Journeys of a Martian

End of rotation

2008-01-08T18:07:00.000Z

End of MDRS

So we left bright and early after three hours of sleep on Sunday morning. J-field's flight was at 17.00 ish, so we had to make sure we were gone by 9.00. I was riding their butts, calling in five minute increments to get our crew out the door. We had three cars to caravan back to SLC, and it wasn't that bad because Sundays in Utah are pretty quiet.

While I was at MDRS, I learned that six strangers can get along better for two weeks then your closest friends. Sometimes the unfamiliarity will help draw out everyone's strengths and help mesh them into a workable team.

Almost our entire crew was in tears when we parted ways Sunday evening after a nice breakfasty dinner at IHOP. Zena and Auvi stayed at the hotel because their flights weren't until Monday morning, and Derek, David and I went to the airport to catch our fights. Despite being at terminals on completely opposite ends of the airport, they came and sat with me while I waited for my boarding zone to get called.

I spent a three hour layover in Atlanta, where I heard about a bus in Utah that got flipped because of icy road conditions. It reinforced my need to travel together back to SLC. I'm glad we all made it safely to the airport together.

When I got home, I washed my hair three times. The toilet actually talks when I flush it. I almost cried when I dumped a cup of shiny new water down the sink before thinking about it. My toothpaste that I used to love tastes funny because it's not organic. I'm having readjustment issues.

The night I got back home I was so tired I lay down on the couch under my sleeping bag and closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, my mother was saying something and I could not remember who on my crew could have said something like that. I was panicked and woke up so that I could ask, and realized I was at home. My crew is spread out to their homes. At least my mother didn't make me tuna for dinner.

So now we're home, and thinking back on our experiences at MDRS. I learned how to comfortably manipulate an optical telescope and CCD camera. I was always nervous while using the optical telescope at my uni because it was so expensive, but now I find I am confident that I can use our telescope and we might even be able to get the CCD camera working.

I learned that cleanliness is not next to godliness, and that hard work will pay off a lot more than being clean. I learned that I didn't have to be clean to focus.

I learned that you can pick up an accent in two weeks. You can also get massive culture shock upon return. I find myself still trying to make ridiculous puns even though Zena isn't here. I'm almost certain I didn't get up this morning because I didn't hear Auvi begging for five more minutes. The house is so quiet.

This blog marks the end of my rotation. I will be updating about astronomical news every two weeks or so in the future, but MDRS is finished.

I miss everyone.

night monkey out.

Day 14

2008-01-06T07:28:00.000Z

I will update this when I get back, we have lost capable internet service.

Day 13

2008-01-04T23:54:00.000Z

Day 13

We're coming up on the end of our rotation and I keep alternating between being extremely happy to get back to civilization and extremely sad that I'm leaving. It's been an incredible experience to live here with five awesome people who are just as nerdy about Mars as I am (we've proven it, Jeff and I are Teh Top Nerds).

I haven't been thinking much about how this experience has changed me, because there hasn't really been time to think about anything other than the task at hand. Today I helped screw the Igloo together which was kind of fun. I've never used power tools before (gasp) and Jeff let me use the drill (pick that jaw up, his head wasn't stuck in the toilet. That's later tonight).

I helped Derek solder (sodder?) some wires together in the telescope dome to try and get it to work correctly. The telescope is almost completely automated, only the dome is the missing piece. Granted, the telescope won't be completely and utterly remotely controlled, but once the star alignment is performed future astronomers will be able to operate the telescope solely through the computer in the HAB. This neglects the fact that the telescope is a bit off its support, and the software and telescope aren't perfectly calibrated. Still, with better technology, these problems will become obsolete. Theory is that a telescope on Mars will be able to be operated from the habitat without the necessity of the astronomer actively going to the dome like on Earth.

Zena had at the frozen grey water with her favourite tool today while I was playing around with the power tools. She was very pleased to use the pick-axed, possibly not so pleased that grey water was flying everywhere with each strike. The rest of us were none too pleased either. Still, the Heinlein memorial walkway is ice-free now.

We had hot garlic butter pasta for lunch today. It shall be the last time we have pasta. From here on out it's rice and beans and tuna. Yum. Not together, obviously. Beans don't go so hot with tuna I'd imagine.

Jeff, David, and Auvi are all under the HAB right now. I can hear Auvi through two floors of wood. It's pretty amusing. Tomorrow we shall have our day off while we wait for Crew 64 to arrive. I have pancakes and stuff planned if they are around for dinner. If not, it'll probably be pasta again.

I had such a hard time getting up this morning, again. I got a solid 7.5 hours, I have no idea why I'm always so tired. I know I've said it over and over again. Also, I think I might have actually gained weight while being here, which defies all reason. Don't ask how it happened. David and I are probably just obeying the conservation of mass theorem. He lost so I gained.

We have to exchange pictures and print out our door tags before we leave. I'll probably work on that tomorrow. We also need showers. Half the crew was rolling around in the dirt today, so they'll probably shower tonight. I think I'm going to take my shower tomorrow and save whoever sits next to me on the plane their nose.

Jeff's going to be the first one out of here Sunday. His flight leaves at 17.00, which means we have to leave the HAB by 9.00 latest. We're performing another caravan, this time in three cars. I sort of wish were only driving one up so that I could spend more time with the crew before we all part ways.

night monkey out

End Day 13

Day 12

2008-01-04T01:09:00.000Z

Day 12

How to cook for six people

Rule 1: If you think you have enough food, you're wrong.

