Pauline

Facts You Need to Know in Order to Send a Rover To Mars

 * Mars has seasons, polar ice caps, volcanoes, canyons and different type of weather
 * Mars and Earth orbit the sun at different __speed__ and distance so sometimes they’re really far apart, and other times they’re really close together
 * Every 2 years Mars and Earth are in perfect position to get to Mars with the least amount of rocket fuel
 * Takes about 7 or 8 months to reach Mars
 * Mars is a cold and desert-like
 * Mars is half the size of Earth
 * Mars appears red because its surface contains iron minerals that rust/oxidize and the dust is kicked up into the atmosphere
 * It’s a rocky body
 * Mars is covered by hundreds of thousands of craters so need to pick a smooth landing site
 * Mars has dust storms so need to construct rover so it is as resistant as possible to dust
 * Need to launch when Earth and Mars are aligned so the distance between the planet is as as possible so we can use the least amount of rocker fuel
 * Needs to aim ahead of where Mars currently is in order to reach it
 * Mars has polar ice caps so may need to make rover able to roam on ice
 * Mars is about half the size of Earth so need to consider this for tour trajectory/flight path
 * Mars has seasons so in winter the rover won't be able to recharge
 * Mars only gets 44% sunlight so need a back-up __generator__
 * Takes about 8 months to travel to Mars
 * Mars is very cold
 * Temperature varies greatly within a few feet of the surface
 * Rover needs good traction as surface is rocky and has loose soil

//Ms. Mc: Good facts about Mars and its conditions from our class discussion but I don't see much original __work__ (-3). 7/10//

History of Rocketry
The first device with the principle mechanism of a rocket was the “hero engine”. The Hero Engine is a sphere on top of a water kettle. The way it works is that there is a fire below the kettle that turns the water into steam. The gas travels through pipes and into the sphere. Two L-shaped tubes on the side of the sphere allows the gas to escape and it gives a push to the sphere which causes it to rotate.


 * The Hero Engine- Figure 1**

The Chinese also had various ways to use a rocket. They had a type of gunpowder made from salt peter, sulfur and charcoal dust. In order to create explosions during a religious festival, they filled bamboo tubes with a mixture and tossed them in the fire. They kept experimenting and finally attached bamboo tubes to arrows and launched them with bows. They then discovered that the gunpowder tubes could launch by themselves using the power from the escaping gas. When the Chinese were fighting against the Mongols, they repelled the invaders “arrows of flying fire”. These were a simple kind of solid-propellant rocket.




 * Chinese fire-arrows- Figure 2**

Now skipping ahead into more modern times, in 1898, a Russian schoolteacher, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky suggested space exploration by rocket. He proposed to use liquid propellants for rockets so as to gain greater range. Tsiolkovsky has been called the Father of Modern Astronautics due to his ideas, research, and vision.

On March 16, 1926, American Robert H. Goddard achieved the first effective flight using a liquid-propellant rocket. The rocket flew for just two and a half seconds, reached up to 12.5 meters and landed 56 meters away from the cabbage patch. Compared to today, the flight was not impressive, but still made a huge impact on a new era in rocket flight. In the early 20th century many small rocket societies were founded around the world. One in particular in Germany called Society for Space Travel developed the V-2 rocket. The V-2 accomplished a great thrust by burning a combination of __liquid oxygen__ and alcohol at a rate of about one ton every seven seconds. The V-2 was an extraordinary weapon that could overcome whole city blocks. On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched a satellite called Sputnik I. It was the first successful entry in a race for space between two nations. A few months later, the United States launched their satellite called Explorer I on January 31, 1958. In October of that same year, the US officially created its space program called the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NASA became a civilian agency with the goal of peaceful space exploration for the benefit of all humankind.

Ms. Mc: Great general overview of the important contributions to the history of rocketry. Great drawings too. Please be sure to include "Figure #" in your caption (-1/2) and refer to them in your text (i.e., "as seen in Figure 1, . . .). Nice work! 9.5/10

Scratch Rocket Flight Simulation
media type="custom" key="14053876" Instructions: Click the green flag on the top right to make it start. Click the red button next to the flag to make it stop. Don't forget to turn on your sound.

Comments:
 * I think you did a really good job on explaining all the parts to your rocket simulation, though i did think your simulation was a little bit rushed, everything seemed to go past so quickly. I also liked how you launched your rocket from a field, a field is really plain but creative at the same time :) - Maddy
 * I liked the way your simulation was corrected and it was realistic.However, if you watched the simulation again by pressing the green flag the backround does not reset. Though I did find your backrounds very interesting and creative. - Georgia

Rocket Parts

 * Figure 3**

As seen on the figure above, the nose cone is the very top of the rocket. It allows smooth airflow around the rocket. The body tube is the main part of the rocket. It is used as an airframe and it is usually built out of a sturdy paper tube. The recovery system is inside the top half of the body tube. It is used so that the rocket can come back down to the ground without any damage. On the bottom half of the body tube is the recovery wadding. It protects the recovery system from burning that might be caused by the hot gasses used for ejection. As seen on the figure above, that little white tube on the side is the launch lug. It helps navigate the rocket straight up off the launch pad, and into the air. The fins at the bottom of the rocket keep the rocket traveling straight up. Inside the rocket at the bottom, is the motor mount. It holds the motor together. Finally, the rocket motor is non-reusable and it is what gives the energy to the rocket to shoot up.

