Mars Cannon
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Desert-mapping cannons on Mars.
What's cooler than a cannon ... on Mars?
This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science saying, at least so thinks a team funded by NASA.
Their intriguing idea: to attach a small, 13-pound cannon to a Martian rover or lander. The cannon would fire a 200-meter loop of copper wire across the barren Martian desert, at over 70 miles an hour.
The rover or lander then would generate electrical currents in the ground.
Why? Well, different materials have varying conductivity, and give off different magnetic fields when they're hit by a current.
So that loop of copper wire would act as a giant detector. It would map the magnetic fields induced by the current. This would allow scientists to see the layers of rock, dirt, metal and even pockets of water that might harbor microbes, or very little green men, up to three miles down.
This method, called induction, is widely used to find water deposits on Earth. Though a cannon is a pretty explosive idea for space exploration.
But it's a pretty rad concept, don't you think, dude? A cannon on Mars!
The Loh Down on Science, online, at lohdown.org. Produced by 89.3 KPCC and the California Institute of Technology, and made possible by TIAA-CREF.
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