#400 - Astrobiologist: What NASA Isn’t Telling Us About Mars | Alyssa Carson

Watch every episode ad-free & uncensored on Patreon: https://patreon.com/dannyjones Alyssa Carson is a pilot and astrobiologist training with NASA to become one of the first humans to visit Mars. Her scientific research focuses on Mars exploration, the latest space technology, and the quest for discovering life on Mars. SPONSORS https://whiterabbitenergy.com/?ref=DJP - Use code DJP for 20% off. EPISODE LINKS https://www.instagram.com/nasablueberry https://www.driventoexplorefilm.com FOLLOW DANNY JONES https://www.instagram.com/dannyjones https://twitter.com/jonesdanny OUTLINE 00:00 - The first human to go to Mars 06:13 - How NASA uses SCUBA for training 11:25 - NASA's timeline for Mars missions 16:37 - Possible windows for Mars launche 19:14 - Nuclear propulsion technology 28:07 - 2033 could be the year we go to Mars 30:37 - Organisms that can survive in space 40:14 - Alyssa addresses moon landing conspiracies 44:15 - Apollo 17 missions' UFO encounters 54:10 - Why Mars rovers won't discover life 55:50 - Where astrobiologists are looking for life in space 01:02:07 - Best areas on Mars for civilization 01:10:19 - Terraforming Mars 01:14:34 - The problem with Venus 01:21:44 - The danger of space junk 01:24:20 - Decommissioning the ISS 01:27:13 - Using reusable rockets for Mars missions 01:31:17 - Research done on the ISS 01:32:17 - Evidence of ancient Mars civilization 01:37:43 - Alyssa's "Driven to Explore" documentary 01:44:03 - Scuba diving in San Diego 01:47:54 - Artemis vs. Apollo missions 01:52:24 - Alyssa's PhD research Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 1:07Danny Jones?

  Are you really gonna be the first person to go to Mars? Sure you wanna do that?

• 1:11Speaker 06

  Yeah, I don't know, obviously, but I will certainly have put in a good effort to do it. I think I've always had an interest in wanting to contribute to the space industry. And really, for me, I think I've done a lot to almost separate, like, my dreams and ambitions from like things I can control. And so, I had this initial interest in wanting to become an astronaut, get involved in space. Locked in super quick with the idea of wanting to go to Mars. Mostly because I thought that was my only option. Like, when I was a kid and hearing about how, you know, we've already sent people to the moon, I was like, well, when I grow up, Mars is the only option that I can go to. Like, that's the only thing I'm gonna be able to do if I wanna be an astronaut. So I got super locked in on Mars.

• 1:56Speaker 06

  And, you know, as like I got more and more interested, I think I started understanding of, okay, here's what I can do to work towards becoming an astronaut. And then also, at like what point is it, you know... Okay, it's someone else making that decision. You know, I can do all this work to make the best resume possible. And then at that point, I'll give it my best effort. But at the end of the day, it's someone choosing those things, right? Have to apply to the astronaut selection process, get selected. And then even from there, I mean, depending on which mission you get selected on. So I think really my dreams have focused so much on the things that I can control and then we'll see.

• 2:32Danny Jones?

  Yeah, didn't, um, I saw recently that Elon actually scrapped his goal to go to Mars and now he like dialed it back to the moon. He's like, we need to go to the moon first. For what, did you see that?

• 2:44Speaker 06

  Yeah, I did.

• 2:44Danny Jones?

  What did you think about that?

• 2:46Speaker 06

  You know, I think that Mars was almost like jumping the gun a little bit with a lot of ambitions that there were surrounding it. I mean, Mars has been a hot topic, I mean, for so long. It's just been such a area of interest. Obviously Mars is literally the most studied planet, second to Earth.

• 3:07Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 3:07Speaker 06

  So we've just sent so many rovers, satellites, things. We've learned so much about the planet. And so that's created such this interest and draw to it. And I think that there's even still today, I think there's still some challenges that especially technology challenges and just the aspect of, you know, keeping humans alive for that extent of time on a long-term mission. And so there's just a lot of things to figure out. So I think a lot of these like early ideas of wanting to go to Mars. As I said, was almost jumping the gun just because there were still so many issues to figure out before we could get there or like put a hard date on it.

• 3:41Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 3:42Speaker 06

  I think there's been a lot of improvements in that area. You know, I think that um, we've made a lot of progress in making like a mission to Mars more realistic and there's been, you know, it's starting to become more and more of a possibility. But yeah, I think it makes perfect sense that we're kind of like going back to the moon first, testing a lot of these systems. Cause I mean, geez, it's been since the 1970s that we've done deep space travel. And sure, that's different technologies. That's a different type of space travel. Um, you know, different periods of time in space. Obviously it's a whole new rocket, whole new systems, all that has to get tested first. So I do think it's a, a good call. But yeah, I think, uh, finally maybe a little sense came. To what it takes to actually do the Mars mission.

• 4:23Danny Jones?

  Yeah, so explain like what your goal is as far as like being a becoming like an actual astronaut like how did like? How much training have you been through and like? What does it take to be like one of the people that gets chosen and who does the choosing?

• 4:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, so I think that for me, my first interest was just wanting to become an astronaut. I didn't really know what an astronaut was inherently. I mean, I started learning. A little bit about the space industry and then when I was young, I went to space camp in Huntsville. And that was like my dad always says, like, that was my Disney world. Like you got to ride simulators, you got to. Meet astronauts and so I felt like I was learning so much about the space industry like from just going to camp there. And I think that's when I started forming like. Okay, there's like different jobs, right? You can be a scientist, you can be a pilot, you can be a doctor. There's so many different routes you can go. And then that's when I think I started shifting. Okay, an astronaut isn't really a job that you can pursue, right? You can't go to college and study astronauting.

• 5:19Speaker 06

  And so then I was like, okay, what do I want to do from there? And I didn't really know. I mean, it started just like an inquisitory thing of like. What do I want to do? Like, would I want to be a pilot? Would I want to go to the military? Would I want to just do science? And so? Really, my childhood was figuring a lot of those things out and almost trying different things, but it was through like a lot of like almost physically trying them. Um, and figured out that I really was interested in a lot of the science aspect of it. Um, now I'm an astrobiologist, so I fell really into the field of astrobiology. Um, and that was just kind of natural progression of like figuring out what these interests were.

• 6:01Speaker 06

  And then from there, working on building that resume to apply to the astronaut selection process. So NASA has an astronaut selection. Process that they open up every few years. It's usually at random, so it's not like they're always in need of astronauts, right? Because they already have astronauts. So it's mostly just. You know, when they're in need for a new class, they'll open that selection process up. Send in an application and really there's not too many requirements. So you know, you have to hold at least a masters. You have to. Yes, so you just have to have a masters in some sort of STEM. If you're coming from more of a pilot background. I think it's like a thousand hours flight like flight hours.

• 6:40Speaker 06

  Have a little work experience and then you're eligible to apply. So there's not many requirements in order to apply. So I took that as, okay, how can I build the best resume? What are things I can do to almost enhance that? Cause it's like, I have a master's. Well, so does eighteen thousand of the other applicants, right? And so it's starting to now try to differentiate yourself in that way.

• 7:00Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 06

  So that's really what I was looking into, trying to find these like unique opportunities to almost add stuff to the resume. And yeah, so I mean, I guess as far as things that I've done or been interested in, I mean, I did like scuba diving and skydiving as like a, an aspect of learning more about some of those like less gravity environments. So, you know, NASA uses like underwater to simulate like long duration microgravity in a way. They like train underwater in Houston in their pool. So like learning some of those environments. I got involved with I I A S, which is like a citizen science research institute. So it's like normal people, but it's conducting like real research.

• 7:42Speaker 06

  So with them, I got to work with a spacesuit company, try on spacesuits, got to do microgravity flights, atmospheric imaging also. And I think that really like was a lot of the beginning that got me super interested in research, which is why I'm in a PhD program now and like heavily pursuing, I guess, the research side of things. So, um, yeah, a lot, a lot of those just experiences were really, I guess, to build on the resume, but really just genuine interest in a lot of these different fields. And I feel like I learned a wide variety of like different fields within the space industry and then slowly found like my, my niche within it.

