UBC Mars Colony
2259 Lower Mall V6T1Z4 Vancouver, BC, Canada

Imagine Day is finally here! Head to the main event here: https://amscampusbase.ubc.ca/fair_map?id=33 and visit our virtual booth for a link to join our live information session running from 2:00 to 6:00pm.

Applications are open! Help us develop a fuel production plant on Mars, start up a brand new food production project, or help out the support team with auxiliary work. Head on over to our website (https://ubcmarscolony.ca/) and click on the "Join Us" tab to learn about the available positions and for a direct link to apply. For more information please visit our virtual imagine day booth and send us a message or join in on our live Q&A on September 8th (more details in the Imagine Day Booth).

The Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover has launched! The mission addresses high-priority science goals for Mars exploration, including key questions about the potential for life on Mars. Perseverance takes the next step by not only seeking ancient signs of habitable conditions but also searching for signs of past microbial life itself. The rover introduces a drill that can collect core samples of the most promising rocks and soils and set them aside in a "cache" for possible sample return to Earth. That would help scientists study the samples in laboratories with special room-sized equipment that would be too large to take to Mars. Perseverance is on track to land at Jezero Crater on Mars on February 18th, 2021.

The experimentation continues! We still have no access to our proper team space, but thankfully our Mechanical Team Lead has been able to continue assembly while in social isolation in his garage. Check out these photos showing the main reactor body wrapped in heating tape for strict temperature control. Insulating rockwool blocks are also used for safety and thermal stability.

The Korolev crater near the north polar ice cap of Mars is a massive, permanently stable deposit of ice. Up to 60 km in diameter and 1.8 km deep, the water ice trapped here formed in place within the crater, without ever being part of a larger polar ice sheet. This crater was named after Sergei Pavlovych Korolev, a brilliant Soviet rocket engineer, responsible for launching the first satellite, Sputnik, the first space dog, Laika, and the first man in space, Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin. Linked here is a movie, rendered based on images and topographical information taken by ESA's Mars Express, which showcases the crater. https://www.esa.int//2020/06/Flight_over_Korolev_Crater_on

Ingenuity is an autonomous helicopter hitching a ride with NASA's perseverance rover to Mars. Standing 0.5 m tall and only 4lbs, it is equipped with two cameras, navigation system sensors, and a central computer. If this mission is successful, it opens the doors to testing second-generation helicopters on future Mars missions, as well as the rapid aerial exploration of Mars. More information on the first powered flight on Mars can be found at NASA's site here: https://mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter/

We're on the hunt for three new individuals to join our electrical team for the Sabatier Fuel Plant project. If any of these positions seem like a fit for you, apply directly here: https://forms.gle/HS2qGTAdutCxziDV9 Check back with us in August for general recruitment for the 20/21 winter session!

Thanks to the generous support from Fluor Corporation (Fluor Canada Ltd) we've been able to purchase only the safest and most reliable fittings for our Sabatier reaction testing apparatus. Since 1949 Fluor Canada has provided engineering, procurement, fabrication and construction services for clients throughout Canada and around the world. Fluor is a new sponsor this year and we are incredibly grateful to have them on board.

A very special Mars Monday this week - giving a HUGE thank you to Aalborg Instruments for continuing to be a key sponsor of our team. They are a state of the art manufacturer of precision instrumentation for flow measurement and control. They recently provided us with calibration services and refitting for our gas flow controllers, allowing our experimentation to proceed safely and reliably. Their contribution is more important than ever in this trying time. Check them out at http://www.aalborg.com/

NASA intends to launch its newest rover, Perseverance, to Mars between July 20 and Aug. 11, 2020. Samples collected by the rover will be used to investigate the habitability of an ancient Martian surface and search for signs of microbial life. The sample/caching system aboard the Perseverance is the "most complicated, most sophisticated mechanism that we have ever built" according to JPL Chief Engineer Adam Steltzner. Perseverance is less like a single robot and more like an ...integrated set of robots. The sample/caching system is made up of three robots: A seven-foot autonomous robotic arm wielding a percussive rock drill; a small saucer-like robot, "the bit carousel", which provides sample tubes and bits to the drill; and the "T-Rex Arm" which moves samples between documentation and storage modules. The precision required for the sample/caching system is extremely high, with over 3000 parts to integrate. Perseverance will also test and "Demonstrate technologies that address the challenges of future human expeditions to Mars," such as methods for producing oxygen from the Martian atmosphere and characterizing weather patterns. Learn more about the story of the Perseverance at the links below! Official Perseverance Webpage: https://www.nasa.gov/perseverance/ The Extraordinary Sample-Gathering System of NASA's Perseverance Mars Rover: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7671

Five years after NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft entered into orbit around Mars, data from the mission has led to the creation of a full map of electric current systems in the Martian atmosphere. Unlike Earth, whose magnetism comes from its molten iron core, Mars has what is called an induced magnetic field. When solar wind hits Mars' atmosphere, electrons become stripped from atmospheric atoms causing the upper atmosphere to become ionized. This induces currents in the planet’s ionosphere that cause a strengthening of the magnetic field, creating the so-called induced magnetosphere. More info can be found here: https://mars.nasa.gov//maven-maps-electric-currents-aroun/

The world witnessed a historic event this weekend when SpaceX's Crew Dragon successfully launched 2 NASA astronauts into space on Saturday and docked with the International Space Station Sunday morning. It has been 9 years since the last space shuttle docked at the ISS from the US. This paves the way for commercial space flight and human space exploration. NASA is still working on their new rover, Perseverance. which will begin its journey to Mars in July this summer

Thanks to the ability of our latest Martian probes, we now know that the Red Planet has plenty of fascinating geological phenomena despite not being tectonically active. Every spring, frozen carbon dioxide (called "dry ice") covered plains in the upper latitudes begin to thaw and crack - releasing streams of dry ice that carry material upward and outward and stain the basalt dunes. Think of it like snow - except it comes from underground.

