The Phobos Grunt is an incredible mission to land on Mars’ moon, perform experiments and then blast a tiny rocket-propelled robot all the way back to Earth, making it the most amazing return trip since Indiana Jones escaped the Temple of Doom. The LIFE mission is intended to test the effects of interplanetary space on organic life. It’s a little removed fosm manned missions, what with the tiny samples having to be freeze-dried first (maknig it slightly incompatible with the idea of astronauts), but even these tiny test samples will investigate the effect of cosmic radiation on DNA.
Even on the International Space Station we’re shielded from an incredibly unfriendly universe by the Earth’s magnetosphere - if we’re going to fly further we need to find out what awaits, and the Planetary Society’s admirable idea is “let’s just send something and see.” Unfortunately our attitude towards organic life seems to be seeing it as a filthy stain on a supremely sterile existence. Every off-world mission has to pass rigorous testing to make sure they don’t accidentally spread the only life ever known in all of existence, and the LIFE mission itself faced criticism for daring to freeze-dried life in a sealed metal container to a dead rock only twenty kilometers across.
The Phobos Grunt mission has just been delayed by testing, meaning it will miss the next launch opportunity and have to wait two years before Mars is in a suitable location again. The LIFE experiment will have to wait with it, but then we’ll get to expose tiny organisms to months of cosmic radiation, and since it only took a few seconds for the Fantastic Four it’ll be interesting to see what comes out.
Luke McKinney
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/10/can-life-survive-deep-space-lets-send-it-there/
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