Posted on 12/17/2018 9:12:10 AM PST by BenLurkin
The nuclear ‘tunnelbot’ would deploy from a lander with a fiber-optic string of data ‘repeaters’ unfurling as it sinks.
Any such a Europa ‘tunnelbot’ would be relatively large. And risky to launch.
“We didn’t worry about how our tunnelbot would make it to Europa or get deployed into the ice,” says University of Illinois at Chicago associate professor Andrew Dombard. “We just assumed it could get there and we focused on how it would work during descent to the ocean.”
Which is the purpose of their mission. Whether or not such a nuclear-powered ‘tunnelbot’ is built and deployed is the next step. But the decision will be based upon an informed study of what it would take to take a peek under Europa’s ice.
Sending a probe to Europa is one of NASA’s major ambitions for the coming decades. But getting the mission past an increasingly skeptical US Congress may not be easy.
The project’s chief advocate was Texas Republican John Culberson, who chaired the subcommittee that funds NASA. The NASA study which produced the nuclear-powered ‘tunnelbot’ is a result of his efforts.
But he lost his seat at the recent midterm elections. And President Donald Trump’s most recent budget states he has no intention of funding an Europa lander.
Some experts express the fear such an attempt would be a ‘bridge too far’: we simply don’t know enough about the icy moon, yet.
“It’s a mission that came out of Congress as opposed to a mission that came out of the science,” says The Planetary Society’s Emily Lakdawalla.
Others argue the long lead-up time for such ambitious missions means now is the time to start working towards the project.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
A “nuclear tunnelbot” — sounds like the end of the world is nigh.
—
All deep space / long term probes requires a lump of nuclear material (plutonium) to provide an energy source. Voyager 1 and 2 used plutonium. As did Cassini, Curiosity, and New Horizons.
My Dad was the program manager at GE who led the development of the RTGs on the Voyager spacecraft!
They do realize that 2001: A Space Odyssey was fiction, don’t they?
And this, boys and girls, is why we are twenty trillion in the hole.
“Gosh, look at how “ridiculous” this million dollar thing is. Let’s get rid of it ... but ignore the trillion we spend every year on socialism.”
OK ... you win. ELIMINATE NASA ENTIRELY.
Wonderful.
You haven’t done a goddam thing to meaningfully reduce government spending.
But you sure do feel good about yourself, you steely-eyed budget hawk.
Don’t you?
50 year old SciFi movie!
Still holds up very very well!
Stealing from the productive and giving to the unproductive, while taking a cut off the top?
Please ...
Take another look at that pie chart. You do know how to read it.
Right?
Seriously: Eliminate NASA entirely. You won’t do a damn thing to reduce debt or deficit. You’ll sure get to feel good about yourself, though.
NASA’s cost is not even big enough to be called chicken feed!
Entitlements are the problem!
You could zero out the Federal budget and entitlements still drive us off a financial cliff!
But everybody can rationalize why they deserve an entitlement so it will never happen!
Thanks fieldmarshaldj. I can almost smell the A.C. Clarke jokes without reading the topic.
They do realize that 2001: A Space Odyssey was fiction, don’t they?
Nope. If they made a movie about something with ‘science’ in it, then if must be real (except comic book characters ... well maybe kinda could be real you never know.
Lets put a nuke on a
launch pad.....brilliant.
Or to the moon or anywhere. Let's finish the mars thing...send life in the form of moss and see if it 'takes'...
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