When humans are working, they are expending energy. That energy requires food to replenish it (occasionally sleep, but mostly food). If humans are taxing themselves in an unfamiliar environment, they will eat. A lot. I don't usually eat a lot, so when I first started cooking for the crew I severely underestimated the amount of foodstuffs we would be consuming. Now I make extra of anything, figuring it can just be shoved in the fridge if there is any left over. 'Extra' quickly becomes 'more food' during the meal, however, and as of right now the only thing I've had to save has been beans. We don't really like beans, which is annoying because that is about all we have left.

Rule 2: Spices are your friend.

Before coming to MDRS, I had never touched anything besides salt as far as spices go. Salt was always enough for me to put on instant dumplings or steamed Chinese buns. Here, where there isn't really that much variety as far as food goes, spices are the meaning of every meal. I've learned the joys of parsley, oregano, and basil. I've figured out that I can make garlic butter pasta with garlic and butter (who knew? Oh, and pasta.). Vegetable oil prevents pasta from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

Rice can be more than just rice with some spices and butter. It can have flavour and richness. If you get bored, then you should play around with the spices.

Rule 3: Cooking will get you out of cleaning.

Probably the most fun of them. I've been cooking the entire time, and therefore are exempt from cleaning the dishes. Fair trade, I think, however, cooking will take up much of your time.

Rule 4: Not everyone will like what you make. Get over it.

You win some, you lose some. With six, it's hard to satisfy everyone's tastes, but on Mars one must learn to be flexible. Meals can be flexible as well, depending on what is made. Rice is an extremely bendy main course. It goes with almost anything, and spices won't drown it.

Rule 5: Plan meals

I've found that planning meals out at least a day in advance has been very helpful to my stress levels. Setting aside enough time to cook the meals also helps. Water boils weirdly here as opposed to my uni apartment, and cooking takes longer. Make sure to plan for that, and allot enough time for meals.

Rule 6: Cans are nasty beings

Don't cut yourself on a can lid. It's tres painful and rather annoying.

~Cooking for six has been an experience that I must say I've enjoyed for the most part. It's let loose a creativity that I never knew I could have. I don't know what happened, or how it came about, but I know that when I came on this mission I could barely boil water, and now I know my way around rice, pasta, beans, bread, oatmeal, tuna, chicken, and soup.

night monkey out

End day 12

Day 11

2008-01-02T23:15:00.001Z

Day 11

I earned my EVA stripe today.

We put on the full-suit, the boots, the gloves, the helmets, everything. It was pretty cool. Pretty painful also. The backpacks sat weird on my shoulders and caused tension right where the back of my neck meets my shoulders. A quickie massage after the EVA took care of most of the pain. I just hope I can get out of bed tomorrow. Today was bad enough.

I rolled around for about half an hour after the first wake-up music started playing. I really don't know why I find it so hard to wake up in the morning here. Even with the prospect of coffee, it's insanely hard to get up.

Tonight is supposed to be clear according to the weather reports, but it's not looking so hot for observering. I'm a bit happy in a way, because this means that I'll get to sleep tonight. This also means that we should have gone last night when it was clear, because there is a snow storm coming in Friday, and it's quite likely that we won't have another clear night.

Oh well.

For once, Jeff doesn't have his head in the toilet. He's actually outside working on the third ATV, trying to un-hotwire it to make it run. David's still got his head in the toilet though. Hopefully it's almost done and will be operational tonight.

I made bread last night, and it was absolutely amazing. If there's one thing I'm learning on this mission is how much fun it is to cook. I looked up how to make bread and it sounds rather fun actually. I might try it when I get back to uni.

We watched War Stories last night. I think that is my favourite episode of Firefly. It's the first one I saw, and it blew my mind. Any prediction I made for the episode was blown out of the water by Joss Whedon's brilliance.

Zena and Jeff said they liked my garlic butter sauce. One of the high points in my day.

Guh, I am going to be so stiff tomorrow.

night monkey out

End day 11

Day 10

2008-01-02T00:13:00.000Z

Day 10

Egad my toes are gone.

I was standing outside with my first aid kit in case anything happened while Derek and Zena were cutting wood and the sun started its descent. It dipped behind a hill and the temperature dropped nearly fifteen degrees. I was completely unprepared, and my toes are freezing.

Life is simple when it makes you happy that you realize you have two 'clean' pairs of jeans instead of just one. Of course, this means I must have worn the one pair at least seven days in a row. Ah well.

Guh. It's so cold. All I can think about is how cold it is outside. It makes me never want to be an optical astronomer. Ever. Unless I'm stationed in Hawaii. I think I'd be able to deal with it then, but anywhere else is a flat-out no. Maybe I'm a baby, but it's beyond cold here and I don't like it.

We got to sleep in this morning, until around 10.00. It was nice. It's always so nice and warm in my sleeping bag. So warm that I more often than not wake up in a sweat. It's nice but sort of annoying. It makes me long for my sleeping bag during the day while it's so cold outside.

We all showered yesterday so I smell like flowers now, which is comparable to sweat. Yum. It also makes me inordinately happy that I had almost four 'clean' shirts when I looked in my bag this morning. I've been layering, so the top layer is 'clean' in my standards.

I'm making bread tonight. We have misplaced the recipe for wheat bread so until I dig that up I'm going to deal with white bread. It smells really good. Bread, rice, and beans. A nice hearty meal (hopefully).

I've learned something about myself here. I kind of actually like cooking. Maybe not for myself, but providing for others is definitely something I enjoy doing. I might ask for a full spice collection when I get back to Earth, so that I have something to play around with when I get back to Uni.

Tired again. I am getting enough sleep, I'm just tired all the time. Mmm bunk.

night monkey out.

End day 10

Day 9

2007-12-31T22:53:00.000Z

Day 9

New Year's Eve, eh. We got up this morning to watch the international space station pass almost directly overhead. It was magnitude -2, which is about as bright as Venus in the morning sky (which we saw as well, because the sun was about to rise). It was pretty cool, a much better view than from my uni department's rooftop. Much less pollution on Mars, eh? (Ack, I think I'm turning Canadian!)