Olympus Mons is the tallest mountain (and volcano) on Mars with a summit height of approx. 21.9 km above the datum. Although popularly thought to be the tallest mountain in the solar system there is another contender for that title, the mountain peak in the centre of the Rheasilvia crater on the asteroid Vesta is about 22.5 km tall. However, one does not know for sure because of difficulties in defining the ‘base’ heights of the two mountains, and uncertainties in measurements. To learn more visit: https://www.canadiangeographic.ca//five-strangest-mountain

Have you ever heard about the Zambian Space Program? In the 1960's Edward Makuka Nkoloso had a dream of landing Zambians on the moon (and even Mars). Training exercises for his space program included rolling down a hill in an oil drum and swinging on a tire swing. Watch this video to learn more and see footage from the training camp: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TI9ixb-a5M&t=14s

Speculation of intelligent life on Mars has been going on for centuries. In 1877 astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli was observing Mars. Due to the technology at the time, it appeared that there were dark, straight lines networking the surface. Giovanni called these lines "canali", Italian for channels. English speakers assumed canali meant canals, and the idea of an advanced civilization modifying the geography of Mars was born. This kicked off a whole generation of sci-fi and ...is the origin of the idea of Men from Mars, which was an extremely common theme in sci-fi until as recently as the 1960s, when the Mariner 3 and 4 Probes did a flyby of Mars, disproving the existence of canals or channels for good. Check out these links to learn more: https://www.nasa.gov//fea/F_Canali_and_First_Martians.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldFvoglm6C8 See more

To all of our Facebook supporters! The COVID-19 pandemic has had a huge impact on the work of UBC Mars Colony. Attached is a letter from our Captain providing a detailed update on where our team stands, and what this means for the future of the Sabatier Fuel Plant project.

Happy Mars Monday! Colonizing Mars is a big challenge with lots of questions to answer. We might be able to answer some of these questions by exploring its moons, Phobos and Deimos! The Martian Moon Exploration (MMX) mission, developed by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), intends to explore these moons up-close. JAXA is aiming to have a probe land on Phobos to collect soil samples and perform several flyby observations of Deimos and Mars. At the end of this ex...ploration period, the soil samples will be sent to earth in a return module for scientific analysis. The five-year mission aims to answer whether the Martian moons are asteroids that fell into orbit around Mars, or bodies formed as a result of Martian sediment being ejected into the atmosphere by asteroid impacts over billions of years. The results of analysis could help determine the composition of Mars’ soil, offer insights into the evolution of the Martian surface, or explain how substances like water may have ended up on Mars! The MMX project was just approved on February 19, and the probe is scheduled to launch in 2024. Check out the official MMX webpage by JAXA for more details at http://mmx.isas.jaxa.jp/en/

Happy Mars Monday! After nearly a year of trying to dig into the Martian surface, the heat probe belonging to NASA's InSight lander is about to get a push! The mission team plans to command the scoop on InSight's robotic arm to press down on the "mole," the mini pile driver designed to hammer itself as much as 16 feet (5 meters) down. The mole found itself stuck on Feb. 28, 2019, the first day of hammering. The InSight team has since determined that the soil here is different... than what has been encountered on other parts of Mars. InSight landed in an area with an unusually thick duricrust, or a layer of cemented soil. Rather than being loose and sandlike, as expected, the dirt granules stick together. The mole needs friction from soil in order to travel downward; without it, recoil from its self-hammering action causes it to simply bounce in place. Ironically, loose soil, not duricrust, provides that friction as it falls around the mole. Learn more here: https://mars.nasa.gov//mars-insight-lander-to-push-on-top/ See more

On board the Atlas V rocket, the Mars 2020 rover is being constructed in NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The expected launch date to the martian planet is spring 2020. The 2020 rover is equipped with SuperCam, an updated camera and laser system no bigger than a cereal box, running an artificial intelligence algorithm to identify target rocks to zap on the surface of Mars. An infrared laser beam vaporizes rock material and study the resulting plasma using the Raman spectroscopy technique. This will help scientists study fossilized microbial life to details never before possible. Learn more: https://mars.nasa.gov//all-about-the-laser-and-microphone/

Plenty can go wrong when you're floating through interstellar space, billions of miles from Earth, running on a radioisotope thermoelectric generator and coming up on 43 years since the last time anyone laid a spanner on you. We’re talking about the Voyager 2 satellite of course - the second human-made object to reach interstellar space! Last week Voyager 2 initiated an emergency shutdown during a calibration manoeuvre that resulted in two of its onboard instruments consuming a large amount of power. However, scientists at NASA were able to bring the satellite back online - more than 13 billion miles from Earth! This is a testament to the feat of engineering that has kept this instrument operating in deep space for 42 years instead of the intended 5 years lifetime. #amazing_engineering #space_exploration