• 8:17Danny Jones?

  Now, when you say you did scuba diving, did you actually go into like those giant pools where they put you in those like big contraptions and spin you around and stuff?

• 8:24Speaker 06

  Yeah, so I've done, you know, obviously like normal scuba diving. Um, and then, uh, so I did that. I've also done like the Aquanaut certification, which is where you like stay underwater for a full twenty-four hours.

• 8:36Danny Jones?

  Whoa.

• 8:37Speaker 06

  And so you go inside of like, I mean, you're in a facility, but it's still submerged. So it's almost like living inside of a scuba tank is how they describe it in terms of like the effect on your body. And like you're living in that environment. environment. So I did that, um, which was honestly really cool. Got pizza delivered down there.

• 8:55Danny Jones?

  Oh, so it was like, you're like in a bubble underwater.

• 8:57Speaker 06

  In like a facility, but it's like fully submerged. It was like thirty feet down. Um, so I did that as like a way to uh, hon- honestly just understand living in like a habitat environment. Um, but as far as what you're talking about with the, you know, the big pools, not the one at NASA Johnson. But I did do a very similar, we were almost creating a mockup of very similar, so like our own version of that. And we had like a full contraption underwater. It was in a big pool. Rather than using spacesuits, I was involved in kind of the initial testing of the system. So we were in full scuba gear, but using like a full face. So the, um, where you can, you know, still communicate, have communications built in.

• 9:39Speaker 06

  And we did like a simulation of testing, like a spacewalk underwater in it. So we had like the, the build out and they were eventually going to take that to then use for like spacesuit testing. But I was helping them with that, like initial, um, getting it all built and put together. So that was really fun.

• 9:56Danny Jones?

  Were you, were you like the only, how old were you when you did that?

• 9:59Speaker 06

  Um, that was probably a few years ago, so maybe twenty twenty one, twenty two ish, so.

• 10:05Danny Jones?

  Were you for sure the youngest person then?

• 10:07Speaker 06

  Um, yeah, I was, I'm almost, almost any and everything that I've done. I've certainly been.

• 10:12Danny Jones?

  Gap between you and the next person.

• 10:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, I've certainly been the youngest at like everything, but it's been, um. I don't know, it's been fun. I think that a lot of the time I've been able to like really show that like young people can have really serious interests in a lot of these fields. And so, you know, very grateful to, to IAS, cause when I like first, first started with them, I was only like fifteen. And they were like still open to, to having me involved in things. And so they've just been so wonderful and including me in a lot of this.

• 10:43Danny Jones?

  And yeah, like the idea of being one of the first people to go to Mars is pretty scary. Like is your, do you still think about it the same way now that you did when you were like 16?

• 10:55Speaker 06

  Um, I mean, I guess yes and no. I mean, I think that I really do think about like my interest in wanting to become an astronaut and even with the Mars thing, you know, I really just want to as a goal contribute to the space industry in any capacity and whatever makes the most sense. You know, I think my goals really align with obviously the overarching goals. I want the best people who go on that first mission to Mars to be the best possible candidates. So, you know, I don't know for sure if that's me. I would love to, um, you know, tell you that I'm for sure gonna go. But I think really for me, I, I really want the success of the space industry and I want to be able to contribute to it. And, you know, if that ends up becoming a part of the mission, then that's great.

• 11:38Speaker 06

  If that is a part of like the research that aids in the mission, that's great too. And so I think that, um, that's really, I think, the biggest difference from like a lot of those initial goals to like where I am now is, you know, I just think that the space industry is such a unique one that, um, I just feel like I've learned so much about it and it's such a, a community and it's such, um, a space that I think is really important that we continue to pursue and continue to succeed in. And so I think that's why my interests now are so much of just whatever the success and whatever the best case scenario is for us continuing that exploration, I think is what's most important.

• 12:16Danny Jones?

  Yeah. So like what are the logistics of actually, actually before I ask you that, so, so Elon pulled it back to the moon. But is NASA still, does they still have a plan or like a schedule as far as at least trying to get to Mars?

• 12:31Speaker 06

  So NASA, I think is still interested in Mars. Um, there's not, I guess, official statement or timeline, but a lot of the, the current Artemis program is setting up a potential for a Mars mission. Um, and so they certainly are still interested, but it may be like a joint effort. So I mean, even with a lot of the current Artemis program and going back to the moon, it is joint efforts with commercial companies. So I'm pretty sure like the lander systems and everything. For the like lunar mission is coming from like commercial companies. So some parts are NASA, some parts are commercial companies, which really is not that surprising. NASA has always used like private contractors. I mean Lockheed Martin. I mean, it's kind of that same aspect.

• 13:14Speaker 06

  Except now you're having SpaceX Blue Origin be some of those contractors. So it's certainly a collaborative effort. So I think, you know, the same thing may be true with the mission to Mars. You know, parts of it may be NASA, it may be a NASA rocket, but then, you know, commercial other systems, habitat. You know, SpaceX having, being the provider of the habitat system or like the lander system. So I think it's certainly going to be a collaborative effort. As far as timeline goes, I mean NASA has stated they are working on getting back to the moon. Having the next Artemis III will test those lander systems. Artemis IV plans to land on the moon and then we'll kind of see from there. I know that they want to establish permanent presence is the term that they're saying for the moon.

• 13:58Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 13:59Speaker 06

  So some sort of habitat system, some, you know, whatever they claim as like, you know, so who knows how many missions that will take to accomplish their goal of permanent presence. And then Mars will certainly come in, but they're still certainly working on a lot of the technologies and ideas of getting to Mars. So I would certainly not count them out for a mission.

• 14:21Danny Jones?

  The Artemis thing was so funny to me because when I had, I had Tim Dodd in here, the guy from Everyday Astronaut. And, and he was, when he was here, they were supposed to launch it like the following week. And they kept pushing it because of weather and all that stuff. And they eventually did it on April Fool's Day. I was joking with some of my friends and I was like, was there, I would love to be in those meetings in NASA. And just be a fly on the wall to like, understand, was there any logical, technical reason? They couldn't do it on the second. Like, why the first?

• 14:59Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, I think that they just didn't care that it was April Fool's Day.

• 15:04Danny Jones?

  I'm sure they had to have thought of that, like.

• 15:07Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think they certainly.

• 15:08Danny Jones?

  Can we do the second?

• 15:10Speaker 06

  They certainly did. Yeah, I mean, really. So the launch windows are just placed solely for the sake of like trajectories. So like if we launch, which days can we launch and have the correct trajectory that they're going to accomplish their mission? And so that's why, you know, there was only a few days of the, each month that they could potentially launch on. And it's funny because you could say like, yeah, sure, we could have done it on the second. But then it also, what if the first would have launched, but then the second got scrubbed and the third got scrubbed. Now we're pushed to May, may even June. Who knows, you know? And so it's, you want to take advantage of any good opportunity that you have.

• 15:45Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 15:45Speaker 06

  And so, because there was no guarantee, we could have gone on the second. There could have been weather delays, it could have been anything. And so it's really just making the most of any opportunity you can to keep the mission moving forward. Because, I mean, as you said, it was already delays from other issues and it was supposed to go in February, then March. And so it was really just taking advantage of the best possible moment. And I mean, it was like a two a T, almost like perfect launch. It launched like at the beginning of the launch window. I mean, it was, it was crazy.

• 16:14Danny Jones?

  Mm hmm. And I think they used the, the, um, the thruster from the space shuttle, I think, or the engines from the original space shuttle, which is kind of nuts.

• 16:23Speaker 06

  Yeah. So they were, I know for sure they were refurbishing a lot of the, the old engines, um, from the space shuttle program. And that was like a big part of kind of with the Artemis program as a whole. And then, I mean, even, I mean, there's a lot of refurbishing, which is kind of good to see because they're, you know, the space industry has been almost wasteful, you could say in a way. Um, looking back, I like the history of it, you know, the amount of stuff that is spent in having to build a whole new rocket for every mission. And that's been a big advantage, I think, too, of like commercial space. It's brought in a lot of like the reusability. But I mean, even like the Orion spacecraft that the astronauts just flew in, that will get refurbished and potentially used on another Artemis mission. So we'll take a look at it and try to reuse it again.

