麻豆淫院

How can the exploration of a Canadian lake, using deep-water submersibles, help NASA plan for the human exploration of Mars?

What鈥檚 the most effective way to explore an unknown world? That鈥檚 one question that members of the Pavilion Lake Research Project (PLRP), with a bit of help from NASA mission planners, hope to address this summer when they conduct their first comprehensive underwater study of Kelly Lake in British Columbia, Canada.

Each summer for the past several years, PLRP scientists and astronauts have joined forces to explore another British Columbian lake, Pavilion Lake. On its surface, Pavilion Lake is a typical freshwater mountain lake. Underwater, however, it is home to a very unusual phenomenon: its lakebed is covered with a virtual forest of microbialites, formations believed to have been built by microscopic organisms, and widespread on early Earth but rare in modern times.

This year, instead of continuing their work at Pavilion Lake, PLRP scientists will be exploring nearby Kelly Lake, which contains a less-extensive population of microbialites.

At the heart of the work at Kelly Lake will be the underwater exploration of the lake in a pair of DeepWorker mini-submersibles, built and managed by Vancouver, British Columbia-based Nuytco Research. But submersible 鈥渇light鈥� time 鈥� PLRP refers to DeepWorker sojourns as flights 鈥� will be limited. The subs will be available for only a week, and each flight is a taxing journey in a pressurized vehicle into a dangerous and alien environment, where life-support factors such as battery power, oxygen supply and pilot fatigue must be given priority consideration.

In an effort to maximize their scientific return, PLRP will be using planning software developed by the Human-Computer Interaction Group at NASA Ames Research Center initially as a task-planning tool for NASA鈥檚 Mars Exploration Rovers.

鈥淎s a group,鈥� says Mike McCurdy, who leads that software-development group, 鈥渨e鈥檝e been interested in the analogs for a while, essentially as test beds for future tool development.鈥� Analogs are scientific research sites on Earth where some aspect of the environment or the research process is similar to what future explorers on other worlds, particularly Mars, may face.

Score, a version of the software built by McCurdy鈥檚 group, is currently being modified, in partnership with mission planners at NASA鈥檚 Johnson Space Center (JSC), for deployment on the International Space Station (ISS). Both members of McCurdy鈥檚 team and a group of JSC mission planners familiar with ISS procedures will participate in this year鈥檚 PLRP activities, using Score to detail the timeline for sub flights and any critically related pre-and post-flight activities.

鈥淭he project has reached a critical mass and I cannot manage it as I did when it was smaller鈥� any more, says Darlene Lim, PLRP鈥檚 principal investigator. 鈥淭hat worked when we were 20, maybe 50 people. But we鈥檝e gone beyond that.鈥� As many as 80 researchers and support personnel are expected to take part this year鈥檚 fieldwork.

A timing glitch anywhere in the process can cause setbacks that ripple throughout the project and compromise its scientific goals. If pilots or support personnel are not where they need to be, sub flights will be delayed. If sub flights are delayed, researchers may not get the data or samples they need.

That鈥檚 where the expertise of the mission-planning team from JSC will come into play. 鈥淲e鈥檙e hoping,鈥� says Lim, that they 鈥渃an automate that process for us, bring their experience to the program, help us to streamline our movements and just make us much more efficient.鈥�

Like McCurdy, JSC鈥檚 Lauren Rush, who led the planning of a recent Space Shuttle mission and will be the lead planner at Kelly Lake, sees the collaboration between her group and PLRP not only as benefitting PLRP, but also as helping mission planners think about the future of human spaceflight.

鈥淚 think that [PLRP] is very applicable to future missions, because it鈥檚 the same idea. It鈥檚 putting a crew in a rover, equipping them with what they need to go and do,鈥� she says.

One important difference between Space Shuttle planning and planning for PLRP, though, is that with the Shuttle crew, 鈥淲e know where they鈥檙e going to be.鈥� But at Kelly Lake, she points out, people will be 鈥渟pread out from the mission-control-center trailer, to the barge [the floating platform from which the subs are launched], to a submarine, to somewhere on the side of the lake.鈥� Or in the worst case, in a hotel room, 20 minutes鈥� drive away. 鈥淟ooping them together I think is going to be a challenge.鈥�

Another difference between a scientific expedition like PLRP and a Space Shuttle or ISS mission is the level of autonomy given to the participants. On Shuttle and ISS missions, Rush says, 鈥淲e tell the crew exactly what they鈥檙e going to do, broken down into five-minute increments of every day that they are in space, from launch until landing鈥�. From the time they wake up until the time they go to bed, every single thing that they do throughout the day.鈥� Including bathroom breaks.

But Kelly Lake will be a mission of exploration. Once they descend below the lake鈥檚 surface, a sub pilot may make an unexpected discovery that he or she wants to take unscheduled time to pursue. Learning how to accommodate the give and take of the exploration process is one of main ways McCurdy and Rush believe their groups will benefit from working with PLRP.

鈥淧avilion is particularly interesting because it is a real science mission,鈥� says McCurdy. 鈥淚 see a lot of similarity between the priorities of the Pavilion team and the priorities of the Mars folks that we worked with in the past, in terms of really wanting to maximize the science output of the mission鈥�. In some ways, that鈥檚 our bread and butter. That鈥檚 where our tools got their start.鈥�

Although Lim has high hopes for this three-way collaboration, she knows there could 鈥渂e problems around the edges. I鈥檓 expecting that,鈥� she says. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 know exactly how we鈥檙e all going to work together yet.鈥�

She is 鈥渁t once completely frightened and completely excited鈥� by the prospect of delegating responsibility for a critical aspect of her project to an outside group. 鈥淚 feel like they鈥檙e there to keep us in line with what we intended to do 鈥� but also respond to the fact that we are a bunch of field scientists interested in doing science, not interested in being scripted to the second.鈥