Zena and Derek went on an EVA today, but ended up getting lost. Again. They made it back safely, but couldn't manage to find the place they were trying to get to. They're going to try again tomorrow. I'm running out of interesting things to make with what foodstuffs we have left. Mostly it's just beans, rice, and tuna. There's not much one can do with those. Derek gave us the idea for dinner last night, which was an interesting porridge type thing of salmon and rice. I added some spices but it still tasted like salmon. Meh, fish.

The crew is really enjoying each other's company. I think we all got lucky with this crew, we seem to click very well together. An interesting example is Zena and David. Zena absolutely adores horrific puns. David had a before-now latent tendancy towards atrocious puns. Together, they make a fantastic team of not-so-witty repatoire. Derek is very amused with the 'that's what she said' game, and I'm honestly shocked that he had never heard of it before. The whole crew is enjoying that one.

While Derek and Zena were rolling around on the ATVs, I fixed up the engineering door a little bit. The two corners are still letting air in, so I have to get to those possibly tomorrow if I can drag myself out of my bunk. I dug more holes/trench things today as well. I'm going to be feeling it tomorrow. It's all good though, I got to use a pick-ax.

Jeff's got his head under the toilet yet again, and David's got on the poop suit to clean out the toilet before they reinstall it tomorrow (I think). I'm the only one up in the living quarters right now. I have to think about how I'm going to do dinner with what we have. And how to make it taste good. I'm thinking something like garlic butter pasta. Rule of thumb for next mission: If you think you have enough food; you don't.

We're planning to watch at least three episodes of Firefly tonight to try and catch-up. If we're going to finish by the end of our mission we have to get a move-on. We're all really tired from the work we're doing. It's pretty taxing. Shower night is tonight, which is great. I cannot see the blue of my jeans anymore, mostly because today I was squirming around in the clay under the HAB trying to dig trenches, but they were pretty bad before the digging. Time for a new pair methinks.

night monkey out

End day 9

Day 8

2007-12-30T23:53:00.000Z

Day 8

Today was a busy day for me relatively speaking. I compiled and stacked all the images that we took of the moon and Mars. Then I put them into photoshop and played around with the color and contrast. I think we can actually see Syrtis Major in one of the images of Mars, which is a bit impressive considering the resolution we have on the telescope.

I am a happy kitty.

The moon images turned out pretty awesome as well. By manipulating the color and contrast we can see quite a bit of the craters in remarkable clarity. Derek did a good job. I think we're going to go out again tonight and take some images of the comet that is passing in front of M33 tonight. It's supposed to be green, I'll be very curious to see if that's the case.

I caught the mouse yesterday. Well, one of them. We named it This Mouse and then received an email concerning the hantavirus which was found in the area. Apparently mice spread it through their urine and its fatal. We placed This Mouse outside to be safe, and when we woke up this morning he had escaped from his little cage. We put up more traps around the HAB to try and cut down on the mice problem. So far we've only seen two.

Also yesterday Derek and I had an adventure with making breakfast for dinner. We attempted to make pancakes on the top of the stove which is kind of small and cramped. We ended up using too many dishes and frying the pancakes one at a time in a skillet instead of trying to work two to a pan. We only had egg beaters, not real eggs, but they tasted yummy with a bit of salt.

I did manual labour today and it was fun. We cut up some boards to make a skirt around the HAB to prevent wind from cutting under the building, then we dug some holes to drop the wood boards into. The ground appears to be frozen on the backside of the HAB, however, so we could only get as far as the ground had thawed.

Jeff's got his head in the toilet again. We're all really tired despite being allowed to sleep in this morning. Auvi's doing great, but even David took a small nap this afternoon. I feel tired after lunch, but today I worked, so the lethargy was beaten out of me. I feel good.

When I first got here, I was amazed that Ben could walk around without a jacket despite the freezing temperatures. Now I realize how he was able to do that. You get used to it. I was outside, granted I was digging holes but still, and I was in a t-shirt. It felt lovely, and I think the high today was only about 30F.

My hands smell like sawdust now. Or whatever was in the gloves I was wearing today. I hope the smell comes out soon, it's kind of irritating on my nose.

Firefly last night was one of my favourite episodes: Safe. Auvi listens to some good music.

I should have brought more socks. My entire room smells like feet. I'm also fairly certain that my jeans used to be blue. Now they're a kind of reddish color.

Night monkey out.

End day 8

Day 7

2007-12-30T00:50:00.000Z

Day 7

Today was amazing. I woke up at 11.00 because I had to pee, not because I had to get up. It was absolutely amazing.

I woke up, ate breakfast, and then launched into manga. I plowed through Tsubasa chronicles, and it was amazing. Fai went through so much. I knew he was my favourite character for a reason. I can pick the angsty ones, yes.

We had lunch and then let our food digest a bit. After about an hour, we went outside and played soccer. For all of twenty minutes. I'm proud to say that I am not the most out of shape one here. Yes, I am actually one of the more physically fit. Pick that jaw up. Zena had me, and Derek might have given me a run for my money, but I didn't start to get winded until near the end of our little game.

Zena made a tape hand, a new twist on the duct-tape line of products. She made the hand out of clear packing tape. Derek is reading Red Mars. I still haven't caught that mouse. He tripped the trap last night after taking all the food. Now we're sitting here listening to comedy skits from Bill Cosby, Monty Python, and Chris Rock. I've been sitting around making fun icons.

