Trees on Mars? Surreal Landscape

Been a while since I snooped around Mars...

This picture really caught my eye...


CREDIT: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona.

Strange Mars Photo Includes Tantalizing Tree Illusion


CREDIT: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona.

Caption for the image

This new image of Mars taken by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows an optical illusion. What appears to be trees rising from the Martian surface are actually dark streaks of collapsed material running down sand dunes due to carbon dioxide frost evaporation. The image was released in Jan. 2010.

Naturally erupting dust clouds on Mars are creating structures that look surprisingly like trees near the planet's north pole. But don't be fooled ? it's just an optical illusion, NASA scientists say.

The Martian "trees" are actually dark basaltic sand pushed to the surface of sand dunes by sun-heated solid carbon dioxide ice, or dry ice, sublimating directly into vapor, explained Candy Hansen, a member of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) team at the University of Arizona.

The sand dunes form a nearly complete ring around Mars' north pole and are covered by a thin layer of reddish Martian dust and patches of dry ice. To date, there is no firm evidence of any type of Martian biology, past or present, plant or otherwise.

Credit: Guy Webster 818-354-6278 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. [email protected]

Source
www.space.com...

Those black marks look more like petroleum seepage than trees.

It looks like there's oil in thum thar hills.

Here is MikeSingh's version of an image from the region:

"OH U DONT SEE THIS ITS NOT REALLY THERE >.> YEAH AND BEARS # IN A TOILET >.> it could also be smudges making it look that way too or something else..

Originally posted by Exuberant1
It looks like there's oil in thum thar hills.

I guess mankind has a reason to settle up on mars then.

Hasn’t this already been posted on ATS?

reply to post by zorgon


You do know that nuclear based explosions burn images of the surroundings into the ground sometimes.
Just food for thought.

reply to post by itisortofthetruth


Oh come on.

The portion of the mars surface we are looking at in these images is not unchanging.


*On the bright side, when the USA nukes a city the property values go up.

Food for thought. Not related at all to the topic though.

I'd have to go with petroleum seepage over a frozen terrain. That shot came from the polar region - correct? I say frozen because it's too pink... needs more red, thus red soil mixed with ice... the pressure from the ice could be causing trillion year old fossilized petroleum beds to seep, revealing what's left of Mars' ancient life when it existed.

Mars is indeed a whole new frontier for archeological understanding... Just my opinion, based on other images I have that actually DO show vegetation growing around an abundance of water filled ponds. GET YOUR OWN IMAGES LOL... they're all there for the reviewing - lazy peeps... roflmao...

Good call though Zorg... petroleum will be a required asset to settlers

If that's dark material running down sand dunes are we seeing the picture the right way up! I only ask because the black tree like lines seem thicker at the bottom than the top which you see (obviously) on tree's here on earth.
Does NASA's explanation ring true?

Originally posted by Heyyo_yoyo
Good call though Zorg... petroleum will be a required asset to settlers

Kind of hard to burn it without oxygen...

reply to post by Observer99


....Implying we only use petroleum for burning.

Originally posted by Exuberant1
Those black marks look more like petroleum seepage than trees.

If there IS oil then there WAS life...

Originally posted by Observer99
Kind of hard to burn it without oxygen...

Well true...current NASA stats say carbon dioxide (95.32%)... but just drop some lichens and algae on the planet and in no time those hardy little buggers will suck up that CO2 and spit out the Oxygen

They are going to need that oil for these things, though the Humvee people refused to tell me how they will get them up there

MARS 1 Humvee

Originally posted by Exuberant1
Those black marks look more like petroleum seepage than trees.

It looks like there's oil in thum thar hills.

Here is MikeSingh's version of an image from the region:

edit on 22-7-2011 by Exuberant1 because: (no reason given)

if there's oil i bet they're already planning going to attack there.

Originally posted by Exuberant1
Those black marks look more like petroleum seepage than trees.

It looks like there's oil in thum thar hills.

Here is MikeSingh's version of an image from the region:

edit on 22-7-2011 by Exuberant1 because: (no reason given)

Looks like it's only a matter of time before the "coalition" invades...