• 17:06Danny Jones?

  If you enjoy watching our show on Spotify or YouTube and you want to be more involved, I encourage you to please come check out our Patreon community. Not only does our Patreon community get every episode you see on YouTube, early, fully uncensored and ad free, but we're also doing Patreon exclusive episodes as well as live Q and A's and you can get your personal questions answered by our guests every single week. For me, being able to collaborate and communicate back and forth with our Patreon community every week has been huge. And this is my way of saying thank you for the cost of a cup of coffee a month. Now back to the show. How many, how many windows of opportunity are there to launch to Mars every year? Isn't it, isn't it true? There's only a few of them?

• 17:44Speaker 06

  Yeah. So it's pretty like minimal. Um, I mean, it's really, uh, I mean, I don't know if I'd have like an exact number. It really just depends on like the way the planets are orbiting. Cause right, sometimes Mars is really far away from us and sometimes it's much closer to us. And so you'd want to launch at like the closest possible opportunity. Um, and you know, sometimes there's an opportunity to launch. It may not be like the best opportunity, but like you can launch. Um, but certainly like calculating those trajectories, that's a little past my pay grade. That's a, that's what all the really smart people do.

• 18:19Danny Jones?

  What's this say, Steveo?

• 18:22Speaker 03

  Well, this is basically what she's talking about. Like, because, uh, because the planets are so slow to rotate.

• 18:29Danny Jones?

  Okay.

• 18:29Speaker 03

  There's like a sweet spot and then you have to wait till the next year.

• 18:33Danny Jones?

  Oh yeah. It's on the other side of the sun.

• 18:36Speaker 06

  Yeah. So you're almost like playing a game of like catch up. So like when you launch, you're just trying to catch up to where Mars is like going to be at like a later point. And I mean, it's the same thing that they do with like, um, when they send like satellites or like anything to Mars, right? It's always trying to, to make sure that you align. Cause I think currently NASA plans to send a new satellite to Mars in 2028. Um, and that's going to be going and testing a new, I guess propulsion system. Um, that's going.

• 19:06Danny Jones?

  Oh, really?

• 19:07Speaker 06

  So they're gonna be looking at nuclear propulsion, uh, for this mission. And that's a potential that I know has been talked about for a while because they're trying to look at reducing the timeline of getting to Mars. Cause that's, that's the biggest, I would say personally, and, uh, is the biggest issue with getting to Mars is how long it takes to get there. Um.

• 19:27Danny Jones?

  Yeah. How long does it currently take with our current technology?

• 19:29Speaker 06

  Yeah. So like current. And stuff you're looking like six to nine months is like the the timeline and then obviously if you were to have a human mission you'd want to stay there for a little chunk of time and then obviously with the trajectories you may even end up being there for a long time before you're able to come back and then another six to nine months I mean it's just a really really long mission and that's what I think makes it challenging I think that you know we're used to having astronauts in space for a year you know astronauts have lived on the international space station for a year at a time but it's really just how long the mission is compared to what we've seen before and I think that if we're able to shorten the timeline to Mars and make it a more reasonable timeline then the mission becomes a lot more possible

• 20:13Danny Jones?

  Yeah, so tell me about this nuclear propulsion stuff I've never heard of this

• 20:17Speaker 06

  Yeah, so it was

• 20:18Danny Jones?

  Have we ever used it before?

• 20:19Speaker 06

  No, I think um I think this mission to Mars is going to be the first that they're like really using it for and that is going uh it was like recently um the NASA administrator said because he kind of was aligning or laying out some of the plans for like the next Artemis missions and then also mentioned this Mars mission uh so like I said I think it's planned for 2028 we'll see if that timeline gets met but I do know that it has

• 20:44Danny Jones?

  This satellite being launched?

• 20:46Speaker 06

  Yes, yes, yeah, so it's um it's going to just kind of be testing this propulsion system which I know is something that has been worked on for a while because what a lot of what I was like hearing was that the big goal was to try to reduce a mission to Mars timeline from six months to six weeks to make it a way more reasonable timeline, so that was the ultimate goal um so I'm not sure if this will I guess we'll see whenever this mission goes you know how long it takes and how much of an improvement this propulsion is but um I do know that it's been a a big goal for a long time

• 21:21Speaker 01

  It's me, the

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• 21:28Speaker 01

  Stop it. This is about vacation inflation and how Priceline negotiates amazing deals on hotels, flights, and rental cars. Yeah, but I didn't mention that you can save up to 60% off hotels in the Priceline app. Fine. No one deals more deals than

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• 22:19Danny Jones?

  Yeah. And what are some of the other, like, biggest hurdles as far as traveling to Mars other than the time, right? Because the time is an insane one. You kind of have to be like, to be the person that's going to be willing to do that, you kind of like, you got to be able, you got to be willing to kiss your whole life goodbye, right? Because there's a good chance you're not going to come back.

• 22:41Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think that for, like, a mission to Mars, I think, yeah, I personally think timeline is our number one biggest issue, just because a lot of the other issues that are with the Mars mission, we've semi-combated them before, or like, maybe not to the extent of like a mission to Mars, but there's been almost like similar scenarios. I think at least for the first missions, I don't think there's going to be a possibility of a one-way mission, at least especially from NASA themselves. So unless it's like Elon or like a private industry pursuing some sort of one-way, I don't think NASA will ever do a one-way mission.

• 23:20Danny Jones?

  No.

• 23:20Speaker 06

  So they have always been, I guess, the core of their goal is to, you know, have this scientific expedition, scientific discovery, and then bring the astronauts home. So I don't think Mars will be different, and I don't think they will do a Mars mission until the option of a return is possible. So, you know, I think that if they're pursuing a Mars mission, it's because there's like the means of coming back. So...

• 23:47Speaker 06

  We'll see if that delays the timeline and making sure that we have more technology to get there and you know that maybe opens room for I guess commercial endeavors if they if they have that interest but yeah I think a lot of of the Mars mission will certainly be a multi-way but not to say that a one-way isn't possible in the future but I think that for like the first missions will certainly have returns.

• 24:09Danny Jones?

  Yeah and then what the radiation must be a huge problem.

• 24:12Speaker 06

  Yeah I think radiation would certainly be the next you know second to time the timeline just because yeah it's dangerous and it is certainly a challenging one I know that a big idea especially even for on the moon you know is looking at having like habitats and stuff subsurface so going like having the actual habitat be beneath the surface so that way you have the actual surface of Mars protecting you from some of that radiation while you're there and then there's also been a bunch of ideas of like actually protecting the capsule or like whatever you're in but obviously there's plenty of ideas but nothing's like set in stone.

• 24:49Danny Jones?

  What is this Steve? Oh this is an article about it.

• 24:53Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 24:54Danny Jones?

  History and mystery surround NASA's 2028 nuclear Mars mission. Fission-powered spaceflight. A 60-year dream would supercharge the outer solar system exploration. So is this gonna like literally be like a nuclear detonation when it launches or? Okay nearly all of today's space missions rely on chemical rockets which require vast quantities of heavy fuel and are comparatively slow. Instead nuclear electric propulsion NEP relies on fission to generate heat which gets converted to electricity via a gas turbine. This power in turn ionizes a gas propellant into a plasma that shoots continuously out of the thrusters. Wow.

• 25:35Speaker 06

  Yeah so I would say so the actual like satellite system that they're using for this that's going to have the nuclear propulsion. The actual rocket that's launching off of Earth will not have nuclear so they'll still launch it from Earth as if it was like normal and then they'll deploy the actual satellite that has the nuclear propulsion and then that. Satellite will then take off to Mars using the nuclear propulsion. So it will essentially get like turned on.

• 26:02Danny Jones?

  How far will the rocket go?

• 26:03Speaker 06

  Uh, probably just a low Earth orbit. So.

