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Mars Exploration 1: Unmanned Missions (Probes; Rovers; etc.)

Sound on Mars Has a 'Unique' And Extremely Trippy Property, Recordings Reveal​


Eerie audio recordings captured on Mars have revealed, for the first time, that there are two speeds of sound on the red planet, among other trippy insights about how acoustic waves travel on an alien world.

NASA’s Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in February 2021, is the first mission ever to capture recordings of the Martian soundscape.

The new audio confirms that the speed of sound is slower on Mars than on Earth, a result that was expected since the motion of acoustic waves is modulated by the density of substances they occupy. For instance, here on Earth, the speed of sound is faster in the dense medium of water than it is in the air.

On Mars, the atmosphere is 100 times thinner than on Earth, so it makes sense that sound travels at roughly 550 miles per hour on the red planet, compared to a speed of 767 miles per hour on Earth. However, the team also discovered that there are at least two Martian speeds of sound that vary by pitch, or frequency, of the sound waves, a phenomenon that has only been observed on Mars.

Low-pitched sounds on the planet move at roughly 537 miles per hour and high-pitched sounds travel at 559 miles per hour. Maurice and his colleagues suspect that this strange delay in low notes is caused by the low pressure and thermal turbulence of Martian surface air, which combine to help high-frequency acoustic waves propagate more quickly.

In other words, if you were standing on Mars and were able to hear music playing nearby, the high notes would reach you before the low notes. You would need to be very close to this speculative Martian band to hear anything at all, as Maurice and his colleagues also found that sound begins to drop off at just 26 feet from a source, as Martian air is such an inefficient vector for acoustic waves. This makes Mars an uncannily quiet world.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/dyp...d-extremely-trippy-property-recordings-reveal

maximus otter
 
maximus otter said:

Sound on Mars Has a 'Unique' And Extremely Trippy Property, Recordings Reveal​


Eerie audio recordings captured on Mars have revealed, for the first time, that there are two speeds of sound on the red planet, among other trippy insights about how acoustic waves travel on an alien world.

NASA’s Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in February 2021, is the first mission ever to capture recordings of the Martian soundscape.

The new audio confirms that the speed of sound is slower on Mars than on Earth, a result that was expected since the motion of acoustic waves is modulated by the density of substances they occupy. For instance, here on Earth, the speed of sound is faster in the dense medium of water than it is in the air.

On Mars, the atmosphere is 100 times thinner than on Earth, so it makes sense that sound travels at roughly 550 miles per hour on the red planet, compared to a speed of 767 miles per hour on Earth. However, the team also discovered that there are at least two Martian speeds of sound that vary by pitch, or frequency, of the sound waves, a phenomenon that has only been observed on Mars.

Low-pitched sounds on the planet move at roughly 537 miles per hour and high-pitched sounds travel at 559 miles per hour. Maurice and his colleagues suspect that this strange delay in low notes is caused by the low pressure and thermal turbulence of Martian surface air, which combine to help high-frequency acoustic waves propagate more quickly.

In other words, if you were standing on Mars and were able to hear music playing nearby, the high notes would reach you before the low notes. You would need to be very close to this speculative Martian band to hear anything at all, as Maurice and his colleagues also found that sound begins to drop off at just 26 feet from a source, as Martian air is such an inefficient vector for acoustic waves. This makes Mars an uncannily quiet world.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/dyp...d-extremely-trippy-property-recordings-reveal

maximus otter
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“Trippy” ffs

The first proper recording of sounds from another planet: “trippy”

Is there intelligent life on this planet..?
 
Ingenuity prepares for a new record breaking flight.

Nasa’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter has had a big week.

After completing its 24th powered flight on the Red Planet on 3 April, its performance garnered the Ingenuity team at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory a prestigious aerospace award, the Collier Trophy.

But the coming days could be even bigger, as Ingenuity prepares to make a record-breaking flight on Mars sometime in the coming days to begin exploring a dry river delta in the Jezero Crater on the Red Planet.

Ingenuity is a small — 1.8 kilograms, 48 centimeters tall — twin rotorcraft that landed on Mars with the Perseverance rover on 18 February 2021. Ingenuity first took to the Martian skies on 19 April last year, a tense moment for the Ingenuity team, since, as associate administrator of Nasa’s Science Mission Directorate Thomas Zurbuchen said in a recent statement, “we didn’t even know if powered, controlled flight of an aircraft at Mars was possible.” ...

