The sight of Mars is good for the ‘sol’
JSC kicked off Innovation 2015 with Mars Week from April 27 to 30. This year’s theme is Mars (a human presence on Mars, to be exact), so the center invited a few guests to talkMARS.
On Monday, Daniel Kraft started off talkMARS with his vision of the future of medical technologies. Kraft is a physician-scientist who specializes in bone marrow transplantation, stem-cell biology and regenerative medicine. Kraft has also given several TED talks, some of which have been viewed more than 1 million times. About 500 JSC team members flooded the Teague Auditorium to hear Kraft discuss his idea of a world where everyday health can be monitored from an app, where there is more focus on preventative medicine and where patients are always connected with their doctors.
Andy Weir took the stage on Tuesday. After reading aloud the first chapter of his book “The Martian,” he relayed how he went from a science-fiction blogger to superstar author with a movie deal. Weir told of his plans to write another novel—this time featuring aliens and faster-than-light interstellar travel. Weir wrapped up his talk after answering a few questions from some of the 600-plus audience members.
Weir toured JSC for four days during Mars Week and described the experience as a “nerd dream come true.”
It was a fierce competition for 22 of NASA’s most innovative minds on Wednesday. During Innovation Charge Account pitches, speakers had only 90 seconds to explain why their ideas should get funded to a panel of judges that included JSC Director Ellen Ochoa and Weir himself. Those in the jam-packed collaboration area in Building 3 voted for their favorite 90-second pitch. Afterward, Weir signed approximately 200 books over the course of two hours. He took 50 additional books to sign in his hotel Wednesday night, and signed 70 more the next day. Starport sold out of all of their copies of “The Martian” on Wednesday and almost all of the #JourneyToMars T-shirts that supported the Innovation 2015 theme, proving that JSC team members are quite possibly the most amped when it comes to making Mars a reality for humankind.
On Thursday in the Teague Auditorium, some of JSC’s most brilliant minds talked specifically about the center’s ongoing work to building pathways for a human mission to Mars. The new series, dubbed talkMARS, did not follow the model of a typical technical briefing. These talks focused more on the why of a human mission to Mars and translated complicated technologies and ideas in an easy-to-understand format.
Doug Litteken talked about how to “Inflate Your Space” with his talkMARS lecture on inflatable structures. He discussed the possibility of using inflatable structures, capable of achieving three times more volume than traditional metallic structures, for a mission to Mars—and even engaged the audience with a beach ball and on-stage participation. Litteken described the cutting-edge technology that makes these space balloons virtually bullet—and thus space—proof. He urged the audience to help overcome stigma that these structures are not safe for space when, in fact, they have demonstrated more strength than metals used today.
Ron Sostaric captivated the audience with personal stories in his lecture on a “Human Mars Landing: Better Bring a Really Big Parachute!” Sostaric aims to “close the gap” and land humans on Mars within the agency’s timeframe, but one of the biggest challenges is landing a vehicle that would need to be roughly 30-times larger than the Mars Science Laboratory, currently the largest vehicle that has landed on Mars to date. He ended with a story of how he brought the Maraia Capsule to his house before a test and worked with his son—3 years old at the time—on parachute deployment. Sostaric later showed his son a picture of the test being deployed and and said, “Look what you helped me do,”—hoping maybe to inspire him to become one of the next generation of space explorers.
Doug Ming closed the event with “Curiosity on Mars: Trailblazing a Path for Humans.” Ming started his lecture by telling the audience that he goes to work on Mars every day. Well … maybe not on Mars, but he is ultimately the person who directs where Curiosity travels on the Red Planet. Ming stressed the importance of robotics as precursors to human explorers. Curiosity is still sifting through sands—and critical data—about the Martian world. The robot’s findings will help determine how things like Martian dust, radiation and temperature changes would affect the human body in such an alien environment. Ming painted quite a picture when he compared the view of Mount Sharp, as seen from Curiosity, to Mount Rainier here on Earth.
The event was followed by a potato-chip social in honor of main character Mark Watney’s starch-saturated diet in “The Martian,” with the speakers, audience members and Weir partaking in the crunchy goodness and talking more (what else?) Mars.
Our #JourneyToMars continues throughout Innovation 2015. Following the success of the talkMARS series, JSC will be hosting more lectures, broadening the conversation to talkNASA, from month to month and highlight technologies, ideas and innovations throughout the space agency.
NASA Planetary Science Division Director Dr. Jim Green and NASA astronaut Stan Love have already started to talkMARS in Part 1 and Part 2 of “30 Minutes to Mars.” In the videos, they discuss the steppingstones for a successful human mission to Mars.
Gary Jordan
NASA Johnson Space Center