• 26:05Danny Jones?

  And the satellite will have a separate propulsion, propulsion system that will shoot it into Mars.

• 26:10Speaker 06

  Yeah. So almost all like rockets are just going to be like your vessel to get to space. Once you're in space, then, cause so much of the rocket gets like used up.

• 26:19Danny Jones?

  Right, right.

• 26:20Speaker 06

  Just by the time it gets to space. So that's why even like with the Artemis mission, the solid rocket boosters, they're spent. They get taken off, they, they jettison, you know, kind of the big core stage that gets jettisoned. You use up all that fuel. The hardest part about getting to space is leaving Earth. Just because all of that gravity, you need so much thrust, you need so much fuel. That's the hard part. That's why rockets are so big and they take so much fuel. But once you're in space, you know, you have much more flexibility. There's, you don't have all those forces fighting you. So more than likely they'll use, you know, I mean, they may even use like a SpaceX rocket or a, um, or a NASA rocket, or you know, Delta heavy, whatever it takes for, for the satellite to just get it to space. And then they'll deploy it and it's gonna be using that, that nuclear power to, to actually get to Mars.

• 27:04Speaker 06

  And that's going to be the, the interesting part.

• 27:06Danny Jones?

  And for the Mars mission, won't you have to refuel in like that, in like orbit or something?

• 27:13Speaker 06

  So I think it just kind of depends on what the mission's gonna look like. I mean, there's possibilities. I mean, you could have a case where you go from Earth to the moon. You know, maybe do like a fuel stop. Um, depending on how big of a vessel you have actually going to Mars, you could have enough fuel to, to go there. So I think it just kind of depends on what it ends up looking like. I know some ideas have been like almost having like a miniature international space station. Almost being like the vessel of going to Mars. So like you'll launch and then you'll dock with almost this miniature space station. And then that's gonna be the thing going to Mars. So it just depends on what logistically works out.

• 27:55Speaker 06

  I mean, again, with the Mars mission, since it's so theoretical, there's so many ideas of possibilities of what we could do with sending humans to Mars. But like, obviously nothing's been like concrete selected for it.

• 28:06Danny Jones?

  Right. How much testing and trial and error and how much experimentation is being done? Or floated around on how to logistically get people there safe? Like, do they, do, do, do you know if they know, like? Will you go to sleep for the six months that you're traveling there and go into like a hibernation? Or like, how much of that stuff has actually been thought about?

• 28:31Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think there's been a lot. I think space is, as a whole, it's always long-term. You can't do anything fast in the space industry. Not a single idea or a single thing that we see happen is, you know, a quick endeavor. I mean, even you look at the Artemis mission that just launched, right? The Artemis mission, or I guess you can even go back to Artemis I, which didn't have humans on it, but it was the start of the Artemis program. I mean, that was in, you know, a few years ago. And that has been an endeavor since the space shuttle program ended in 2011. So from 2011 to now is how long it's taken to, you know, build this new rocket, get it going, actually have it on the launch pad and make it a reality.

• 29:15Speaker 06

  And so it's really funny because like, from someone that like hears so much of like what's going on in the space industry, you know, the public's like, oh my gosh, this rocket just shot up overnight and now it's taking astronauts? Like, is it safe? But, you know, it's been tested for, you know, over 10 years now. And so it's been an endeavor that's been happening. And the Mars mission is no different. I mean, there's a lot of also just like academic research that goes into a lot of this too. So like universities, I mean, there's people that will do like human studies and you do like analog missions and they have humans practicing that human-human interaction of how would it be to be in a Mars habitat for that period of time? And so there's a lot of those different types of research that's been, I mean, happening

• 29:57Speaker 06

  for many years and I think will continue to kind of gather that data in preparation for a future Mars mission.

• 30:04Danny Jones?

  Right. And so in 2033, I believe, I read something that said, Earth is going to be the closest it's ever been to Mars in like thousands of years. So that would be the optimal window, 2033. But that seems very aggressive.

• 30:23Speaker 06

  Yeah, no, I I'm a hundred percent agree. I mean, I've I've heard 2033 for a really long time.

• 30:29Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 30:30Speaker 06

  With how much it kind of aligns and just from a trajectory standpoint and how much of a benefit it would be that Mars is closest to Earth and closer than it has been in a really long time. I do agree that I think 2033 is a very ambitious goal up to this point. And I think it's, you know, space travel again, it's such a slow process. And so, you know, things anytime something gets like delayed or pushed back, it just kind of makes it more difficult. So I guess we'll see, you never know. But I would think that especially from NASA's perspective, if they are planning to have some sort of permanent presence, or I guess habitat thing by 2028 on the moon, and that's going to

• 31:12Speaker 06

  be some of those initial missions to the moon, then, you know, 2033, you know, mission just seems way too close to a lot of these like lunar missions.

• 31:22Danny Jones?

  Yeah. Well, it would be probably a better if you could launch from the moon, you know, if you could set up launchpads on the moon, or somehow get enough resources there, it would be probably far easier.

• 31:37Speaker 06

  Yeah. So I mean, I think that that's been a big idea. And that's why it almost shifted, you know, for a while. I mean, what we see today as the Artemis program has been definitely reworked a lot of times because originally after the space shuttle program ended, we had what was called the constellation program, then that got scrapped. And then it's kind of slowly merged into what we see as current day Artemis. And I think a lot of the initial ideas was going to be let's go to Mars. And then after looking into going to Mars, it was then, okay, wait, maybe we're going back to the moon first, maybe the moon is like a launchpad to Mars. And so it's just been a lot of iterations of what this is going to look like. And I think that that's why kind of we're at the point of we are going

• 32:21Speaker 06

  back to the moon, we're going to kind of reestablish ourselves as, you know, doing deep space travel, you know, accomplishing something that has been done, but in a new way with new technologies, and then see how we can utilize that as a resource for even deeper spaceflight.

• 32:37Danny Jones?

  And this just popped into my head. I remember this when I talked to Tim Dodd was we found there was this article that talked about this discovery of this fungus. Have you seen it? This Chernobyl fungus? That was found in Chernobyl where there was a nuclear meltdown.

• 32:52Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 32:52Danny Jones?

  Decades ago.

• 32:53Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 32:54Danny Jones?

  And allegedly, there's this like fungi that's growing in like ground zero of Chernobyl. And they found that it actually eats radiation. So they're hypothesizing that this mysterious black fungus could be used in the space capsules or where they're transporting these people across deep space and it could protect them from the from the radiation. Show the the first, what does the first paragraph of it say? Mold found at the site of Chernobyl nuclear disaster appears to be feeding off radiation. So they're they're thinking that they could use this to shield the space travels from the cosmic rays.

• 33:38Danny Jones?

  Insane.

• 33:40Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, honestly, this is a lot of, I mean, my current research and kind of what I do within astrobiology is certainly like that melting pot between microbiology and and space travel. So, you know, working with organisms in space like environments. And so honestly, organisms I think are so fascinating and which is why I've kind of gone into into this route of research, but I think it's something that we are certainly going to learn more about. I mean, even aside from, you know, using organisms to maybe eat radiation, we're also learning a lot of organisms that are able to survive on the outside of the International Space Station and and survive in the vacuum of space.

• 34:17Danny Jones?

  What?

• 34:17Speaker 06

  They are, yeah, so there's been, um, a lot of this is also kind of more, you know, current and academic research, but they did like an experiment. I go to an astrobiology conference and so it's really fun to kind of hear a lot of these like new like research studies, but they were having astronauts like swab the outside of their gloves like while they were outside on an EVA. And then they're basically growing that to see if anything is coming out. I mean, tardigrades have always been a big area of conversation, um, which is basically this. This organism that is that they've put on the outside of the National Space Station and it just survives.

• 34:56Danny Jones?

  It comes back.

• 34:57Speaker 06

  And it certainly is able to put up with the radiation. It's able to to really evolve in organisms. They adapt so quickly and they're able to adapt, obviously, much more quickly than humans are. And so I think that that's certainly a big area of interest. And that's one of the things that fascinates me so much about the astrobiology field and really bringing in organisms because honestly, they're much more adaptable than we are. And so if they're able to, you know, survive in these environments, then you learn so much about those systems and and how those work and see, you know, how that can be used for for other things.

