Will the Mars Phoenix Mission Clear the Way for Manned Missions?

If organic compounds are present on Mars, they're more likely to have been preserved in ice, which is why NASA targeted the Phoenix mission for the planet's high northern plains, where they predicted about six inches of soft red soil should cover the ice so the digger shouldn't have to probe too deeply.

The successful touchdown of the Phoenix lander this week has the scientific capability "to change our thinking about the origins of life on other worlds," according to Peter H. Smith of the University of Arizona A Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and head of the Phoenix mission. "Even though the northern plains are thought to be too cold now for water to exist as a liquid, periodic variations in the Martian orbit allow a warmer climate to develop every 50,000 years. During these periods the ice can melt, dormant organisms could come back to life, (if there are indeed any), and evolution can proceed. Our mission will verify whether the northern plains are indeed a last viable habitat on Mars."

LPL Director Michael J. Drake said, "Phoenix has the potential to be the smoking gun for the evolution of life elsewhere in the universe. While it will not directly seek to detect life, it will look for complex organic molecules. If they are there, they are hinting strongly at present or past life.

"Detection of complex organics will drive all future exploration, and the Lunar and Planetary Lab will play a prominent role. The discovery that we are not alone in the universe, that science fiction of Star Trek may in fact be science fact, will change the way humanity thinks about itself. The existence of even primitive life forms on raises the probability of advanced life elsewhere, and emphasizes our commonality rather than our differences."

This was NASA's first attempt to land a spacecraft on at such a high northern latitude. A lander intended for the red planet's south pole went silent immediately upon arrival in 1999. That failure, combined with the loss of the companion orbiter, prompted NASA to cancel a 2001 lander mission. The parts from that scrapped mission were used for Phoenix -- named after the mythological bird that rises from its own ashes.

The lander parachuted down to a target landing area that is "Kansas flat,", with pulse thrusters easing its final descent with few if any big rocks that could overturn the stationary three-legged lander or bump against its circular solar panels and jam them.

Phoenix should help pave the way for human visitors, especially if it confirms the presence of water ice in large amounts near the pole, said Michael Meyer, NASA's lead scientist. That would be a tremendous resource, he noted. But if organic matter is indeed found, it could pose a quandary: "As gets more interesting, you may not want to send humans right away until you learn out a little bit more about the red planet and find out whether or not life ever got started there."

Attached to the deck of the lander is "The Phoenix DVD" , the first library on compiled by the Planetary Society made of a special silica glass designed to withstand the Martian environment, lasting for hundreds if not thousands of years on the surface while it awaits discovery.

The disc contains Visions of Mars, a multimedia collection of literature and art about the Red Planet. Works include the text of H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds (and its infamous radio broadcast by Orson Welles), Percival Lowell's as the Abode of Life with a map of his proposed canals, Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles, and Kim Stanley Robinson's Green Mars. There are also messages directly addressed to future Martian visitors or settlers from, among others, Carl Sagan and Arthur C. Clarke. In the Fall of 2006, The Planetary Society collected a quarter million names submitted through the internet and placed them on the disc.

Posted by Casey Kazan.