Today has been very relaxing. I need to get up off my behind and get a bath though. My room smells like feet. I left my sweat pea lotion open so hopefully that will help a bit. I'm going to have to burninate all my clothes once I return (Zena drew Trogdor on our whiteboard, and I drew a Japanese cat!).

We're watching Firefly now. It's become a nightly thing. I was a bad girl and started the 'that's what she said' game. My astro family will be proud of me. I'm bringing horrible games to Mars.

Not much to say, we didn't do much today. On the seventh day they rested.

EDT: I have to put this story in because of the frustration it caused. And I'm an idiot. We got the telescope working yesterday and took a few pictures of a far-off mountain ridge to make sure the webcam was functional. When we went back later in the day to actually observe with the telescope, we found that we couldn't see anything through the webcam or the eyepiece.

We naturally thought that there was something wrong with the focus on the telescope, so we started messing around with the mechanized focusing tool attached to the telescope. After about an hour of trying to focus the scope one way and then back the other way, I was getting a little angry. I couldn't figure out what we had done wrong. The webcam had been working earlier, but it apparently had stopped. We also weren't seeing anything through the eyepiece, which was even more puzzling because we should have been able to see at least light coming in, even if it was badly unfocused.

I tried to figure out what we had done wrong when I realized what had happened.

We had forgotten to take the lens cover off the telescope.

Several hours of focusing with the computer, and all it took was the removal of the lens cover. Go me.

Night monkey out

End day 7

EDT: I CAUGHT THE MOUSE! And I shall name it: This Mouse.

Day 6

2007-12-28T22:53:00.000Z

Day 6

Still haven't caught that mouse. He made an appearance last night but he was too fast for me. He sort of sneaked food from my trap and vacated. I thought he would chew the food inside the trap but no. I'm more ready this time. He shall be mine.

It was cloudy this morning when we woke up. Last night Derek and I were fighting with the telescope, trying to get it to work. The webcam was attached to the telescope without issue, but the image we were receiving looked like a very fuzzy donut. I thought it had something to do with the redirecting of light from the telescope since we had taken out all the lenses (there was no eyepiece or lens on the webcam). Derek thought perhaps the image just wasn't focused correctly. After two hours and much frustration, I was fed up. And I hadn't even been working on the damn thing all day like Derek. I have a very short temper I think.

I woke up this morning with a very despondant feeling; an astronomer without astronomy to do. I had a mild nervous attack while lying in bed thinking about my purpose on this mission. I knew I would be the first to crack.

Breakfast and coffee lightened my mood a bit, and then Derek and I started looking around for possible reasons why we were seeing a donut instead of a nice clear image of Mars or the moon.

Turns out he was correct. The telescope wasn't focused to the webcam. We went out this afternoon to try and focus it, and took a pretty decent image of a far-off ridge. Hopefully we will be able to do something tonight. It's a bit cloudy still, but might be clearing up.

David said we could have tomorrow off to relax. I think I'll sleep as long as I possibly can. I'm getting tetchy, and don't want to inflict that on anyone.

Right now we're in the process of cleaning the HAB. By 'we', I mean my other crewmates. Jeff's got his head in the toilet again, and Auvi is working on the engineering table. Zena is rearranging the desks and things in the living quarters, and David is clearing out under the stairs.

We watched Bushwhacked last night, and I remember why I've only seen that episode once. Slightly on the creepy side. It's still very cold here, but my sleeping bag is nice and toasty every night. Tonight will be a sponge-bath with any luck.

Night monkey out.

End day 6

Day 5

2007-12-27T22:39:00.000Z

Day 5

I love my commander.

My personal alarm went off at 6.30 as per determined the night before. However, the music that is usually set to go off and wake us up didn't go off, so I figured I would be a bad girl and roll over. I woke up next to the music playing and figured I had gotten another hour. Lo, my clock read 8.30. We got two extra hours of sleep today!

It felt good, but for some reason I'm still tired. It's a bit annoying because I keep zonking out on my books/laptop and Auvi keeps getting incriminating pictures. Perhaps the afternoon hours are just when my body needs more rest than usual.

The telescope is finally up and running. Apparently I was not authorized to even use the CCD camera, which is perplexing because nobody else was using it. It was in a box collecting dust on the observatory floor. Before I knew I wasn't supposed to be using the CCD camera, I had taken it out and attached it to the telescope. I know how to work one now, which should come in handy when I get back to Uni, as I've heard interest in CCD imaging with our telescope.

We're starting to get sick. The cold and lack of sleep has taken a toll on us. I think everyone is sneezing and sniffling a bit. Nothing serious, in fact I'm surprised it didn't happen earlier. One of the reasons I sort of wish we really were on Mars- we would have been decontaminated before lift-off, so illness should not be an issue.

The observatory is working better than ever, and we just need to get the dome operational before I can remotely observe. I'll comment further on my experiences with getting the observatory up and running at a later time.

I saw the band of the Milky Way a few nights ago. It was breathtakingly gorgeous. I am not ashamed to admit that I leaked a few tears (luckily it was dark so nobody saw). It again reinforced why I do what I do. If I have time tonight before the moon rises I will try and capture horizon to horizon with the camera.

We all took showers last night, which improved morale a bit, and we watched the Train Job episode 2 of Firefly which greatly improved morale. Nothing beats Jayne going crazy and falling asleep.

I have to go plan my six star alignment to try and get the telescope to focus properly.

Night monkey signing out.

End day 5

Day 4

2007-12-26T22:29:00.000Z

Day 4

We all had issues getting up this morning. Auvi had to be shouted out of bed, and I took an extra three minutes waking up. Six and a half hours sleep isn't working well. Perhaps we aren't as young as we thought we were. Derek actually fell asleep at the computer today, which was not good. I told him to lie down for an hour, and he is now fine.