Next up for Ingenuity is its longest flight yet, a 704-metre jaunt to the northwest that will take the helicopter out of the Séítah region of Jezero crater and into a dry delta region. Its aerial imaging will help the Perseverance team decide which of two dry riverbeds the rover should take on its journey to the top of the delta region, as well as help identify science targets on the ground. ...

https://www.independent.co.uk/space/nasa-s-ingenuity-mars-helicopter-b2052581.html
 
Bigphoot2 said:
Another first from Perseverance


https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-56844601
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Next perhaps plasma reactors will be used to create oxygen on Mars.

Last year, NASA achieved something science fiction writers have been dreaming about for decades: It created oxygen on Mars. A microwave-size device attached to the agency’s Perseverance rover converted carbon dioxide into 10 minutes of breathable oxygen. Now, physicists say they’ve come up with a way to use electron beams in a plasma reactor to create far more oxygen, potentially in a smaller package.

The technique might someday not just help astronauts breathe on the Red Planet, but could also serve as a way to create fuel and fertilizer, says Michael Hecht, an experimental scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. But Hecht, who leads the oxygenmaking rover instrument, says the new approach still has a number of challenges to overcome before it can hitch a ride to our solar neighbor.

When Perseverance landed in Jezero crater in 2020, it carried the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE). The device draws in martian air, which is 95% carbon dioxide. By pumping a current between two oppositely charged electrodes in an electrochemical cell, MOXIE can split the carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide and oxygen ions. The oxygen ions then combine with each other to produce oxygen gas.

The experiment has been a successful proof of concept. But to work, MOXIE needs to pressurize and heat martian air—requiring extra parts that consume energy and make it bulky. ...

https://www.science.org/content/article/plasma-reactors-could-create-oxygen-mars
 
ramonmercado said:
Next perhaps plasma reactors will be used to create oxygen on Mars.

Last year, NASA achieved something science fiction writers have been dreaming about for decades: It created oxygen on Mars. A microwave-size device attached to the agency’s Perseverance rover converted carbon dioxide into 10 minutes of breathable oxygen. Now, physicists say they’ve come up with a way to use electron beams in a plasma reactor to create far more oxygen, potentially in a smaller package.

The technique might someday not just help astronauts breathe on the Red Planet, but could also serve as a way to create fuel and fertilizer, says Michael Hecht, an experimental scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. But Hecht, who leads the oxygenmaking rover instrument, says the new approach still has a number of challenges to overcome before it can hitch a ride to our solar neighbor.

When Perseverance landed in Jezero crater in 2020, it carried the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE). The device draws in martian air, which is 95% carbon dioxide. By pumping a current between two oppositely charged electrodes in an electrochemical cell, MOXIE can split the carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide and oxygen ions. The oxygen ions then combine with each other to produce oxygen gas.

The experiment has been a successful proof of concept. But to work, MOXIE needs to pressurize and heat martian air—requiring extra parts that consume energy and make it bulky. ...

https://www.science.org/content/article/plasma-reactors-could-create-oxygen-mars
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Now put one on Earth and solve our CO2 problems.
 
Tunn11 said:
Now put one on Earth and solve our CO2 problems.
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Unfortunately, the CO produced by the machine is even worse than CO2. On Mars that would be sent outside into the Barsoom atmosphere, but on Earth it would have to be stored or further converted.
Also, we don't know the power costs. Supplying O2 to a small group of astronauts has a much smaller energy cost than fixing 100+ years of burning fossil fuels.
 
madmath said:
Unfortunately, the CO produced by the machine is even worse than CO2. On Mars that would be sent outside into the Barsoom atmosphere, but on Earth it would have to be stored or further converted.
Also, we don't know the power costs. Supplying O2 to a small group of astronauts has a much smaller energy cost than fixing 100+ years of burning fossil fuels.
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CO is quite unstable, so will naturally break down fairly rapidly given the right conditions.
 
SimonBurchell said:
CO is quite unstable, so will naturally break down fairly rapidly given the right conditions.
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Or it can be burned as a fuel... well, OK, the end product would be CO2...
 
Mungoman said:
I wonder what the sparkly bits are on the rocks and on the ground
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Probably basaltic rock, quartz, mica or micrometeorites that turned to glass on the way down.
 
kamalktk said:
This being NASA, I am going to assume that they have now computer modelled the damaged rotor based on the imagery of it's shadow and are figuring out how to fly the thing anyway.
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I read somewhere that NASA has 3D printers on the ISS, and use them to make hard copies of needed tools...maybe, next time, they could do the same with the next rover...?
 
Crashing on flight number 72, NASA sent a command for the helicopter ingenuity to tell all of NASA’s ground listening stations that ingenuity is injured and done and this is a farewell to NASA’s global listening stations and staff.
 
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