NASA will have to attend to the issue of the protection of the planets. Agreement for use of space — Yes, there is — as well as laws and regulation are rooted in the days of the cold war. They were written before scientists learned about oceans on the moons of the other planets, about the tenacious organisms that can endure the most extreme conditions, and before we started to look for life on Mars. In addition, themilitary already intend to send people into space, and be sure to succeed.
Therefore, the staff of the division of planetary protection NASA — Yes, there are such — will have to match the coolest division in the Solar system and to develop new methods of protection that will not allow the earth bugs and germs lay their eggs on the Andromeda (or anywhere else).
Some of the new obstacles were a result of the latest experiments and decades of scientific progress. Planetary protection have two main missions. “Reverse protection” implies that nothing of the threat from space will not fall to the Ground. “Proactive” means that no earthly debris will not fall to another world — and that there is no science probes from Earth will not contaminate the surface of another planet.
None of this was never a problem. Mission return samples from asteroids and comets is not a problem, because space radiation will sterilize them. The Rovers very carefully avoid the parts of Mars where life can be.
“But we are preparing to go in a place able to support life the surface of Mars, deep oceans of Europe and Enceladus,” says Joseph Alexander, a consultant and former science Director of NASA. “The private sector is becoming more interested in Mars. International community of players who want to explore a different world, grows and grows. The US has a plan to send humans to Mars by 2030.” The space is getting crowded, and even more important not to make mistakes.
Therefore, the Alexander group recommends several modifications. The relocation of the division for planetary protection in the Department responsible for safety, can open multiple locked channels. The report also proposes to return to an earlier discussion of the planetary defenders and planners of planetary missions and to determine how the net should be all that is sent into space. Another suggestion is to close the “control gap”, which allows commercial space companies to ignore the rules of planetary protection. Obviously, the Falcon 9 launched from Tesla, did not pass inspections for purity, so great that she doesn’t have to deal with something like planet 10 000 years.
The mission and development of asteroids in the future are not the only reasons to review of planetary protection. The Department of planetary protection does not always agree with the people who build rockets, early space programs. “In the beginning, it is a scientific community advocated for pollution control, pre-emptive — to keep the science, the reverse — because the responsibility,” says John Rummel, biologist and fellow of the Department of planetary protection, NASA, working there from 1998 to 2006. “But if people don’t understand how flying, you will have to Dodge”.
Point break began talks on the theme of mission Mars 2020. Some scientific instruments were revised versions of those used by “Curiosity”, but since Mars 2020 you may also try to return to Earth samples of the division of planetary protection will have to adhere to higher standards of cleanliness. Rumor has it that disagreements led to the sudden departure of the last employee of the division of planetary protection Cassie Conley.
The fact that every time science makes progress, changing standards of cleanliness. Scientists appear more and more sensitive ways of living and more ways to kill it on the spacecraft prior to their departure from Earth. In practice, however, it appears that one murder terrestrial microorganisms before the mission is not enough. “They kill everything, but it does not mean that life on the spacecraft no more,” says Luther the Beagle, JPL astrophysicist and lead researcher of SHERLOC sensor placed on the manipulator Mars 2020. The apparatus may remain simple organic shell, which they don’t see the detectors.
NASA will review methods to protect other planets from us
Ilya Hel