Manned Mars rover

DRMA 5.0 "commuter" Mars base, featuring a pressurized rover for two, with a 5 kilowatt sterling radioisotope for power.[1]
An unmanned rover's wheel on Mars

Manned Mars rovers are a component of many designs for a human mission to the planet Mars.[1] For example the Austere Human Missions to Mars proposal proposed including two rovers on its unmanned power and logistics cargo lander.[1] Each rover could hold a crew of two in a pressurized environment, with power coming from a sterling radioisotope generator.[1]

Mars One, a Mars colonization plan intended to be funded by a TV show, plans an unpressurized manned rover capable of traveling 80 km (50 miles).[2] They said a possible supplier was Astrobotic Technology.

The Manned Mars Exploration Rover won a design award in 2010.[3] Some features included live-aboard capability, a winch, airlock, and six foam core wheels.[3] It featured modular construction so it could be assembled from smaller parts, and the suggested power source was radioisotope batteries.[3] An example of RTG use is the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft whose radioisotope power system produces several hundred watts of electrical power.[4]
It produces this amount power continuously with a slow decline over decades, and with even larger amount of heat production at the same time.[4] The electricity is produced from the heat given off by radioactive decay.[4]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 NASA - Austere Human Missions to Mars
  2. ↑ "Is this really possible?". Mars One. Retrieved 2013-08-06.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 http://www.dexigner.com/news/20096 MMER
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Todd J. Barber (August 23, 2010). "Insider's Cassini: Power, Propulsion, and Andrew Ging". Saturn.jpl.nasa.gov. Retrieved 2011-08-20.

External links