05/23/2011

NASAMars Base Studying Mars Soil Soil Properties Lab

The Who, What, When, Where, and Why?

 Who?  National Aeronautics and Space Administration  What?  Aeronautics  Exploration Systems  Science  Space Operations

 When?  Established in 1958  By President Dwight D. Eisenhower

 Where?  California, New York, Maryland, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Texas, Louisiana, New Mexico…

 Why?  “To reach for new heights and reveal the unknown so that what we do and learn will benefit all humankind”

 Who NASA is and what they do  One of their goals is to put humans on Mars!

How do we prepare?

 Human Evolution  Closest planet we might be able to live on  Comparative Planetology  Similar to Earth, we might learn about our history  What might be required to sustain a permanent human presence beyond Earth  Technology Advancement  Contribute to advances in technology

 International Cooperation  Political benefits from a cooperative international program  Inspiration  Motivate people and benefit technical education  Investment  Modest investment

 What should we consider before we build?

 Who NASA is and what they do  Why they want to build a base on Mars and what they need to know before they can  How do they learn about Mars without being there?

How do we learn about someplace million miles away?

 Mars Global Surveyor  Mars Odyssey  Spirit  Opportunity

 Models  Simulations

 Examples of _________.  Banana is to fruit as cabbage is to vegetable  Three is to triangle as five is to pentagon  Four is to car as two is to motorcycle  Boy is to girl as man is to woman  Dark is to light as tall is to short

 What’s an analogy for Mars?  Atacama Desert, Chile (South America)

EARTHMARS

EARTHMARS

EARTHMARS

EARTHMARS

 Who NASA is and what they do  Why they want to build a base on Mars and what they need to know before they can  How we can learn about Mars, though it’s so far away  It’s probably important to know what we’re building on!

Everything we build, is built on the ground, on top of soil.

 Rocks  Igneous = magma (Granite)  Sedimentary = soil (Limestone)  Metamorphic = igneous + sedimentary (Marble)

 Weathering  Physical (water and wind)  Chemical (reactions with oxygen)  Biological (organic acids)

 Who NASA is and what they do  Why they want to build a base on Mars and what they need to know before they can  How we can learn about Mars, though it’s so far away  How soils form  Now that soil exists, so what?

What should we know about soil?

 Soils can fail

 Soils are like particles (time to stand up!)  Particle Size  Phases  Expansion  Consolidation  Strength

 Sieve separates wanted stuff from unwanted stuff

 Can contain all three phases of matter at the same time  Solid = you = soil  Gas = air = air  Liquid = backpacks = water

 Soil is naturally compacted  When excavated, it expands  When the soil is put back, you have extra  You compacted it less than originally (naturally)  When the soil is put back, you need more  You compacted it more than originally (naturally)

 Consolidation is making the soil’s volume smaller  How much weight can the soil take?

 How well can soil hold together?

 Who NASA is and what they do  Why they want to build a base on Mars and what they need to know before they can  How we can learn about Mars, though it’s so far away  How soils form  Soils are particles, have phases, and different properties  How can we measure them?

Measuring some of the properties

 Mass (Dry vs. Wet)  grams  lb  [M]  Volume (Dry vs. Wet)  cm^3  in^3  [L^3]

 Density = Mass / Volume  Grams / cm^3  lb / in^3  [M] / [L^3]

 How much water?  w = (M wet – M dry) / (M dry)  (grams – grams) / grams = grams / grams  (lb – lb) / lb = lb / lb  Unitless!  Actually…  w * 100% = percentage

PropertyMeasurementUnits Particle size (as is)? Wet mass (as is) Wet volume (as is) Dry mass (no water) Dry volume (no water) Particle size (dry)? Density? Moisture Content? Mass passing Sieve (dry) Percent smaller? Percent larger?

 Who NASA is and what they do  Why they want to build a base on Mars and what they need to know before they can  How we can learn about Mars, though it’s so far away  How soils form  Soils are particles, have phases, and different properties  We can measure properties in a lab