• 35:34Danny Jones?

  Now, we have not found any evidence of any kind of microorganisms on Mars yet, right?

• 35:39Speaker 06

  So, yeah, we have not. So my research specifically does look at the potential of organisms growing, especially in like a past Mars situation. Because from what we know about current day Mars, it's not great.

• 35:54Danny Jones?

  Not great.

• 35:55Speaker 06

  It does look pretty inhabitable. You know, you have the radiation, which is your bigger issue. But looking at Mars's past, we think it used to be a lot more similar to Earth. So in like the early stages of Mars and the formation of the solar system, we think, you know, it used to have liquid water. We think it used to be much more habitable. And so by looking at that, we can also test organisms in those environments to see how how they react and if they would be able to survive. So organisms that we know of here that already survive in maybe some unique environments, are they then able to survive in those unique environments like we saw on early day Mars?

• 36:32Danny Jones?

  Well, Elon was saying that there's so much ice on Mars, not even at the poles, like all around Mars, that's just covered in dust. He said if you were to heat up that planet. He believes that you would have mild deep oceans covering about forty percent of it. And he thinks that about four, about four billion years ago, it was a blue planet just like Earth. And that we possibly came, are we, I think there's a large consensus of astrobiologists that believe life started on Mars.

• 37:06Speaker 06

  Yeah, there certainly is a, a theory of, you know, if Mars used to be more similar to Earth, then you know, was that maybe somewhere that, that humans used to survive. But we know, we know for sure, and I mean, again, Mars is such a well-studied planet at this point, but we are, we really are learning a lot about, you know, how much water was on Mars and where it came from. And we also think, you know, Mars used to be more in that like habitable zone. So we think of, you know, Earth being in the habitable zone where you can have liquid water. And so we think Mars used to be a little bit more in that habitable zone.

• 37:36Danny Jones?

  Closer to where Earth is.

• 37:37Speaker 06

  Right. And then it's kind of slowly shifted outward, kind of in the formation of things. And again, geological timelines, I mean, this is over the span of millions and millions of years. But, you know, with, with the way we used to, or think Mars used to look, it just used to have a lot more potential, especially than what we see from today. So that's why there's always been that, that interest in what could be there or what used to be there. And yeah, there's still a lot of interest, I think. There's kind of a bit of a balance, I guess, because I'm, my research is certainly in the possibility of microorganisms that used to live on Mars, or even, you know, if there's any way to, to find things. And we're still discovering stuff. I mean, we recently just discovered a whole new slew of new minerals that the Curiosity Rover just discovered.

• 38:22Speaker 06

  Honestly, it was a new paper that just came out. They found some minerals that we hadn't classified yet. And so that was really interesting to look at.

• 38:31Danny Jones?

  On Mars?

• 38:32Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm. Yeah. So they're constantly sampling Mars with the, with the rovers. And so with that, they are, you know, collecting new samples and some minerals we've seen in like meteorites that have come from Mars. And then some we've seen with like other, you know, collections, but this one had a few new ones. And so that's been really interesting. So there's still so much we don't know. So it's so hard because it's, it's easy to jump to so many conclusions. And really, science as a whole is always jumping to conclusions, I guess. You almost have to roll with some unknowns, but yeah, we're still, we're still learning so much about Mars that we didn't even know previously. So it's, it's going to be interesting and why a lot of interest is in a human mission, right? Because. We have these rovers, they're discovering a lot of stuff that we didn't know about the planet.

• 39:16Speaker 06

  But rovers have such long timelines, right? Because of like the time delay between Earth and Mars. So if you were to send a message to Mars, right?

• 39:24Danny Jones?

  Yeah, how fast can we send those messages?

• 39:25Speaker 06

  It's usually about like fifteen minutes when Mars is like pretty close to us. Um, it can get like upwards to like longer to like thirty-ish minutes, but...

• 39:34Danny Jones?

  We can't do it at light speed?

• 39:35Speaker 06

  No, not quite that fast. Usually there, there is usually about a fifteen-ish minute time delay that a lot of the people that work with the rovers also have to deal with. So you have to think of the rovers as such an incredibly slow process.

• 39:47Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 39:47Speaker 06

  Because if you're like move forward two feet, fifteen minutes later it hears it, it does that. Then, you know, fifteen, another fifteen minutes later, it's like, I successfully moved two feet. So like in the span of like maybe even minimally thirty minutes, you've moved like a couple of feet.

• 40:03Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 40:04Speaker 06

  It just is such a slow process and that's really been a big, um, one of the big benefits about potentially sending humans rather than kind of some of the more robotic technology that we have there is that a human can actually, oh, that rock looks interesting, let's collect that, let's do this, let's do this experiment.

• 40:19Danny Jones?

  Yeah. We would have to get like some, some SpaceX, uh, Starlink satellites going. So we could get some super high-speed broadband wifi, you know?

• 40:28Speaker 06

  Better the technology, yeah, I mean, I think that...

• 40:30Danny Jones?

  I mean, even, I think even light speed communication would still be like a few minutes.

• 40:34Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think certainly, I mean, that area is one to improve. I don't think it's like, um, you know, if we can't get that working, I don't think it's going to completely, you know, make it to where the mission is impossible. I think we've learned to adapt with like the timelines that we currently have. But yeah, it certainly doesn't make it easy and if there's any room to improve there. But kind of the, the big, I guess, back and forth within, especially my field is also the idea of planetary protection, right? Because we want to send humans to really uncover a lot of these things that we want to learn about Mars and maybe the possibility of past life. But then you also, I guess, run into the potential of contamination.

• 41:14Speaker 06

  And you don't want to potentially find something that we think was past life on Mars, but then it's like, oh...

• 41:20Danny Jones?

  Bring it back here?

• 41:20Speaker 06

  Well, not even that, but even just... We think we found life on Mars, but just someone touched a rock and it's like our own organisms. And so it's like very much a, an element of like keeping things separate. And even like the rope, like all of the robotic technology that we've sent to the planet. I mean, there's assumptions that there's been, you know, you can, we can only get things so sterile. And we hope that things are as sterilized as possible, but there's also the potential of like, did we send anything on any of these rovers? Um, and so it's just very much keeping those things separate. So that way, if you make the grand claim that you found, you know, life on Mars, it's serious and not just something that happened to get sent there.

• 41:59Danny Jones?

  Yeah, totally. I would be more afraid of like those astronauts bringing some crazy shit back here.

• 42:06Speaker 06

  Well, it's so funny because I certainly think that Mars will kind of be in that way. Almost like the progression of what happened when astronauts first went to the moon. You know, when astronauts came back from those lunar missions, they were quarantined for like

• 42:19Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 42:19Speaker 06

  20 something days because they didn't know if there was like a moon virus or like a moon bug.

• 42:25Danny Jones?

  Right, right, right.

• 42:26Speaker 06

  You know, we had no idea what, you know, especially even like scientifically, like we just didn't really know much about, about those environments. And so they were like quarantined for so many days post the mission. And now it's funny because, you know, we're like, okay, yeah, they're, they're fine to go to the moon.

• 42:42Danny Jones?

  Have you, have you, I know you're like a, you're a legit person, scientist, scholar. Have you ever paid attention to like the crazy moon stuff? Like the history of like, like the interviews they did and like, paid attention to some of like the fringe kind of theories that people go out there with? Like with the, all the occult ties to those people and like the, the theories of maybe they faked it. Maybe they filmed it, like, look at the post, the press conference post interview. They look like they saw a ghost, like

• 43:09Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 43:09Danny Jones?

  Weird stuff. Have you paid attention to that stuff, gone down those rabbit holes or no?

• 43:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, I guess I've, I've always been, I guess, combated. Anytime you have an interest in space, I think you get combated with, you know, with the moon landing not being real is probably the, the most common. Yeah, I mean, I think that. For me, with especially with like the moon landings, I think one of the things that we we have on the moon. That's the most concrete is like one of the prisms that the Apollo missions left. So.