On a serious and positive note.. If that is oil, surely that makes a manned mission to mars with our current propulsion technology (combustion) more of a possibility.. (of course that depends if we can find a way of refining it into useable form of fuel on the surface of mars)

Originally posted by Exuberant1
reply to post by Observer99

 

....Implying we only use petroleum for burning.

Dow chemical wants to make plastics on mars for some reason?

Originally posted by Observer99

Dow chemical

Care to comment on the topic? The one from the OP.

While you're here, I mean. If it is not too much bother.

Could the oil explain the methane?

So much past undersea life the oil is just dripping out.

Originally posted by Observer99
Dow chemical wants to make plastics on mars for some reason?

Don't know about Dow but...

MARS DEEP DRILLING REMAINS A HIGH PRIORITY

In 1992, The University of Texas Center for Space Research (CSR) submitted a proposal to the NASA Scout Program to drill a “deep” well on Mars. The proposal was unsuccessful. However, the mission remains viable, and can still be accomplished for a very low cost. The science of this mission remains of utmost interest to the science community, and no deep drilling mission is scheduled currently. Deep drilling is the only way to verify the character of the Martian subsurface, particularly to characterize any water to be found there, and eventually to explore for liquid water.

LPI 6001 PDF

DRILLING TO EXTRACT LIQUID WATER ON MARS:
FEASIBLE AND WORTH THE INVESTMENT

A critical application for the success of the Exploration Mission is developing cost effective means to extract resources from the Moon and Mars needed to support human exploration. Water is the most important resource in this regard, providing a critical life support consumable, the starting product of energy rich propellants, energy storage media (e.g. fuel cells), and a reagent used in virtually all manufacturing processes. Water is adsorbed and chemically bound in Mars soils, ice is present near the Martian surface at high latitudes, and water vapor is a minor atmospheric constituent, but extracting meaningful quantities requires large complex mechanical systems, massive feedstock handling, and large energy inputs. Liquid water aquifers are almost certain to be found at a depth of several kilometers on Mars based on our understanding of the average subsurface thermal gradient, and geological evidence from recent Mars missions suggests liquid water may be present much closer to the surface at some locations. The discovery of hundreds of recent water-carved gullies on Mars indicates liquid water can be found at depths of 200-500 meters in many locations. Drilling to obtain liquid water via pumping is therefore feasible and could lower the cost and improve the return of Mars exploration more than any other ISRU technology on the horizon.

LPI 6002 PDF


LUNAR AND MARTIAN FIBERGLASS AS A VERSATILE FAMILY
OF ISRU VALUE-ADDED PRODUCTS
Rand Corporation

Lunar Regolith consists principally of silicates, in some cases as volcanic or impact glasses. We continue to contend that silicon is more versatile in application than all of the other Lunar available elements combined and shouldn't end up in Lunar slag heaps and instead should be the fundamental building block for a wide range of value-added products in a CisLunar economy. Fabrication of silicate glasses are conventional industrial processes and anticipated tensile strength of glass made under hard vacuum is an order of magnitude greater than glass produced in atmosphere containing water vapor.

The logic employed in our reasoning includes the fact that any In Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) effort is going to yield copious masses of silicon oxides which can be used in bulk as conventional glass products or, after further separation, can be synthesized as Silicon and Silicon- Carbide Fullerenes for more exotic applications. Additionally, mechanical wrapping of Silicon Webbing could prove to be more practical and durable and a lot less brittle than attempting large scale hot glass molding of structural components.

Identified fuel production ISRU efforts yield partially heated masses of metal oxides as waste byproduct – rich in silicates and metal oxides useful in bulk as conventional glass products. Fiberglass manufacturing increases effectiveness of prior ISRU fuel production by taking advantage of mineral benefaction and elevated process exit temperatures. The resulting structures would be spheres and cylinders with various configurations that could apply to human support systems, along with structures useable as storage tanks for the very Oxygen liberated in ISRU applications.