//Ms. Mc - great labels and descriptions. Please give your figures a title as part of their captions and specify the figure #s when you discuss them in your text. 10/10//

Atlas V-541

 * Figure 4**

The Atlas V-541 has a total mass of 1.17 million pounds when it is fully fueled. It's height is 191 feet. When mission planners were thinking about what kind of rocket should be launched, they had to consider how much mass each rocket can lift into space. The Atlas V-541 was chosen for this mission because it has the right weight capable for liftoff and similar rockets have flown into space successfully used by NASA. The Atlas is mainly made up of the payload fairing, centaur, common core booster, the main engine and rocket motors. The payload fairing, as seen on the figure above at the very top of it, also known as nose cone, protects the rocket while it goes up through Earth's atmosphere. The centaur is the fuel and oxidizer. It is fired twice. First time to insert the rocket into low Earth orbit and then second time to make it speed up out of Earth's orbit and towards Mars. The common core booster is the main propulsive stage for the rocket. The main engine burns liquid oxygen and RP-1 propellant. There are 4 rocket motors used, and they increase the engines thrust.

//Ms. Mc: Great overview and photo of the launch vehicle! Please title your figures and give their #s when you discuss them in your text (-1/2). 9.5/10//

Rocket Launch Lab Analysis & Writy-Up
The purpose of the rocket experiment was to see if the mass of a rocket affected its apogee. The apogee of a rocket is the highest point it reaches before coming back down. Different forces acted upon the rocket at each different stage. When the rocket was on the launch pad, the force of gravity was pushing it down and the force of the launch pad pushing up was equal. So the forces were equal; therefore the rocket was not moving. During the ignition stage, the force of thrust was stronger than the force of gravity, making them unbalanced, and sending the rocket into the air. When the rocket was coasting, the force of gravity and air resistance acted upon it, pushing it down. But, the force from the thrust cause inertia to occur, therefore the rocket kept going upwards. It was hypothesized that if the rocket is placed at a 100 degree angle, it will go straight up and have a higher apogee than if it’s put at another angle because if it’s at 100 degrees, it goes straight up into the air. It was also hypothesized that the mass of the rocket will affect the apogee because the heavier it is, the stronger the force of gravity. So the inertia will weaken and the rocket won’t fly as high.  The mass of the different rockets ranged from 43.5g to 47.2g. The rocket with the lowest mass (43.5g) had an apogee of 142.8m, and the rocket with the highest mass (47.2g) had an apogee of 100. At 45.4 g, the apogee was 119.2m and 45.5g had an apogee of 115m. Two rockets had the same mass of 46, but their apogee was different. One of them had an apogee of 107.2g, while the other had 71.3. The one with the apogee of 71.3 didn’t go so high because its motor came out instead of its recovery system. The rocket with the mass of 43.5g flew up to 142.8m and the rocket with the mass of 43.8 flew up to 113m. The mass and apogee have an inverse relationship because as the mass got higher, the apogee got lower. As seen in the graph above, the rocket with a bigger mass of 47.2 g flew up to 100m, while the rocket with the lower mass, 43.5g, flew up to 142.8m. My hypothesis was confirmed because it was hypothesized that the rocket with more mass will have a lower apogee, and as seen in the graph above, most of the data is as so. Many things could have gone wrong during this experiment. One of the independent variables were weather. Weather could have affected the rocket flight because if it had been windy, it would have gone another way other than straight up so it would have a lower apogee. Another independent variable was motor malfunction because then the course of the rocket could go a different way which would affect its apogee. The dependent variables were mass and apogee.

[[image:cascience7-2012/psp_rocket.PNG caption="Figure #5 rocket"]]
I think that having 6 fins, will give the rocket more air stream and give it a higher apogee than that achieved in launch #1. We cut the fins that are higher, as seen in the figure above, because we thought if it was too big, it would block the air stream and make the rocket unstable.

For the first launch, the rockets mass was 45.4 g, while for the second launch, its mass was 47.4. So there is a little difference in mass. For the first launch, its apogee was 119.2 m and for the second launch, its apogee was 19.4, which is a huge difference. The weight was bigger for the second launch because we added 3 fins to it. The fins did not really improve the rocket as we expected it to, because instead of getting a higher apogee, it got a much lower one. It was hypothesized that it got a lower apogee because the three fins that were added onto the rocket weren't exactly all cut equally, so it might it could have been a little unequal. Also since the fins were placed higher, between the bottom fins, it created less of an opening for the air to pass threw, so the air stream was not very good.

