Micaela+R

Electronics and How They Relate to Our Search for Life on Mars
==== Electronics are a major part of our everyday life. Electronic devices use electrical signals in order to function. There are different types of electric signals, such as analog signals and digital signals. Analog signals vary smoothly and continuously in time while digital signals change in jumps or steps; digital signals do not change smoothly. While the hands of a clock move smoothly from second to second, the numbers on a digital clock change in a single jump. These are examples of both an analog device and a digital device. Though analog and digital signals are different, they are both types of electric signals used in electronic devices. Semiconductors can be useful in electronic devices because their electrical conductivity can be controlled. This conductivity can be controlled by adding impurities to the semiconductor. When certain p-type semiconductors and n-type semiconductors are put together, they can form electronic components that control the flow of electric current in a circuit. These components can behave like switches, allowing themselves to be turned on and off. Semiconductors are used in diodes, transistors, and integrated circuits. Diodes are used to convert alternation current into direct current. This is because diodes only allow current to flow in one direction, so when an alternation current reaches a diode the current must turn into a direct current. Unlike diodes, transistors have three semiconductors joined together instead of two. They are used to amplify signals in an electric circuit. Transistors can also be used as an electronic switch. Integrated circuits are made of one semiconductor; they are used in electronic devices such as computers. Integrated circuits are used in computers because they can be smaller than 1 mm on each side and still contain millions of transistors, diodes, and other components. Because of integrated circuits, it is possible to have small laptops that can do a huge number of different things. ==== ==== It is very important to have electronic devices when traveling to Mars. Electronics would be needed for navigation of the planet and to record information. It would be important to have electronic video cameras to record sights seen and sounds heard on Mars. Integrated circuits come into play with computers, and it would be very useful when on Mars to have a computer so that information could be sent back and forth from Mars to Earth. Computers would also be important when recording and analyzing data found while searching the planet. Almost everything used in getting to Mars and the search for life on Mars would involve electronics. ====

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The history of rockets shows how far humankind has come in terms of inventions and exploration. It all started in around 100 B.C., when a Greek inventor named Hero of Alexandria created one of the first rocket-like devices. He named this invention The Hero Engine; the basis of the “rocket” was a sphere on top of a water kettle. The fire from below the kettle turned the water into steam, which was used as a propulsive gas that caused the sphere to rotate. Around 200 years later, the Chinese began to make rocket-like devices as well. As entertainment during religious festivals, they filled bamboo tubes with a simple gunpowder and tossed them into fires. This form of fireworks led to gunpowder-filled bamboo tubes that were attached to arrows and launched with bows. When the Chinese realized that the tubes could launch themselves just from the power produced from the escaping gas, the true rocket was finally born. ======

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In 1898, a Russian schoolteacher with the name of Kanstantin Tsiolkovsky proposed a new and exciting idea that would change the use of rockets from warfare and fireworks into something much more. Tsiolkovsky proposed the idea of space exploration by rocket. He thought that using liquid propellants in rockets would achieve a much greater range than the propellants they had been using in the past, and that this would allow them to travel to space. His nickname, “The Father of Modern Astronautics”, comes from his ideas, research, and vision that changed the world of rocketry. ======

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Tsiolkovsky’s ideas led a 20th century American, Robert H. Goddard, to experiment with rockets. He tried to use solid-propellants in rockets, but then became convinced that a rocket could be better propelled by liquid fuel. Even though building liquid-propellant rockets is much more difficult than building solid-propellant rockets, Goddard achieved the first ever successful liquid-propellant rocket flight. He accomplished this major leap in rocketry on March 16, 1926. Even through the rocket only flew for two and a half seconds and landed 56 meters away from the starting point, it was still an important discovery and invention that was the pioneer of modern rocketry. ======

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Rocketry became a major interest during the earliest 20th century; rocket societies were founded throughout the world. A German society called the Verein fur Raumschiffahrt developed the V-2 rocket. This rocket was used against London during World War II. It could destroy whole city blocks in one launching, but luckily for London and the Allied forces the V-2 came very late in the war and did not have much impact on it. ======

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After the war, both the United States and the Soviet Union began to experiment with rockets as military weapons. The Soviet Union was the first to put a satellite into space, but the U.S. soon followed with a satellite of their own. This space exploration led to the founding of The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which was developed in 1958. Its purpose is to be a civilian agency with the goal of exploring space peacefully for the benefit of all humankind. This is the agency that has enabled much exploration of space with rockets and satellites. NASA was responsible for launching the first astronaut to the Moon, and it is the organization that will launch us and our rocket to Mars. It is amazing to look back at the history of the rocket and see how bamboo-filled tubes used as fireworks led us to the creation of massive rockets used to explore the entire universe. ====== = Rocket Stages Animation = =media type="custom" key="9018854"=

= Parts of the Rocket =

My Rocket Experiment Data

The purpose of this experiment was to determine whether mass affects altitude. This experiment was preformed by constructing rockets out of basic materials such as cardboard tubes, a plastic nose cone, and a launch lug. The rockets were built with the recovery systems, and then they were painted with a variety of colors and designs. Nine rockets with different masses were built and subsequently launched.