Before lunch, David planned an EVA with Zena and myself going out on the ATVs. I was excited and nervous, and it took a long time to get ready for it. By the time Zena was ready to go, however, my toes were frozen inside my boots. I'm not sure why my boots are suddenly not retaining warmth, but my toes were so cold they hurt, so I couldn't go out on a two hour long EVA. David took my place and he and Zena went out with the ATVs. They ended up missing a turn on the map and had to turn around and come back.

The observatory is almost working. All of the components necessary to run a sky survey are in place, the only problem is the survey would have to be run from the dome itself rather than from the HAB which would be optimal. We have a space heater, but it uses a lot of electricity and doesn't help much in a small dome when it's open. All in all, though, Derek is absolutely amazing with all the work he's done on the observatory.

Still haven't caught the mouse. If I do, maybe I'll have a friend for the plane-ride home. He ate all the bait I left for him and then pooped in my trap. I am offended and appalled at his lack of manners.

There was a draft (still is, actually but it's better than before) that we plugged up with a moldy pillow. Hopefully it will hold for the most part. I'm going to either shower or sponge bath today (yay!), because my hair is pretty much defying gravity with the amount of grease in it. Yummy.

All in all it's been an uneventful day. I suppose I can catch you all up on the HSO incidents that have been happening. Mostly they're just scrapes and bruises, but a few of my crewmembers have come to me feeling dizzy from fumes. We have no vapour rub, so I might need to request that. I'm just worried about infections with the amount of dust floating around the science lab, and the fact that most of our engineers are working with the waste system.

Toilet's still not working, by the way. At least our rooms are very warm to sleep in. I designed the crew badge for our mission. It was exciting.

I smell.

Night monkey out.

End day 4

Day 3

2007-12-25T23:06:00.000Z

Good evening folks! Coming to you from Mars this Christmas day. There's a right nasty wind blowing outside. We latched down the telescope dome because apparently it has a tendency to blow off if not attached by something. I felt very not safe doing that, though. There's barely any ledge to stand on to get the rope into the eye holes around the rim of the scope. We managed to do it, but with the wind it was nerve-wracking.

Derek has gotten most of the software working on the telescope, so now I can do observing from the actual telescope dome. The idea is to have the telescope remotely controlled because it's really freaking cold outside at night, but at this point I can start performing science if the weather clears up.

I've been constrained to cooking duties because I'm not really much use elsewise. My science takes place at night, and right now with the weather it's not looking pretty for my science objectives. Hopefully it will clear up soon. Although, I probably wouldn't be able to observe anyway because the moon is so bright.

David has spent all day cleaning the latrine. I admire his stamina and his willingness to take on jobs he knows nobody else would want to do. He's an amazing commander for us, very upbeat and wonderfully enthusiastic.

Derek's having some frustration with the telescope and making it do things, but he's been plugging away at it for a good while now. I'm so grateful that he's as enthusiastic about the observing as I am, otherwise I never would have been able to get anything done. I know nothing about computers.

Jeff has also been awesome. He's spent all day on his back under the HAB trying to get the black water system working. It's a nasty, dirty job, and he's such a great person for looking at it.

Auvi's music is awesome, and he's working on a humanoid robot during his 'free' time. Zena is coming up with suggestions for a compost pile in the GreenHab. The entire crew is busy and working well together.

Jeff brought a tiny Christmas tree which we've set on the table. It's a bit light, and is knocked over easily, so we made a rule where if someone knocks over the tree they have to sing a Christmas carol. Auvi doesn't like that rule very much and is giving the tree wide berth. David and Jeff don't mind singing which is good, because they are the ones that knock it over most frequently (we're trying to get Derek to knock it over).

I'm going to try to catch the mouse during some of my observing runs if we can get the HAB computer synced up with the observatory. Perhaps we can make it the HAB pet. Hopefully there's only one. We watched Firefly last night, the pilot episode. Apparently it's become a bit of a tradition, since the rotations are 14 days and there are 14 episodes. The crew before us left a list of the Chinese translations behind to read. Some of them are very amusing. I hope to take a sponge bath tonight, I'm starting to smell.

Happy Christmas!

End day 3

Day 2

2007-12-24T23:55:00.000Z

Gosh I'm out of shape.

I've been wondering why I've been shaking the entire day I've been here. Apparently I'm so out of shape that standing is a chore for my leg muscles. Must work on that. Granted, coffee for the first time in six weeks helped a bit with the shaking. O glorious day. The Return of Coffee.

We started off our morning by sleeping in a full hour. We woke at 7.30 MT, a step up from the 6.30 David wanted us at. He cut us some slack because we were all pretty wiped after yesterday. I had my first cup of coffee in six weeks. Again; O glorious day.

The Don came and brought us Christmas cookies! We're all very excited. We planned to have turkey tomorrow. (Turkey sandwiches!) and rice and gravy. Yum. After The Don left, we split up into our groups to start our daily work. David got the lovely task of cleaning the toilet bucket. I trained Zena on the ATVs and the EVA suits because she will most likely be using them the most. I don't know if I'm going to go out in them. They're awfully heavy. I know I have to do it at least once, but probably I won't be doing it often.

After ATV training, I returned to a pleasant surprise. Derek had fixed our computer in the observatory. It was very exciting, but we couldn't do anything because we were extremely hungry. We broke for lunch, and talked about splitting up into three shifts, paired off so that I could get my work done at night with the telescope.

Point: The moon, while being very pretty, is extremely annoying when it's full. It's blotting out everything except the very brightest stars and Mars. This would normally not be a bad thing, because we would still be able to look at Mars, but the moon is positioned such that it blinds anyone trying to look at Mars. They're very close together on the sky right now. Annoying.

Even if we do get the scope and computer working, I might not get any data because the moon is so bright.