History of Rockets
In 350 BC, a Greek mathematician Archytas builds a mechanical bird that is propelled by steam. It is one of history’s earliest studies of flight and model airplane. In 270 BC, an engineer named Ctesibus made water clocks, as seen in Figure #6 with movable figures. They were a big break through because his invention before that, the Greeks measured time with hour glasses, but his water clocks measured time as a result of the force of water. Between 1500 to 1800, automatons were built and some could act, draw, fly and play music. There were also a few calculators. By 1800, cloth production was completely automated. With the Industrial Revolution, the idea was practical for industry, because it saved time and money. In 1898, Nikola Tesla demonstrated a remote controlled boat in Madison Square Garden.

The word “robot” became known by a Czech author in his play “Rossum’s Universal Robots”. According to him, his brother invented the word from the Czech word “robota” meaning servitude. In 1927, the movie “Metropolis” came out, and it was the first movie with a robot in it. The first actual robot named Televox operated through the telephone system and was constructed in the United States in 1927. In 1991, NASA sponsored a competition, Carnegie Melon University’s eight-legged robot Dante, as seen in Figure #7, but the robot failed to collect gases from the volcano Mt. Erebus because of a broken fiber optic. The robot was originally designed to collect gasses near the surface of the magma, and the failure did not permit the robot to enter the active volcano. To this day, an astronaut helper named Robonaut 2, launched to the space station aboard Space Shuttle Discovery on a mission. It is the first humanoid robot in space, and for now it is teaching engineers how robots behave in space in the hope that one day it could go outside the space station to help spacewalkers make repairs.

//Ms. Mc: good overview and figures! I like how you included some of NASA's robots. How are robots primarily used today? (-1/2). 9.5/10//

Log Entry #10
media type="file" key="psp_robot video.AVI" width="300" height="300"

Caption? -1/2



One of the challenges we needed to complete was called "Over The Edge". The challenge consisted for the robot to move forwards after hearing a sound, and stopping after detecting a certain light. We tested this by putting the robot in the middle of a table, and putting a piece of dark colored tape at the edge of it, and it stopped just before it rolled off the table. What was it to say after it stopped? -1/2 Figure #8 is a representation of the programming code that is being used for the challenge "Over The Edge". Block 1 (first one on the left) is a wait for sound block, and it makes the robot wait to move until it detects a sound above a volume of 50. (What port is activated? -1/2) The second block, a movement block, makes the robot actually move forward for an unlimited time. (Ports? -1/2) Block 3, which is a light sensor block, makes the robot come to a stop after detecting an amount of light of 38. (Port?) Block 4, makes it stop after detecting light. (Ports? Stop by braking or coasting?) And the last one, Block 5, makes the robot emit a sound after the challenge is complete. (What sound, how loudly, and for how many times? -1).

//Ms. Mc - good overall but missing some of the details. 17/20//

[[image:psp microrganism.jpg width="487" height="361" caption="Figure #9- Microorganism"]]
A microbe or micro-organism is made up of either a single cell, cell clusters (as seen in Figure #9), or multicellular complex organism, and they were the first form of life to develop on Earth around 3-4 billion years ago. Most of these are microscopic so they cannot be seen by the naked eye, and were discovered in 1675 using a microscope. Microorganisms include bacteria, fungi, algae, protozoa and some animals. Microorganisms live in all parts of the biosphere where there is liquid water like soil, hot springs oceans, and more. They are essential to nutrient recycling in ecosystems because they act as decomposers. If a sampled from Mars contained microbes, we'd have to classify it as dead, dormant, alive or non-living. For something to be alive, it has to have all 8 characteristics of life. The 8 characteristics of life are: it's made of cells, need materials, homeostatic, respond to stimuli, reproduce, grow, adapt and respiration. If something is non-living, it means it has never and will never have any characteristics of life. If it's dead, it means it used to have the 8 characteristics of life, but they are no longer active. Dormant means that some characteristics of life are temporary not being used, or slowed down.



Over the years, there have been some evidence for the possible life on Mars. But why are scientists so focused on finding life on Mars and not any other planets? Well, Mars is the most Earth-like planet, besides Earth, it is the planet most likely to have developed indigenous life and it will probably be the first extraterrestrial planet to be visited by humans (Mars, as seen in Figure #10). In 1996, a group of scientists found evidence of life in a Martian meteorite. They evidence were, bacteria like objects, detection of hydrocarbons, mineral assemblage and magnetic particles. Scientists had serious debates on the truth of these claims, and most said that the claims were probably invalid. Despite this, scientist continued on searching for life, and concentrated mostly on trying to find water because it is so essential to life. Today, there has been some proven evidence that liquid water sometimes flows on the surface in a few places. (such as? -1/2).

Ms. Mc - very good entry and figures! -10%, 1 pt. late = 8.5/10