Orbital Space Settlements and a Solar System Wide Web Al Globus CSC at NASA Ames November 2000 Humanity could be life's ticket to the stars (The dinosaurs weren’t space-faring)
http: //spaceflight. nasa. gov/history/shuttle-mir/photos/sts 71/mir-imax/hmg 0018. jpg
People Live Everywhere • • Every continent, including Antarctica Hottest, driest deserts Coldest, iciest regions Wettest rain forests On water For short periods, in orbit 6, 000, 000 people on Earth
Life is Everywhere • • On nearly all land areas In nearly all waters In the rocks under the Earth In near-boiling water In ice On desert rocks On a spacecraft on the Moon
Next Target: Orbit • Your lifetime: thousands of people living in orbit • A few centuries: most of humanity in orbit. • Next millenium: generation ships to the stars
Orbital Space Settlement • Who? Ordinary people. • What? Artificial ecosystems inside gigantic rotating, pressurized spacecraft. • Where? In orbit; near Earth at first. • How? With great difficulty. • Why? To grow. • When? Decades. • How much will it cost? If you have to ask, you can't afford it.
Who • Today: highly trained astronauts. – $20 -40 million tourist trip to Mir – Survivor in Space • Tomorrow: everyone who wants to go. – 100 - 10, 000 people per colony – Ultimately, thousands or even millions of colonies • Sounds unrealistic? – A hundred years ago nobody had ever flown in an airplane. – Today ~ 500 million person/flights per year.
What • A space settlement is a home in orbit, not just a place to work. • Live on the inside of air-tight, kilometer scale, rotating spacecraft.
Where • In orbit, not on a planet or moon. • Moon (1/6 g) and Mars (3/8 g) gravity too low. – Children will not have the bones and muscles needed to visit Earth. – Orbital colonies rotate for 1 g. • Continuous solar energy. • Large-scale construction easier. • Much closer: hours not days or months.
How • Materials – Moon • Oxygen, silicon, metals, some hydrogen for water. – Near-Earth Asteroids • Wide variety of materials including water, carbon, metals, and silicon. – Radiation protection • Life support: Biosphere II scientific failure, engineering success! • Transportation critical and difficult.
Why • Growth = survival. • Largest asteroid converted to space settlements can produce living area ~500 times the surface area of the Earth. – 3 D object to 2 D shells – Uncrowded homes for trillions of people. – New land. • Nice place to live.
Real Estate Features • Great views • Low/0 -g recreation – – Human powered flight Cylindrical swimming pools Dance, gymnastics Sports: soccer • Environmental independence • Custom living – Weather art
When • A few decades should be sufficient to build the first one. • No serious effort now. • Technology requirements: – – – Safer, cheaper launch Extraterrestrial materials Large scale orbital construction Closed ecological life support systems And much more
How much will it cost? • If you have to ask, you can’t afford it. – How much did Silicon Valley cost? • Orbital space settlements will be far more expensive: – – – all materials imported transportation difficult build all life support hostile environment new techniques must be developed
Key Problem: Launch
Launch Data Systems • Major opportunities for information technology. – SIAT: wiring trend data were very difficult to develop. • Some launch failures caused by software – Sea Launch second flight – Ariane V – The comma “, ”
Information Power Grid • IPG: integrated nationwide network of computers, databases, and instruments. • The Network is the Computer • IPG value – help reduce launch costs and failure rates – support for automation necessary to exploit solar system exploration by thousands of spacecraft • Problems: – low bandwidths – long latencies – intermittent communications
Integration Timeline NAS • Single building • A few supercomputers • Many workstations • Mass storage • Visualization IPG • Nation wide • Remote access • Many supercomputers • Condor pools This talk • Mass storage • Solar system wide • Instruments • Terrestrial Grid • Satellites • Landers and Rovers • Deep space comm.