After lunch we refilled the water tank and then went on a hike out to a mountain. I didn't go up to the top, I waited at the bottom with a walkie while the rest of my crew climbed. (Scared of heights, yea) I had a Stargate moment. It was nice and warm today (a toasty 36F!) so I opened up the neck of my coat and slipped the walkie onto my collar. This way, I could click the talk button without moving the walkie around in an irritating manner. It reminded me of what Jack O'Neill does in SG-1, and that made me inordinately happy.

On the way back we saw a desert hare. There is life on Mars after all!

The toilet issue is still rather horrific. It's supposed to get down to below zero tonight, and not get above freezing for the rest of the week. Right now we're peeing into lovely bags and dumping them outside. It's slightly gross, but the water pipes above ground keep freezing, and there's not much we can do about it. Jeff and his engineers are working their hardest to remedy the problem.

Without any science to perform, I'm not sure what exactly I will be doing here. I'll probably help Zena out in the lab a bit if I can, or do housework-type things around the HAB. I really hope we get the telescope working.

Night Monkey out

Day 2

MDRS Day 1

2007-12-24T02:14:00.001Z

In the interests of conserving bandwidth, I will edit links once I return to Earth.

Well, it's begun.

I arrived about fifteen minutes late on Saturday, and made it to the hotel for a warm welcome by my teammates. I was the only girl for the moment. We realized we had to rent a few cars, and so we set about doing that.

While we were waiting we chatted and picked our commanding officer, XO, and chief engineer. David was named our commander, Derek the executive officer, and Jeffery the tech whiz was named Chief Engineer. Auvi and I are quite content with the choices. The rental cars arrived almost an hour late, and we went shopping. After fighting the holiday rush and spending two hours shopping, we finally managed to get on our way.

We were in a two car caravan, and that made it rather difficult to stay together during the rush hour traffic in SLC. After a few false starts, we managed to make decent headway towards Hanksville. We got seperated once more, but we eventually ended up at our destination six hours later. By this time it was nearing 10pm MT, and I had been up since 1am MT. I was a tired kitty.

The leaving crew was extremely helpful and made us dinner. The start of our two weeks of living on pasta. Before we slept, the elder crew told us about the HAB mouse, and when I went to my bunk I swore I heard something slamming against the bottom of my bunk. It couldn't possibly be a mouse, however, because it sounded much larger. And I was absolutely certain that I felt something slam against my sleeping bag, but it was just the HAB itself shaking. After an hour of lying awake panicking about a mouse being in my room, I finally fell asleep.

We awoke at 6.30am MT, for breakfast and training. We got the brief on the simulation suits (if I told you what they were, it would ruin the surprise!), I got a tour of the observatory, and I was trained on the ATV.

It was warm today, relatively speaking, and the water pipe under the toilet unfroze! Which means, we had a working toilet for an hour. Then, we realized it was leaking. Bad, bad, bad. My CO is cleaning it right now, as I write this, and I'm making dinner. Auvi is helping him, and Derek and Jeff are out running about picking up our last crewmember. Frozen/leaking toilet = no bathroom for us women. It's not pleasant at the moment.

I had my first HSO moment today as a result of that, actually. My CO got something in his eye as he was trying to work out where the leak was coming from, and I had to administer eye wash so that he could clean it out. Nothing serious, but I still have to write a report about it.

The guys are great, the place is pretty awesome, and I already smell horrifically. Mars is amazing in the sky, but the moon is so bright that I can't see the Milky Way band. It's clear tonight, so we're hoping to get out to the observatory and do some celestial sight-seeing.

Will be more coherent tomorrow, I swear.

End Day 1

Commander's report
Daily Check-in

MDRS: Preparing to go

2007-12-20T04:44:00.001Z

So, this is the first post detailing my mission to Mars! (Also cleverly known as Utah.) I'm insanely nervous and excited all at the same time. A few links:

the crew mission reports
webcams
mdrs homepage

I think this is the lightest I've ever packed traveling. I am going to be one smelly person come the end of this adventure. First is going to be the actual journey. I'm getting rerouted through Atlanta, which is going to be harrowing. I've never flown alone, much less had to transfer planes anywhere. With the holiday rush it's going to be maddening.

My first flight leaves at 8ish, which means we have to get up at 4am to get down to the airport and stand in line for security and what not. Hopefully I will only have one checked back and a sleeping bag to carry-on. If I can manage things correctly that should be about all. Hurrah for traveling light! This also means I'm going to be very bored during layover. But that's all right. I have to read up on the telescope specs and what not.

See you on the other side, hopefully!

LLL

Kiss Jupiter Good-bye

2007-12-12T06:00:00.000Z

A majority of the planets that have been found outside our solar system, or exosolar planets, are gas giants like Jupiter. Unlike Jupiter, however, they are positioned precariously close to their parent stars, sometimes within the orbit of Mercury. Scientists aren’t sure what causes such large planets to form so close to their suns, but have a few ideas that might work.

Gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn start out as larger than average rocks, much like the Earth and the terrestrial planets. Slowly, over the course of their lifetime, they start to accrete gas because of their noticeable mass. A popular theory is that Jupiter is a failed companion star to the Sun. Most of the stars in the night sky are actually binary systems, or a pair of stars that orbit around a common center. With a planet like Jupiter dominating the solar system, it’s a cause for concern if anything develops about its future path.