The experiment was preformed by placing the launch lug of the rocket through the rod of the launch pad to secure it. A group of people used a trundle wheel to measure a hundred meters from the launch pad, where they measured the altitude of the rocket using an angle gun. Then two alligator clips were clipped onto the igniter. Both buttons of the igniter box were pressed, and after about 10 seconds the rocket lifted off into the air and coasted until apogee. When apogee occurred, the people with the angle guns measured the altitude angle of the rocket. As the rocket was recovering and landing, the launchers of the rocket ran out to retrieve it. This experiment was preformed with every group's rocket (nine in total). The data was recorded during every experiment and the altitude was found using trigonometry.

The results of this experiment were that, in general, the rockets with a lower mass had a higher altitude. There were a few outliers, but the data still showed an inverse relationship. It was hypothesized that the rockets with the lowest mass would have the highest altitude, and this hypothesis was proven to be correct.

Our rocket, Marshall Stanley Rosen, was built with the utmost love and care. Our original painting was not quite what we were aiming for, so we repainted our rocket. Even so, the mass of Marshall Stanley Rosen was about average. When we launched our rocket, it took a little while for Marshall Stanley Rosen to lift off after we pressed the buttons. Our rocket lifted off with a lot of smoke and some fire sparks, and then coasted until reaching its apogee, which was about 60 meters high. At that point, the parachute was ejected and the rocket made its way back down to the ground. The rocket drifted back and was blown by the wind until it landed in the baseball field. When we recovered it, we found that the parachute had been burned a little and had melted in spots. When calculated, it was found that our rocket had the lowest altitude of all of the rockets. It is unclear why this occurred; we will have to preform more launchings to get a correct average.

= The Importance of Astronomy in Our Search for Life on Mars = Astronomy is very important because it shows us how our Universe began and how it works. It is important to know this while searching for life on Mars because it can give us clues to whether or not there is actually life on Mars. Astronomy can show us how Mars formed and developed through time. In researching this, we will be much more likely to find information about life on Mars. The probes and orbiters that we send to Mars gather data that will help us with our investigation. Also, we need to know where Mars is in relationship to the Earth and how it revolves, and astronomy tells us this. This data is necessary in order to time when we should launch our rocket. Astronomy has a big impact on our search for life on Mars; it has greatly helped us.

To read more about astronomy, click on this link. More About Astronomy

= History of Robotics = The history of robots began around 350 B.C., and we have been advancing our innovations ever since. In 350 B.C., the Greek mathematician Archytas of Tarentum built a mechanical bird named “The Pigeon”. This is a record of one of the first robotic creations, and is also one of the earliest studies of flight. For around 1500 years after that, no significant leaps in robotics were made. But in 1495, Leonardo DaVinci built a mechanical device that looked like an armored knight; the mechanisms were designed to make the robot move as if there was a real person inside of it. This was a major breakthrough in robotics. Taking a big leap into the 1700s, we go to Jacques de Vaucanson who created automata in 1738, one of which was a duck that moved, quacked, and even ate and digested food. Pierre Jaquet-Droz also made automata that could write, play music, and draw pictures. These are the standouts in robotic creations until the 20th century.

In the 20th century and specifically in the 1960s, lots of advances in robotics occurred. In 1962, the first industrial robot arm, the Unimate, was introduced by General Motors. This robot arm could complete dangerous and repetitive tasks on assembly lines that would injure human beings. A few years later, Victor Scheinman created the Stanford Arm, whose design is still influencing how we build robot arms today. Also in the 60s, The Stanford Research Institute created the first mobile robot ever to know and react to its own actions. Robots that are able to do this are more commonplace today, but in 1966 this was an influential breakthrough in technology. Later in the 1900s, more developments were occurring. The deep space explorers, Voyagers 1 and 2, were launched in 1977. In 1989, the paper, “Fast, Cheap and Out of Control: A Robot Invasion of the Solar System” was published. This important paper changed rover research from making one big, expensive robot into making lots of little, cheap robots. It also made the idea of robots more accessible to the average person. Later in the 20th century, Dr. John Adler came up with the idea of a robot that could scan a cancer patient and give high doses of radiation to the tumors with extreme accuracy. It is a non-surgical option to patients who have complicated or inoperable tumors, or to other cancer patients who do not want to be operated on. In 2001, this robotic device was finally allowed to treat tumors.