Relevant IPG Research • Reservations – insure CPUs available for close encounter • Co-scheduling – insure DSN and CPU resources available • Network scheduling • Proxies for firewalls – Extend to represent remote spacecraft to hide: • low bandwidth • long latency • intermittent communication
IPG Launch Data System Vision • Complete database: human and machine readable • Software agent architecture for continuous examination of the database • Large computational capabilities • Model based reasoning • Wearable computers/augmented reality • Multi-user virtual reality optimized for launch decision support • Automated computationally-intensive software testing
2020 Tourism • • Hotel Doctors Maids Cooks Recreational directors Reservation clerks etc. These may be the first colonists.
Low/0 -g Handicapped/Elderly Colony • • • No wheelchairs needed. No bed sores. Easy to move body even when weak. Never fall and break hip. Grandchildren will love to visit. Need good medical facilities. – Telemedicine • Probably can’t return to Earth.
Aster. Ants: A Concept for Large-Scale Meteoroid Return Deliver extraterrestrial materials to LEO Support solar system colonization Al Globus, MRJ, Inc. Bryan Biegel, MRJ Inc. Steve Traugott, Sterling Software, Inc. NASA Ames Research Center
Near Earth Object Materials • Mining of large NEOs very difficult to automate – Mining involves large forces – Materials properties are unknown and variable • Capture of small NEO may not require human life support • 10 million - 1 billion 10 m diameter NEOs • Far more 1 m diameter NEOs
Solar Sail in Earth Orbit World Space Foundation
Znamia 1993 Guy Pignolet • 20 meter diameter spinning mirror • deployed from Progress resupply vehicle
Solar Sailing 1 Net force Photons Sun Sail
Solar Sailing 2 Orbital velocity Outward spiral Propulsive force Sail Orbital velocity Sun Inward spiral Sail Propulsive force
NEO Characterization Project
Solar System Exploration • High launch cost of launch = small number exploration satellites – one-of-a-kind personnel-intensive ground stations. • Model based autonomy = autonomous spacecraft • Requirement drivers – – Autonomous spacecraft use of IPG resources low bandwidths long latencies intermittent communications
Each Spacecraft • Represented by an on-board software object. • Communicates with terrestrial proxies to hide communication problems – know schedule for co-scheduling and reservations • Data stored in Web-accessible archives – virtual solar system • Controlled access using IPG security for computational editing
Spacecraft Use of IPG • Autonomous vehicles require occasional large -scale processing – trajectory analysis – rendezvous plan generation • Proxy negotiates for CPU resources, saves results for next communication window • Proxy reserves co-scheduled resources for data analysis during encounters
Conclusion The colonization of the solar system could be the next great adventure for humanity. There is nothing but rock and radiation in space, no living things, no people. The solar system is waiting to be brought to life by humanity's touch. And computer science can help.
NEO Composition • Widely varied, includes large amounts of: – – Water Carbon Metals, particularly iron Silicon • Spectral studies don’t agree very well with meteorite analysis
Detection of 1 -meter diameter meteoroids • Current Earth-based optical asteroid telescopes – Smallest found < 10 m diameter – Maximum 1 m detection distance ~ 106 km – 2, 000 to 200, 000 within range at any given time – 5 -7 hit the Earth each day • Radar required for accurate trajectory and rotation rate
Solar sail experience • Solar sailing used by Mariner 10 mission to Mercury for attitude control – Enabled multiple returns to Mercury by reducing control gas consumption • Ground deployment test by World Space Foundation • Zero-g deployment test by U 3 P in aircraft • Russian Znamia mirror February, 1993
Solar sail meteoroid return • Characteristic acceleration of 1 mm/s 2 produces 1. 3 km/s delta-v per month • 170 -182 meters square sail for 500 kg NEO return at 0. 25 mm/s 2 characteristic acceleration • Once design is refined, mass production of Aster. Ants spacecraft • ? NASA build first one open source, then pay for meteoroid materials by the ton?
Summary • Capture ~1 m diameter NEOs (Near Earth Objects) • Return to LEO (Low Earth Orbit) • Solar sails for propulsion • Start with one small spacecraft, scale up with copies • Early returns have scientific value, later materials for construction and resupply
Conclusion • Benefits – – small down payment (one small spacecraft) scales by mass production missions can probably be automated no consumables • Challenges – 1 m NEO detection difficult – solar sails have little flight experience – geosynchronous applications require space manufactured sails
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