Monthly Archives: December 2012

Mars Sample Return Concepts and References

(It may be important to note: sample return is not a necessary precursor to human exploration,
and, some robust sample return missions are proposed as follow-ups of on-going
human settlement.)

Gorgeous 2020 MSR Concept by Corby Waste for NASA JPL


Earlier MSR Concepts also by Corby Waste for NASA JPL

Even Earlier Concepts by Corby Waste for NASA JPL

Character Reference: SpaceX’s Molly Soule

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania newspaper:

“SpaceX, a rocket and spacecraft design company based in Los Angeles, hired Liverpool native Molly Soule to help weld together vehicles capable of inter-planetary travel — enabling future generations the opportunity to live on Mars.

“I’ve always been really fascinated with aerospace,” Soule said. “And SpaceX’s main mission is to occupy Mars and to make it affordable to have regular people live there.”

But it wasn’t space travel that encouraged Soule, 20, to pursue welding. It was motorcycles.

“My fascination with motorcycles and cars really got me pumped on working with my hands,” Soule said. “I thought welding would be great a way to get involved with stuff like that.”

That passion, she says, led her into Keith Hammond’s welding shop at Cumberland Perry Area Vocational Tech School three years ago.

Hammond says Soule, one of two women in the class, not only impressed, but she also dominated.

“It’s a male-dominated field, but she excelled,” he said. “She just rose above everybody else with her grades and work ethic.”

Soule mastered tungsten inert-gas welding (TIG) during her three years under Hammond’s instruction.

“What was extraordinary about Molly was her TIG welding skills,” Hammond said. “TIG welding is very hard, and you have to have good hand-eye coordination.”

TIG welding uses an arc of electricity that jumps from a tungsten metal electrode to the intended weld surface, which is often comprised of aluminum or steel. The process proves ideal for welding round or curvy objects, such as motorcycle frames.

When compared to traditional stick welding, TIG welding creates cleaner, more precise seams between objects because no filler metal is applied to fuse objects together.

Soule says she prefers the complexity of TIG welding and its usefulness when constructing motorcycle chassis (frames).

“I really grew in the weld shop at vo-tech,” she said. “Mr.Hammond allowed me to demonstrate my skills and really encouraged me.”

Soule graduated in June and took a job TIG welding at Henchcraft Racing Products in Newport.

“She turned down a higher-paying job because she wanted to focus on her TIG welding,” Hammond said.

The decision, he says, ultimately landed her the position at SpaceX.”

NASA Johnson Style

(Good work but it needs a lot more slutty women…depth of field and color boosting wouldn’t 
hurt either, but definitely: add women of questionable character. ; )

NASA Johnson Style is a volunteer outreach video project created by the students of NASA’s Johnson Space Center. It was created as an educational parody of Psy’s Gangnam Style. The lyrics and scenes in the video have been re-imagined in order to inform the public about the amazing work going on at NASA and the Johnson Space Center.
Special thanks to astronauts Tracy Caldwell Dyson, Mike Massimino and Clay Anderson 
Special thanks to Mr. Mike Coats, Dr. Ellen Ochoa, and all supporting senior staff members
“NASA Johnson Style” Lyrics: 
NASA Johnson Style
Johnson Style
Welcome to NASA’s Johnson Space Center
We are coming in hot so don’t burn up as we enter
We do science everyday that affects your daily life
Throw them up for manned space flight
Science everywhere
As we engineer the marvels
That fly though the air 
And take us way beyond earth’s levels
Science everywhere 
Because we engineer the marvels
That fly though the air 
Flys us through the air
Control the mission out of Johnson
This is ground, hey!
And this is space, hey!
Tell me Houston what’s the problem 
It’s okay!
It’s okay!
Because there’s flight controllers on the job today 
NASA Johnson STYLE!
Johnson STYLE!
NA, NA, NA, NA NASA Johnson STYLE!
Johnson STYLE!
NA, NA, NA, NA NASA Johnson STYLE!
EYYYYYY science daily!
NA, NA, NA, NA, NASA STYLE!
EYYYYYY it’s amazing!
NA, NA, NA, NA ey ey ey ey ey ey!!
Orbiting earth, international space station
Where we work and live in space with a crew from several nations
Got Japanese, and Russians, that European charm 
Throw them up, like the Canada Arm
Kicking out research
29k cubic feet, revolves around the earth
Science microgravity, revolves around the earth
Columbus, JEM, and Destiny
Kicking out research
Kicking out research
Train the astronauts at Johnson
To go to space, hey!
To go to space, hey! 
Cause the missions of tomorrow 
Start today, hey!
Start today, hey!
As we engineer the future day by day
NASA Johnson STYLE!
Johnson STYLE!
NA, NA, NA, NA NASA Johnson STYLE!
Johnson STYLE!
NA, NA, NA, NA NASA Johnson STYLE!
EYYYYYY science daily!
NA, NA, NA, NA, NASA STYLE!
EYYYYYY it’s amazing!
NA, NA, NA, NA ey ey ey ey ey ey!!
Orion or SLS, MPCV 
We cannot feel the floor, cause the lack gravity
The destinations are an asteroid, mars, or moon 
We are blasting off start the countdown soon
[Sound clip: launch countdown]
EYYYYYY science daily!
NA, NA, NA, NA, NASA STYLE!
EYYYYYY it’s amazing!
NA, NA, NA, NA ey ey ey ey ey ey!!
NASA Johnson Style
The original:

Zubrin Advancing ‘Humans to Mars’ as Questioner at Mars Concepts 2012

Zubrin (as questioner in audience at about 1:22): “The purpose of the human, exploration program, inasmuch as it is cooperating with the robotics, exploration program, should be to prepare for human exploration not to prevent human exploration…and so…you really don’t want to get into this thing of “you can’t do your program, until we do my program”. And so that, for example, while the Mars Sample Return has a great deal of scientific merit – I’m not going to argue against the mission – ah…to say you cannot do a human mission, until you’ve done a sample return mission, to certify that the target site is lifeless, ah…doesn’t make any sense. In fact, if you did do a sample return mission and you found biological material at that site, that’s exactly where you’d want to send human explorations. You want to send human explorers to the most interesting sites, not to the least interesting sites. And, other things here…we clearly don’t need to do a Phobos mission before we do humans missions. You might want to do a Phobos mission, but to claim you have to do a Phobos mission before you do humans missions, its not relevant. To say you have to do a humans to Mars orbit before you do human mission to the Mars surface, makes no sense, because actually, a human mission to Mars orbit, unless you have very advanced propulsion systems which can take on very large delta Vs, will involve over twice the radiation dose of a human mission to the Mars surface, because you’re left in Mars orbit for a year taking in-space radiation doses. So, I think what you want to do, is – for instance: Mars missions that provide reconnaissance for the most interesting sites to target human exploration to? Great! Okay…the, the Mars missions which do reconnaissance to assure us of no landing hazards, great. Mars missions that find resources that would be useful to human missions, great. Okay, and we should do the maximum number of them – but, the idea of doing, of, of, of setting an infinite series of precursors and saying “you can’t do that until you do all these things” – many of which are clearly irrelevant and are just being stuck in there because somebody’s interested in them, that’s not the way to go.”

Free 3D Model Libraries of NASA Spacecraft, etc.

Free ISS Model from NASA
(Use the free Blender program to translate files to your preferred modeling application.)
Free Bigelow Hab model 
(The .skp file can be exported as .obj from SketchUp Pro’s free demo.) 
_________
Free & Commercial from TurboSquid:

Hello Cute Ladies! (Scientist, Engineer References & Beautiful Women – Yes Please!)

“I’m one of those people, I love to learn, and, I know that, if I had a job, that ah, I couldn’t continue my learning, that would hinder me in some way. And so I think that was one thing that really attracted me to NASA. Just the opportunities to learn. We’re making innovative things here, and, so to me that’s very important. I’m contributing to the betterment of society, so, that’s definitely important for me. NASA’s definitely a place where you can do that.” 
“By working for NASA I’m actually contributing to the greater good. We’re learning about the universe. We’re learning about our place in the universe, how do we fit in…how did we even get here…? You realize that for the first time, as a society, we have the ability to answer these questions scientifically. Just by being able to make people’s lives better, I think that’s worthwhile. I think trying to understand how we fit in to this crazy picture of this complicated universe, I think that’s interesting as well.”
I am very passionate about being a materials engineer. And…it’s because I see – the applications, everything is so practical. I’ll be at a party and something will fail and I’ll say “let me see that, come here, I’ll tell you, what happened to this” – if it was made incorrectly, if was used incorrectly, and so I – it’s a career where you can apply it anywhere and its also a very fulfilling career at NASA because everything that you’re looking at is so unique.” 
“This is not a dress rehearsal – we are in the play, so, we have to keep on moving forward, and 
keep a positive attitude, and, keep on going.”
“At the end of the day I don’t really feel that I answer to any project manager or center director, 
I answer to my conscience and the taxpayers of this country, because they’re the one’s who allow 
us to do what we do. And it’s important to me we give them something that’s meaningful to them. “
“Just go for it, because, if it’s an obstacle for what I want, it’s still going to be there whether I want it to be or not. And, it’s 
amazing how much you can grow when you decide you’re just going to conquer that thing and 
not let that thing conquer you.”
“NASA’s a wonderful place, because, we can be what we want to be. We can be a girl, and, we can still 
love math. And still, want to turn a wrench…or, or, um, you know, work onna piece of machinery
which wouldn’t normally be something you would do. NASA is a very good place for girls. 
We can be what we want to be.”
“I do what I do to empower people. Go out there and make a difference for yourself, for NASA, and 
this country – and we’ll all be better off for it.”
“It’s just funny to wake up in space and think, ‘Wow! I’m in space!’ you know…it’s ah, not like waking up in your bedroom at home. It is beautiful. As a geologist it was just awesome for me to see the big scale. Um, mountain chains, and folded mountain belts, and just coast lines and everything. You’ve looked at so many amazing pictures of the crews that have gone before you, but, a picture has a limit. It has those edges. And you’re suddenly not being limited through the window. It just took my breath away. “
“This group I’m working with is just a really interesting group of people. One of my co-workers here 
has described it as ‘a group of people you’d be willing to hang out with outside of work'”.

“Push yourself. Go beyond your comfort zone. You’ll grow as a person and that is the kind of thing that helps us grow as a culture and as humanity. So find confidence in your own place, and push yourself, that extra little bit, to help yourself advance.”
“I wanted to use the math and the science that I had – in school. The equations, and, and, and being able to ah, you know, calculate, or estimate, or predict what is going to happen – the fact that you can put equations on things that happen every day in our life is fascinating to me. And I love that part.”

“I wanted to change my name to ‘Lisa Smith’ for the longest time. And it wasn’t until I became age 18 and I had the legal right at that time to change my name at that point and time that I decided ‘you know,  I’m okay with being QuynGiao Nguyen. It’s, it’s okay. […] Be passionate about everything you do and I don’t just mean about math and science in general. But be passionate about life. You only have this one opportunity to live this life and to live your dreams. So live it to the fullest. And when you are passionate, about what you do, others will see it.”  

Terrific Resources:
(Factual Fiction transcriptions…”ums”, “ahs”, “and you knows” are not meant to be insulting ; )