• 43:38Danny Jones?

  Prisms?

• 43:39Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 43:39Danny Jones?

  Like the mirrors?

• 43:40Speaker 06

  Yeah, like a mirror. So one of the missions had one of those. You can, and there's even been like universities to like do the tests where you can like shoot a laser at the prism. And like you'll see it bounce back because we know the location of that mission. So I think that there's so much to combat. And I think, you know, the hard.

• 43:55Danny Jones?

  The argument there is couldn't you get that there with a with a robot?

• 43:58Speaker 06

  Yes. Yeah, certainly. I think I think that one of the difficult parts about the space industry and especially

• 44:07Speaker 06

  kind of, I guess, defending a lot of the things that happen in the space industry is it's also hard to. There's so much, I guess, scientific complexity to it that doesn't always translate down to the general public. And I think that that is, you know, it's a big challenge, but you know, I think that that's why it is so important to talk about the space industry and kind of really explain a lot of what's going on and kind of the efforts because, you know, you hear. Even, you know, I was even thinking about it with like the NASA livestream of like the Artemis mission. I mean, they certainly try. But I mean, even listening to the livestream, I'm sure so many people are like, what are they saying? You know, like if you're not. If you're not really in tune with a lot of the complexities, then it's hard to, I guess, keep up with like what even is going on.

• 44:53Danny Jones?

  That's why I love talking to people like you because like you have a foot in both worlds. I often think about it like the people who are like living and eating and breathing in this world of for this example, like in NASA or like working on rockets and shit all day, who don't pay attention to YouTube or podcasts or anything like that. You can see how it could be two separate, parallel universes of information, right? Like they don't pay attention to anything that these people are talking about on the internet. And the internet, there's like a complete and total disconnect.

• 45:26Speaker 06

  Right.

• 45:26Danny Jones?

  So someone like you can kind of like have a foot in both worlds, like, okay, you can kind of connect some dots here or see where there's stuff missing.

• 45:33Speaker 06

  Yeah. And I, and I think that's a big challenge. I mean, as I was saying, like, and the importance of bringing, you know, that to the general public, right? There's no point in doing science if we're not all learning from it, right? And that's the whole goal of scientific endeavors. And especially like even coming now from like a research standpoint, I mean. Digesting a research paper is not for the weekend, not for, you know, they're all so,

• 45:55Speaker 06

  so focused on like their very specific research topic. And so sometimes it's, it's, you know, and you have to get through these layers to really understand what's happening. And I think that that's, that's really important, you know, to be able to take what we're learning and then bring it down to, to a level that really is understood very commonly.

• 46:14Danny Jones?

  Right. Did you see these, uh, these UFO files that just came out and they dropped the thing about the Apollo 17 mission where they saw the UFOs?

• 46:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, I, uh, I have not had, I guess, too much time since like a lot of this has, has like fully dropped because I think I saw there's like 160 something files or something. Yeah, there's, there's a lot.

• 46:36Danny Jones?

  The Apollo stuff is crazy.

• 46:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think I'm, I'm very much looking forward to, to seeing some of this. I mean, I think there's, you know, you always have to remember that NASA is a government agency, of course. And so I think that there's no surprise that there's elements to a lot of the missions that maybe we don't get to see or maybe aren't as public knowledge. But, you know, I think that that's almost anything governmental. And so, yeah, you almost have to expect that when you're looking at, you know, NASA, who is a government agency, you know, we are learning a lot, but obviously I'm sure there's plenty more that we don't. But yeah, I'm excited to...

• 47:15Danny Jones?

  Oh, what are these? The photos? Oh, CBS News. Okay, okay. So this is, they're publishing the photo from the actual files that the government dropped.

• 47:24Speaker 06

  Right.

• 47:24Danny Jones?

  Saying that in 1972 during the Apollo 17, that was the last mission, right? So, so, yeah, the Apollo 17 mission shows three dots in a triangular formation in the lower right quadrants of the lunar sky that is clearly visible upon magnification of the image, the Defense Department said in the caption of the image. Uh, the Pentagon said that there is no consensus about the nature of the anomaly. But the guys, the astronauts, um, were saying that it looked like the Fourth of July outside the window. They said that these things were like jagged, zooming all around like fireworks in the sky.

• 48:02Danny Jones?

  Yeah, it's insane. And this stuff is like, because there's always been that. One of the conspiracies about the moon is that they went there and they saw they saw UFOs or aliens or whatever and told them not to come back. And like, that was, I think they said that Buzz Aldrin said that at one point, but then people thought that they were, he was being taken out of context. But like this stuff, now that they're, the government's like confirming it is kind of crazy.

• 48:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, it is certainly interesting. I mean, I'm, like I said, I'm very, I'm very interested to kind of read, you know, a lot more. Cause I mean, it's funny, cause they're, it's, it's so difficult because it's almost a back and forth. I mean, obviously, I guess with these, they've been kind of looking at this material for, you know, since the seventies. But with, with space travel, since there are so many unknowns, I remember this story from one of the early, one of the early missions. I'm trying to remember, it may have been like a Gemini mission. So this was like when they would go to space, but you know, they weren't necessarily going anywhere. They were just learning about, you know, the really early missions. And one of the things was one of the astronauts made like a comment and was like, it looks like there's fireflies out there, like where we're getting like stuff outside the window, like we don't know what it is.

• 49:14Speaker 06

  We think it's like fireflies, like it kind of looks like that. And then they like later figured out it was like the like tank, like dumping the urine like out and they were in as it was like hitting the vacuum of space. That's what they were seeing. And so it's so funny because it's like, you have two extremes, right? You have one extreme where it's like literally the most simple solution to the issue. And then you have like the other extreme, which is like aliens coming for you. So it's just, it's so funny because I think it's, it's always such either one or the other, right? It's always hard to find, like, I think the balance in a, in a lot of these things.

• 49:47Danny Jones?

  But that's like the, the thing about like how this stuff evolves over time is like, six years ago, you'd get laughed out of a room for talking about UFOs. And now like the government's literally saying that they're real. Within like three week time span. So it's like, you can't write those, you can't write that stuff off anymore. That stuff's like legit science now.

• 50:06Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, I would say that it's always been interesting to me that, you know, the idea of aliens has ever been almost like a fully laughing matter. Just because, I mean, I think for me, I've always believed that there has to be something somewhere. Right? The universe is just so vast. And so it's been interesting to kind of see that progression because, you know, I think the concept of, you know, whether they're here or not, or whatever else, sure. But the concept that there ever has been aliens, I think, should certainly be a something that is pretty agreed upon that the universe is just so big. That would be so crazy to think that we're the only ones out there.

• 50:42Danny Jones?

  Yeah, totally. What is this, Steve? Oh, this is Jesse Michaels. Okay, so I don't know if you're familiar with Jesse Michaels. He's my friend who has a podcast and he covers like the whole history of NASA. He's like a super nerd historian on all of this stuff. He's friggin incredible. And he knows more about like the history of the space program and rocket propulsion than anyone I've ever met. And he goes around the world interviewing these people. And he's interviewed like heads of the different Nasa's of different countries all over the world. And this guy was a Japanese guy who was the head of one of the Japanese space programs, I think, and he's also a NASA historian. And he was close to Eugene Cernan, who was on Apollo 17.

• 51:26Danny Jones?

  So here, we can, there's headphones, we can listen to this clip.

• 51:29Speaker 06

  Okay.

• 51:32Speaker 07

  It's me, the

• 51:35Speaker 07

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• 51:47Speaker 07

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• 51:53Speaker 07

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• 52:02Speaker 01

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• 52:32Danny Jones?

  And I think there's captions on us. They're gonna have to read captions. Okay, go ahead.

• 52:37Speaker 03

  Buzz Aldrin, do you think that we went to the moon in 1969? In the first... In the first... In the first... Yes. Of course, we went. And then, do you think there's anything we don't understand about that story? Did they see UFOs along the way? Because... I saw UFOs.

• 52:56Danny Jones?