Our society has come very far with our robotics innovations. We have sent robotic rovers to Mars, and we have also made robotic devices available for the average person. We have even created a humanoid robot that is able to play the violin. Robotics has advanced so much since the first robot-like device in 350 B.C., and it is incredible to think of what we might be able to create in the future.

Motors and Sensors: A Robot's Movement

Motors are an essential part of robots; they allow them to move. With the Mindstorms program, we were able to program our robots to perform tasks such as moving forward, moving backward, and turning around. With Mindstorms, we could create programs that would allow our robots to move using motors. We were able to decide on the number of rotations or degrees we wanted for each part of the program. Using Mindstorms and the robot motors, we were also able to program our robot to go through driving courses. Although motors are very useful, the wheels were definitely a challenge when it came to using motors with a robot. Sometimes the wheels were uneven, or the back wheel caused the robot to move incorrectly. Also, the degree of turning you put into the Mindstorms program did not necessarily pertain to the degrees your robot actually turned. Even including the frustrating parts of the motors, motors are definitely a necessity in order to move a robot around. While motors allow robots to move, sensors also allow robots to move by the robot’s reaction to different senses. The sensors we worked with were touch sensors, sound sensors, light sensors, and ultrasonic sensors. The sensors were used for different tasks; for example, when the sound sensor was used the robot moved accordingly to the sound and programming. With the sound sensor, we were able to make our robots “dance” to the music. On the other hand, the ultrasonic sensor was used so that the robot could detect when an object was coming up. The multiple sensors all have different functions, but they are all necessary in order for a robot to perform a variety of tasks.

The Characteristics of Life and How to Detect Life on Other Planets

A living thing must possess eight characteristics in order to be considered living. It must be made of cells, need materials, be homeostatic, respond to stimuli, reproduce, grow, adapt, and respirate. Cells are the fundamental units of living things; therefore all living things must have cells. Cells have organelles inside of them, and some cells have a nucleus, which is the cell equivalent to a brain in a human being. All living things also need materials such as water, minerals and air. They take what they need from the environment, and all need sugar in the basic level. Even though some living things produce their own food while others hunt for their food, both types of creatures need basic materials to live. Living things are homeostatic as well. This means that internally living things stay about the same despite environment changes. These creatures have to expend a great deal of energy to maintain homeostatis; human beings use around 95% of their energy just to heat them up. The fourth characteristic that a creature must possess to be considered a living thing is to respond to stimuli. A stimulus is anything that causes a living thing to react; the two types of stimuli are positive and negative stimuli. A positive stimulus is when one moves towards the stimulus, and negative stimulus is when one moves away from the stimulus. Another characteristic living things have is that they all reproduce. Reproduction is the process by which organisms produce offspring of their own kind. There is both sexual reproduction and asexual reproduction, but plants, animals, and bacteria all reproduce in some way. The sixth characteristic is being able to grow. Even though not all things grow at the same rate or reach the same size, all things develop from a lower or simpler form to a higher or more complex form. Some creatures can even regenerate, which is when the creature grows new body parts to replace lost or damaged ones. Starfish can regenerate very well. Adapting is another aspect to life that categorizes whether or not a creature is living. Living things have all made modifications that make them suited to their way of life. The ancestry of all organisms can be traced back to the first cell, but they have all evolved in different ways that adapt to multiple ways of life. The final characteristic for a living thing is to be able to respirate. Respiration is when energy stored in the chemical bonds of sugar is released. Some organisms are consumers and must take in food to sustain life, while others are producers and create their own food. Either way, all living things must respirate. These eight characteristics are what an organism must possess to be considered a living thing.



Although there is not one surefire way to detect life on other planets, we do have some methods to decide whether or not there is life. First of all, every form of life on Earth needs liquid water to survive. Because of this, life on other planets probably needs water as well. We have discovered a layer of ice under the crust of Mars, which shows that there must have once been liquid water there. This is evidence of a warmer and wetter past of Mars, so discovering this ice shows that there might once have been life there. Also, to detect life on other planets we need to dig deep into the ground to get samples of the rock. We need to scoop up dust and drill into rocks to test for the organic building blocks of life: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen. It has been detected that there is methane in Mars’ atmosphere; methane is made up of hydrogen and carbon atoms. The methane might be made from either organisms or geological processes like the oxidation of iron, but either way the methane shows that Mars is still alive. These are a few ways that we can determine whether or not there is life on another planet, specifically Mars.