By observing planets outside the solar system, scientists have devised a model that might explain why so many planets are so close to their parent. Its possible that large gas giants like Jupiter can migrate inwards from their orbit (Jupiter is currently five times further from the sun than we are), and end up in a ridiculously close orbit to the sun. (Don’t worry, this will take eons to happen)

But yes, it also means that Jupiter will one day swallow Earth, if such motion is possible in solar systems such as ours. It also means that once Jupiter is close enough, it will cause its own death. Based on simulations run by researchers at the University College London ran a few simulations as to what might happen should Jupiter grow dangerously close to the sun. At .15 AU, or well inside Mercury’s orbit, then the atmosphere begins to destabilize and get stripped away. Further away from the sun, Jupiter’s own atmosphere is able to keep itself cool, along with a nifty effect created from H3+, which is a charged form of hydrogen in Jupiter’s atmosphere. The H3+ helps reflect solar radiation into space and thereby keeps the planet’s temperature down. As Jupiter was drawn closer to the sun in the simulation, more H3+ was created until about .15 AU, where the atmosphere heated up and production of H3+ stopped.

Before all this happens, however, Jupiter is going to have a nice lunch on the terrestrial planets. While it’s on the move, Mars, Earth, and Venus, will most likely get torn apart as they are drawn into Jupiter’s large gravitational well. Scientists believe this might be why we can’t see many terrestrial planets in systems where the gas giants are so close to the sun. It’s possible the gas giant has already eaten them and is on its way to its own death.

The theory that Jupiter is going to swallow the earth is immensely interesting because it’s just one more bit of evidence that the universe is not at all a safe place, and even the relative stability of our own solar system is subject to disturbing motion. In the past, Jupiter has protected us from asteroid hits and a great deal of debris colliding with earth that might have killed any life on the planet. And, if this new theory is correct, it might wipe out earth just as easily as it protected our small little rock.

Spiders on Mars

2007-12-12T04:58:00.000Z

Mars has long fascinated the people of Earth, in the beginning owing to its reddish color in the night sky, and then, as we learned more about it, the possibility that it once held life and liquid water on its surface. Mars continues to hold the minds of many scientists mystified with its secrets, as new images are produced ever day from various missions to the Red Planet.

Mars also has a history of providing Earthlings with odd and interesting structures, one of the most infamous being the ‘face’ on Mars. Originally thought to be evidence of a sentient culture on Mars, it was later debunked by scientists proving it was the way the shadows crossed the structure that made it appear like a face. Recently, images from the Red Planet show very strange, spider-like etchings in the surface of the planet. Until a few days ago, the strange markings perplexed planetary scientists and defied explanation. However, thanks to new observations from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, new light has been shed on the mysterious wiggles.

Because Mars experiences seasons, like the Earth, it goes through periodic warming and cooling of its ice caps. Much of the ice on the Martian surface is frozen carbon dioxide, which sometimes skips right past its liquid phase when it is heated. In the Martian spring, when the polar caps are facing the sun, light from the sun heats the caps. Because of the nature of the polar caps, the light passes through the top layers and penetrates to the darker Martian rocks under the ice. This causes the ice to heat from below, and instead of melting, the ice sublimes, or goes immediately into a gas.

When gas builds in a closed environment, it puts a great amount of pressure on the walls of that environment. In this case, the walls are the Martian surface. The gas causes too much strain it actually forces cracks in the terrain so that it can escape. Scientists think this is the method that causes the interesting spider-like structures that have been seen on Mars. After the springtime, when summer on Mars approaches, the sun causes the ice to completely evaporate, and leave behind the cracks and fissures it caused.

The theory surrounding the spiders on Mars is important to understanding more of Mars. If we can understand more about Mars, we can learn how better to support human life there in the near future. Studying the Martian surface may also give us clues as to how our own planet will look in the future, as we are slowly spiraling towards the same fate. (Slowly, very, very slowly)

Protoplanetary Phlegm

2007-11-30T03:58:00.000Z

Originally it was thought that the moon was a captured protoplanet that had been so attracted by Earth’s gravitational well it decided to stick around for a few hundred million years. Then, theory evolved and changed, so the moon became the aftereffects of a massive collision between early Earth and some other huge body. Planets form from collisions of smaller things slamming together around a star.

Spitzer, the last of NASA’s Great Observatories mission, has retrieved images containing evidence that such collisions are taking place in the Pleiades star cluster located in Taurus on the night sky. When planets form from dusty discs around new stars, one of two things can happen. The dust can clump together and smash into neighboring clumps and stick, or they can crumble into itty bitty pieces and try to start the clumping process over again.

The amount of dust that Spitzer is imaging, however, is said to have been caused by something much bigger than little clumps of rocks floating around. According to calculations made by the researching team, only crashing planetoids could leave behind the trail that is being seen. An analysis from the emission lines coming from the dust led scientists to conclude that the ring around the star HD 23514 in the Pleiades is indeed second generation, or the dust had formed something massive at one time and had been smashed apart subsequently.

One of the reasons scientists think this disk is not primordial is because the stars are so old. The Pleiades star cluster is on the order of 100 million years old, which is more than enough time to clear its neighborhood of any dust and debris. The remaining particles in the star’s area must be something too heavy to be blown away by stellar winds and radiation.
This is not the first ring that has been found around a star where the dust is not of primordial make up. The same team that monitored HD 23514 also discovered a ring of second generation particles orbiting around a solar like star. This was in fact what led them to look at the Pleiades star system and find a dust ring around one of their stars.

Such star systems are crucial to learning about how our own solar system formed. Terrestrial planets and the cores of gas giants formed from massive collisions of protoplanets just like the ones that are being postulated in the systems above. If we can learn about planetary formation by studying stars such as HD 23514, then we might learn more about other solar systems that are forming, and why our own solar system seems to be a minority, containing terrestrial planets rather than gas giants.