  He says they saw a UFO, I'm sure of it.

• 52:57Speaker 03

  Why are you sure? I saw Apollo 17's captain, Jean Sarnin. He was close to him, he went to his own home, he went out to eat with him. He asked me a question. Why did Apollo end up with Apollo 17? But at that time, it was already 18 or 19. But why did Apollo end up quitting at 17? I want to know the real reason they stopped at 17. His answer was, "They told me never to come back." "Don't come back." Really? Yes. This is not an earphone, is it?

• 53:41Speaker 03

  It was sent directly to my brain. Mental download. Never come back again. And were any reasons for not coming back again that they cited? They told me to stop.

• 53:53Danny Jones?

  I beg you, save humanity on Earth. I was told not to get in their way.

• 53:57Speaker 03

  Why? They told us not to interfere with their activities.

• 54:07Danny Jones?

  They told us not to interfere with their activities.

• 54:09Speaker 03

  When we were in a laboratory, we were experimenting. If a squirrel entered the laboratory, they told us to leave. It's the same thing. So do you think the extraterrestrials were using them?

• 54:23Danny Jones?

  Moon as a way to research the earth.

• 54:28Speaker 03

  38万キロ離れた月からもうすでに観察はしてますし、あれは人工的に作られたものだと僕は

• 54:35Danny Jones?

  Oh god, he believes the moon was artificially created. Anyways, crazy story.

• 54:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 54:41Danny Jones?

  From a guy who was friends with Eugene Cernan on Apollo 17. You know?

• 54:46Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I think there's also so many, um, so many factors. I mean, um, a lot of ending the Apollo program too.

• 54:54Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 54:55Speaker 06

  Certainly came to a big funding issue as well.

• 54:58Danny Jones?

  Totally.

• 54:58Speaker 06

  Um, because I mean, that's another big factor that you have to consider with the space industry. It's like, well, why don't we do this? And why don't we do that? I mean, even just looking at, looking at it financially, it's insane. I mean, during the Apollo program, NASA had 4% of the government budget.

• 55:12Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 55:12Speaker 06

  And now it has half of 1%. And so it's like, you know, even just from a money standpoint, it's like, yeah, if we had 4% of the, of the, of the government budget.

• 55:23Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 55:23Speaker 06

  There probably could be a lot of advancements and a lot more happening, um, with like deep space. So I think there's, there's definitely a balance to it and it's, you know, coming from government funding as well.

• 55:34Danny Jones?

  Yeah, and also, you know, the context back then during this, the whole space race is we were just trying to like flex and prove we could get humans there first. It was more of just like theatrics.

• 55:45Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 55:46Danny Jones?

  Like there was no, there's no real, there's no real logical reason you would want to put humans there. Like it's not safe, it's not efficient. Like it's better to have robots there doing that stuff because they can be more efficient. They can do just as good of a job as a human. I mean, we have hands with fingers on them and like we're, we're not great for those environments. And it's also like really not safe. So like, why just, why do it? Why do it again? There's really no reason other than the fact to prove that we could actually do it. It would be much more efficient to do it with robots.

• 56:16Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean certainly the Apollo program and during that Apollo stage was solely coming from the space race standpoint. I mean, that was every step of the way from literally the first satellite in space was a space race. I mean, it was not even just the human aspect of it. It was, you know, who can send the first satellite? Who can send the first animal? Who can send the first man? Who can send like, it was every single stage was a space race. And, um, and a lot of it came from like fear too. I mean, if you go back to like Sputnik that, uh, that Russia had sent up, you know, it was, it was a fear, you know, that, that, you know, all Sputnik did was beep, but we didn't know that. And so it was coming from a place of fear is like, oh, well, we also have to be at that

• 57:01Speaker 06

  point. Um, so there was just so much fear surrounding it, which like perpetuated this full like space race that, uh, that came to the point of going all the way to the moon.

• 57:10Danny Jones?

  Yeah. Going back to the, um, the micro microbes and the bacteria and stuff on Mars, those rovers that are on the surface of Mars, how, how deep do they dig and excavate?

• 57:21Speaker 06

  Yeah, not deep. Um, and that's kind of a big challenge when it comes to looking for life on Mars. Um, so you have to almost consider having a life or a search for life focused mission is not going to be very possible at this point, just because, you know, we don't actually know that there's life. So it's almost like jumping the gun. And so that's why with Mars, a lot of these, uh, rovers, their goal is to study the planet geologically. So it's just there to look at the minerals, what's there, have a better understanding. And then from there, maybe we can progress to like, oh, well, this is, we didn't even know it was possible to have life or if there would be any type of environment capable of supporting life. So that's why a lot of these rovers, their main objective

• 58:06Speaker 06

  is to study geologically. And so they're going maybe an inch, um, down whenever they make these samples. So they have some low core samples, an inch, maybe a couple inches, but it's really not going very far. But that's certainly a big challenge from like the astro biological standpoint, because if you are looking for life, we certainly think that our best place to look on Mars is the deep subsurface.

• 58:27Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 58:28Speaker 06

  And so in order to really have a very good understanding of that possibility, you would almost need more of like a drill, like type of mission that's actually exploring the subsurface. But we just aren't quite at a point yet. And then also the money of a life. You know, focused mission is probably going to be pretty challenging to get that like fully funded. So it almost a lot of missions that do have an astrobiology aspect to it. It's almost in tandem. So your big missions right now within the world of astrobiology is going to be they're looking at Europa and they're looking at Titan are the two big ones.

• 59:05Danny Jones?

  The moons?

• 59:06Speaker 06

  So that's where they're currently looking at almost like the highest possibility of finding some kind of life. So Europa Clipper is the mission that's going to Europa, which is a moon of Jupiter. And that one kind of has one of the biggest areas of interest because we think it has a subsurface ocean. So it is, you know, we think it's a liquid subsurface ocean. It's just covered with like a sheet of ice on the exterior. So Europa Clipper is going to study a little bit more about the the moon itself. But then there's like an aspect of it that kind of dips a little bit more into astrobiology and seeing the potential. Because the first step isn't just looking for life itself. It's like, okay, is there liquid water? Is there carbon? Is there oxygen? Is there things that we think

• 59:48Speaker 06

  are important to life? And then kind of going from there. And then Titan is a similar story. That one, that one hasn't launched yet, but it's called Dragonfly. And that mission is going to Titan, which is a moon of Saturn. And it doesn't have liquid water, but what it does have is liquid methane and ethane. So we think that there is so it has lakes and it has these like liquid lakes. And so anytime that there is like liquid, that is very interesting. So you would probably find a type of life that would be very different to what we know of as life, because obviously, it's in a a very different environment, you know, living in liquid methane. But but there is also that area of interest that has the possibility of life being different. But again, that mission's going to really study

• 1:00:33Speaker 06

  more about Titan. There's just like that little snippet of like, for is there a possibility of some sort of microbial life that could survive in that environment? So astrobiologists kind of tacked on to kind of some of these missions as like a sub area of research, but it's certainly not like the main focus of them.

• 1:00:51Danny Jones?

  Don't they also speculate that there could be life living in the rings of Saturn?

• 1:00:56Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, I think that.

• 1:00:58Danny Jones?

  Have you heard that? Am I crazy?

• 1:01:00Speaker 06

  Um, I mean, I wouldn't be surprised just because there certainly is, I mean, especially once you bring in the microbe aspect of it, they're so much more resilient and they're so much uh more adaptable that you really can explore so many different areas. I mean, there's also ideas of like, is there life in Venus's atmosphere? Is there possibility, you know? So there's almost, you can take so many different environments, but you know, we were slowly learning more about these places. And I mean, even, you know, talking about, you know, like Saturn or even some of the moons out in the, in, you know, of Jupiter and Saturn and out in the deep solar system, we've had so few things even fly by them that it's crazy. You know, we've had like a few things fly by Jupiter had Juno, which

• 1:01:44Speaker 06

  was really the main mission to say Juno and or to say Jupiter. And then Saturn had Cassini, which is really our one main satellite that went studied uh side Saturn and the New Horizon went to Pluto. Uh so it passed by those, but really there's so little data. And so that's why some of these upcoming missions are also really important for actually looking at some of these possibilities.