ISRU can manufacture more than fuels: even spacecraft are feasibly and affordably manufactured on Moon based upon fiberglass "tankage" integrated with fiberglass keels. Second generation structural components may take advantage of Silicon Nanotubes for additional composite strength. Diverse products for human systems support are manufacturable in-situ using glass fibers and fabrics, and CNC-type programmable manufacturing delivering state-of-the-art flexibility of remote design and parts manufacture. These concepts suggest extensibility and evolutionary capability derived when machining tool parts from fiberglass.

Contemporary Terrestrial industrial composite fiber products range from pressure vessels to lightweight sporting goods. A large number of products related to human systems support can similarly be manufactured in-situ using fiber fabric made from lunar silicate glass. Building structures using spun glass would be similar to those currently employed by Raytheon Aircraft or Scaled Composites to build composite aircraft. Pressure containers, structural components, woven fiberglass fabrics, molded and machined solid objects, glass fiber and filament are each large classes of value-added products.

This file is in the public domain available on CD from LPI

LPI 6034 PDF

This is a few of the 6000 series documents There are thousand more similar ones available



My favorite...

SPACE TRANSPORTATION FOR A LUNAR RESOURCES BASE (LRB)

Hubert P. Davis, Starcraft Boosters, Inc.
1032 Military Drive
Canyon Lake, TX 78133

This is a report of a work in progress. So far as the author is presently aware, this topic has not
been previously addressed. Proprietary work by NASA or others may, however, exist that
address similar topics.

This work assumes that a base near the South Pole of our Moon will be established for the
purpose of exploiting the resources of the Moon; principally the water ice that many believe was
discovered by the Clementine and Lunar Prospector satellites. The ice is of particular value as,
with the aid of the ample solar resource available nearby, it may become an essentially limitless
source of oxygen / hydrogen propellants for continued visitation to and expansion of the base and
for the support of additional space exploration missions, including human exploration of Mars.
This work placed a total 129 tons initial base for both the in-crater and crater rim installations, as
well as a 90 tons “marshalling yard” at the Earth-Moon L-1 libration point. For launch services,
the results of an in-house Shuttle-Derived Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle study were used. It is called
Aquila. This vehicle can deliver over 50 tons to low Earth orbit from the Kennedy Space Center,
using a combination of Space Shuttle and Delta IV-Heavy components.

A second stage of the Delta IV-Heavy vehicle was used to deliver 15 tons payloads from Earth
orbit to docking at L-1. By so doing, no “new start” systems are needed beyond those of the L-1
station and the LRB itself, provided the Aquila and Crew Exploration Vehicle have been
previously developed. At L-1, three of these once-used stages are fitted with landing gear and
other elements needed to produce a highly capable Lunar Vehicle and it is refueled from
propellants delivered from Earth to place the base and to provide a single visit of a six person
crew to aid the robotic operations necessary to produce a fully functional base.

If the ground rule is established that “dry” cargo and propellant must be launched separately, 34
launches were required. This will permit over 50% of the launches to launch only propellants.
Later missions, using propellants produced by the LRB, show a large net gain in propellants
available at L-1. For example, a round trip mission with the CEV results in a net gain of over six
tons of propellant at L-1; a cargo delivery nets over 69 tons.

Work continues on the “pay-off” phase; that is, further missions making use of the propellants
obtained from the shallow “gravity well” of the Moon. Propellants produced on the Moon will
only be used from the lunar surface or from L-1; no attempt will be made to deliver them to other
locations. That will come, but is “out-of-scope” for the present work.

A Mars mission departing from L-1 with mass of 686 tons can be placed on the trans-Mars
trajectory expending lunar-origin propellants and just one of the Lunar Vehicles, requiring an
additional 13 Aquila launches. This will permit dual Mars spacecraft to be used for each mission
with a 28% mass margin over a single, similar mass vehicle departing from low Earth orbit.

LPI 6013 PDF

These abstracts are in the public domain... the full meeting reports are not

WHO is Starcraft Boosters?

SEE HERE

WHAT is the Aquila?

SEE HERE

There are no coincidences