Darkness in the Stars

2007-09-20T01:17:00.000+01:00

Stars are bright. While admittedly not the most luminous objects in the universe, our own sun generates 3E26 Watts of power each second. That’s approximately 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 60W light bulbs. Recent changes in primordial evolution theory suggest that the universe’s earliest stars may have had a very dark origin. September 14, 2007, a new theory about early star formation was published concerning the idea that dark matter may have helped ignite the first stars.

Two types of particles with mass exist in the universe; dark matter and visible matter. Light interacts with visible matter, enabling us to see it. Everything that can be seen, rocks, clothing, water, the sun, electrons, are all composed of this form of matter. However, visible matter only takes up 3% of the universe. Dark matter makes up 25% of the universe, and is virtually undetectable to human technology as it stands because dark matter does not interact with light. So far, only indirect observations have taken place to confirm the existence of this non-luminescent quarter of the universe.

Fritz Zwicky discovered that the galaxies were rotating too rapidly to stay together with only their visible mass when he monitored the Coma Cluster of galaxies, which is some 60 million light-years away. The galaxies needed more mass than was visible to prevent their spinning from ripping them apart. Scientists postulated a form of matter that couldn’t be seen. Thus dark matter was ‘discovered’.

There are two forms of dark matter, cold and warm. Cold dark matter, or CDM, is massive and slow-moving. Warm dark matter is not as heavy, and faster. Consequently, there are two theories as to how dark matter helped stars form.

Imagine a giant bed sheet held taut by all four corners. Place a tennis ball in the center. The sheet dents just a tiny bit. Take the tennis ball off and put a bowling ball in the center. The ball drags the sheet down, deforming it with its weight. This is how gravity works. A large mass, like the earth, bends space-time around it like the bowling ball bent the sheet. Cold dark matter theory suggests that a CDM particle would bend space-time in the same manner, drawing primordial hydrogen and helium into its dent. As more hydrogen and helium gathered, the dent grew larger and pulled more hydrogen and helium in. This cause and effect scenario would have produced huge stars, almost one hundred times the mass of our own sun. The problem with CDM star formation is that huge stars don’t live long. Any trace of the massive stars formed would have disintegrated long ago. CDM theory also can’t account for super massive black holes.

Warm dark matter (WDM), being quicker and lighter, could not have drawn hydrogen and helium to itself like CDM. Instead, it could have sped across the cosmos, leaving a dent in space-time as if one had laid a heavy ruler on the bed sheet. Such dents could have been up to 9000 light years across. Hydrogen and helium fell in smaller quantities into this crevice, forming a line of stars like beads on a string. These stars were not as massive as those formed in CDM theory. If a star formed by WDM theory was one solar mass, the star would still be around. WDM theory also provides an explanation for super massive black holes. Should a string of stars have collapsed, the mass of the stars would have combined and the collective mass could have been enough to tear a hole in space time, or rip through the bed sheet.

WDM theory seems to answer some questions about the universe. The problem now is to detect stars that would have been formed with the assistance of WDM. If stars can be found that date to the beginning of the universe, it will be a monumental step in not only our knowledge of dark matter but also our theory of the universe and how it formed.

Dusty with a Slight Chance of Rain

2007-09-07T01:11:00.000+01:00

Interstellar forecasts are dominated by dust clouds, UV radiation, and strong molecular winds, but a recent discovery in the NGC 1333-IRAS 4B star system might change that. On August 29, 2007, the Great Observatory, Spitzer, run by CalTech, obtained a spectrum from the star system NGC 1333-IRAS 4B. The analysis showed enough water to fill Earth's oceans five times over.

NGC 1333-IRAS 4B is called an embryonic star system. As the name implies, this is a star system that is not fully formed yet. A star is radiating, but a thick cloud of dust and gas still swirls around it, leaving the star open to obtain a companion, or possibly a solar system.

A star forms when a dust cloud collapses in on itself and becomes dense enough that the pressure of hydrogen atoms slamming into each other is enough to actually fuse a pair together and start ‘burning’. Over the course of billions of years, it mixes all of its hydrogen into helium, and then helium into other, bigger elements. The most massive stars end their lives as supernovas, cosmic explosions that scatter mass in all directions in a matter of seconds. The heavier elements, from lithium all the way up to iron on the periodic table, are flung into space to be captured by the irresistible pull of another star's gravity.

Sometimes a star will not use all of the gas and dust around it, leaving behind a ring that might one day merge to become a planetary system. Planets form not by a gigantic cloud hundreds of light years across collapsing in on itself because it can’t stand the pressure of its own weight, but more like bumper cars smeared with super glue. Small bits of dust stick to other small bits of dust, and gradually they start to spin and orbit the star. As they orbit, they clear out a path around the star, picking up any unfortunate dust clods in their way.

The H2O molecule is the essential element to a star system that excites the potential for life. On Earth, comets and meteors escaping the asteroid belt delivered water by skimming the atmosphere and heating up, vaporizing the ice trapped with the rock into a vapor necessary to sustain life. The vapor was trapped in the Earth’s thick atmosphere, and so enabled oceans to form. NGC 1333-IRAS 4B is a model for a planetary system that might someday contain life.

NGC 1333-IRAS 4B is the proof that planetary formation theories are on the right track. Water molecules, created in the bowels of massive stars, were trapped by gravity to form a sort of bubble of ice particles around the forming star. As the star grew in mass, the bubble drew closer and closer as a result of gravity, and soon the ice started sinking into the residual dust cloud, vaporizing and mixing with dust and small granules of rocks. The image Spitzer received was of the heated vapor in the disk.

Astronomers got their first look at a step in the planetary formation process with the Spitzer data, and confirmed how a planet like Earth forms and opened the possibility that in a few hundred thousand years, another habitable Earth-like planet will have been fashioned. I think this is an amazing discovery because it finally sheds some light on how our planet formed and how other planets might have formed that carry life.