll get a clearer picture in the days to come.
I’d better bring my sunhat
November 30, 2012A followup to my previous blog post. Apparently, the news from Mars that was going to be “one for the history books” was a big misunderstanding between the NASA scientist and the Slate interviewer. NASA have confirmed that they haven’t found organics. What they have found is volcanic sand, the mineral makeup of which has been compared to the sand on the volcano Mauna Kea in Hawaii. This is interesting in itself, but not as exciting as we hoped. We’re still at the beginning of Curiosity’s mission, so we can hope for more news in the future.
MESSENGER approaching Mercury (Credit: NASA)
On the other hand, this news has been trumped by some news from the MESSENGER probe that is orbiting Mercury. This has found not only organics, but ice as well! On a planet that experiences temperatures more than 400 degrees celcius this is surprising, but it appears that the craters offer enough shade. The other interesting thing to note is that the organics are covering the ice, which means they were probably deposited by comets. Their proximity could imply that life may exist under the ice, but there’s not enough information as of yet. This could prove to be an unexpected one for the history books.
It came from Mars!
November 21, 2012I thought I’d join in the science bloggers sense of anticipation at what the Curiosity Rover has found on Mars. For those who don’t know, John Grotzinger, who is in charge of the rover’s investigations, told the US’s National Public Radio that what they had found was “gonna be one for the history books“.
When hearing which instruments on the rover produced the data – the Sample Analysis at Mars(SAM), which is virtually a complete portable physical chemistry lab – and along with the above quote, most commentators have come to the conclusion that they have found organic compounds, which are, of course, the building blocks of life as we know it.
Previous landers sent to Mars to look for organic compounds have come up empty, which is thought to be due to the presence of perchlorates in the Martian soil which may have confused the instruments in those missions.
Organic molecules on their own do not necessarily mean life, and there is a fair amount of them wandering around in space. What we can hope for is a slightly more complex organic compound, such as an amino acid.
We shall (hopefully) all find out at the American Geophysical Union’s Fall Meeting on the 3–7 December, where the results will be presented.
Land of Gregs 