• 1:02:06Danny Jones?

  And what was that? What was that asteroid they just found some stuff on?

• 1:02:10Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:02:10Danny Jones?

  Was it Bennu?

• 1:02:11Speaker 06

  Yeah. Yeah. So that was, that was really cool.

• 1:02:13Danny Jones?

  That was crazy.

• 1:02:14Speaker 06

  We collected or basically with that mission was super awesome because they went to the asteroid, collected a sample from it and then brought that sample back to Earth. And so that was really uh something that is super fascinating because we have such little samples from places. The only other place other than the asteroid that we have a true sample from is the moon because, you know, astronauts were able to bring something back. And so that's why even talking about the conversation of Mars is really difficult because we don't have a sample from Mars. We don't have something to truly study. There's also meteorites, but those have been like altered, you know, by going through Earth's atmosphere. And so they can't be a true reflection of what's on Mars. And so we don't have an actual true sample, which is why uh studying Mars can be difficult because you're really

• 1:02:59Speaker 06

  trying to use um, you know, simulation material, you know, regolith, which is like a simula- like a simulation of what we think Mars's soil is like. We know some of the materials there to study, but, but really you're not getting a full picture unless you have a direct sample from the planet.

• 1:03:15Danny Jones?

  Steve, what was the, what was the actual thing they found on that, on that Bennu asteroid? It was like a uh, do you remember?

• 1:03:25Danny Jones?

  It was like a um, a protein maybe, or?

• 1:03:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah, that one surprised me. I mean, they found like a lot of uh, like a lot of carbon um, base like or and it may have been organic material, um, which I know is, is hard to find.

• 1:03:41Danny Jones?

  Yeah, we had this guy on here who was talking about it and I remember it like blowing my mind like how did they freaking land that thing on the asteroid? Pick up a sample and then take off and come back. So crazy. That thing must have been going fast.

• 1:03:56Speaker 06

  It was, uh, it was really cool. Yeah, I actually, so this like astrobiology conference that I go to, we had um, like a panel of some people from the project come and like talk about like the, the sample and um, the challenge of gaining and even some of like the prototyping and figuring out, you know, how to like collect the sample and um, certainly a very interesting amino acids.

• 1:04:18Danny Jones?

  Amino acids, that's what it was. That was the Asaurus Rex mission.

• 1:04:22Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 1:04:23Danny Jones?

  So the fundamental building blocks of proteins, the amino acids. So that's a big deal.

• 1:04:28Speaker 06

  Yeah, it certainly is. Um, I mean, I think what's, what's so crazy to think about is that there's actually such an abundant amount of material in space.

• 1:04:36Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:37Speaker 06

  And you know, even like oxygen, we're like, we need oxygen. Well, oxygen's everywhere, right? Like all this stuff is everywhere. Like you can find a lot of these things. It's just, is it in that perfect environment, perfect storm to then turn into life, you know, and a, a lot of those materials are there, um, and a lot of the simple building blocks are there out in the universe. And they're pretty abundant, but it's just, you know, does it all come together and, and actually forming life?

• 1:05:03Danny Jones?

  Right. And then like, when it go- going back to Mars, like when you determine, how do you determine like which parts? That if people were to go there, where they would stay? Like where, first of all, where do we have the rovers? Is there a specific part we have the rovers at?

• 1:05:17Speaker 06

  Um, so I know for sure curiosity is in Gale Crater and that was, so really a lot of the target sites currently for. The rovers have been looking at the potential of water on Mars. So they've been looking at places that look like it used to have water and that's been a lot of target sites. It's like, you know, that looks like it could have been a river delta. Let's go send a rover there to see if those materials are, you know, similar to something you would see in a river delta here on Earth. And so it's a lot of those like comparison studies. So that's been a big target of what they've been looking at. Um, I mean, for looking at life, you know, there certainly are regions that we think have like, I guess, a higher probability of like where life could have formed,

• 1:05:58Speaker 06

  especially in Mars's past. And that's really just looking at, you know, looking back at the conditions that that we think Mars had, where would have like the best, best options. So.

• 1:06:10Danny Jones?

  Elon said he wanted to build a city in Arcadia. Why would that, why would Arcadia be good? I don't know anything about that location.

• 1:06:18Speaker 06

  I know. So what, from what I've like recently been reading, I do know one of the biggest pushes right now for life is, um, Acidaelia Planitia, I think is the area on Mars that they think, you know, based on kind of the history of Mars would have the most potential. But it's also kind of a twofold with human landing. So as I mentioned with, you know, the potential of like you contaminating the surface, we almost have these like special regions that we think have like higher potential. And it's like, do we send the humans directly there? Or yes. You're both right. Yeah.

• 1:06:53Danny Jones?

  Arcadia Planitia. Go back to the, go to the picture down there so we can see. So is it like less mountainous? Or what's so great about this area?

• 1:07:04Speaker 06

  Um, there certainly is different.

• 1:07:06Danny Jones?

  Okay, flat, let it go up, scroll up a little tiny bit. Flatland, frozen water, decent sun, uh, and rich history. Maybe the place where humans make their second home. Wow.

• 1:07:17Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, certainly I think, uh, also staying somewhat near the, obviously the equator is going to be warmer than like the poles and so, um, but I do know that the northern hemisphere in general has been a big area of interest, um, for a lot of these places, but. Also just really depends on like the actual scientific goals of that human mission, you know? And so one human mission, I mean, similar to like what happened with the moon. They didn't all go land in the same spot, right? And so it could also be a balance there of like, oh, we want to learn about XYZ. Let's send them here. We want to go learn about this other thing. Let's send things there. And I know that, I mean, even with like the next missions to the moon,

• 1:07:58Speaker 06

  they're currently like scouting potential like landing sites for Artemis IV.

• 1:08:03Danny Jones?

  Oh, really? I heard they wanted to do it near the poles.

• 1:08:05Speaker 06

  Yeah, I I've heard definitely some ideas. I I don't know if it's like fully selected yet, but but yeah. I think it's certainly going to be a bit different than some of the like previous landing sites that we've seen before.

• 1:08:17Danny Jones?

  Mm hmm. And then the other thing about Mars is like, it's gotta be like, like the amount, not only the radiation that you get there has to be really bad. But I'm sure it's gonna be a huge lack of like sunlight you're getting. So we would have to have a way to like, obviously, we evolved here. Um, over however long to receive, you know, we're it's not just the gravity, but it's also like the chemical makeup, the oxygen, the the amount of light that we get is a huge part of it, which like fuels our mitochondria, which fuels everything in our bodies. And like if we're not getting the right amount of sunlight or UV light, that's gonna be really detrimental, compounding with the radiation and all that.

• 1:09:00Danny Jones?

  So like, it's, you know, there's gonna, I'm sure like, the the medical side of this stuff is gonna be really difficult to deal with.

• 1:09:10Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, I will say one of the benefits of looking at Mars and, you know, sometimes, you know, when looking at Mars really is the only kind of next place that we can go to as far as like proximity to us, and it makes the most sense. But another benefit is Mars is realistically kind of similar to Earth in a lot of ways, right? Like, it's a little bit smaller than Earth. Um, I mean, the gravity is one third, which, you know, it's it's less. But um, certainly that's that's something, I mean, having astronauts live in microgravity for a year, certainly something that's been like research for a while of those those effects. To your body.

• 1:09:45Danny Jones?

  Yeah, aren't there really big like hormonal effects?

• 1:09:48Speaker 06

  There's also kind of one of the best things that we have was the twin study that they did. The Kelly twins where one was in space for a year and I mean, there's, there's a lot of things that I think are still being learned about of like the true effects. Of that, I mean, obviously, one of the big ones is like bone density and like, you know, actually being physically strong. Because you're not using your, your bones and your muscles nearly as much. Which is why like exercise is so important and like really pushed. So like astronauts will exercise every single day. In order to try to stay as strong as possible in those environments.

• 1:10:22Danny Jones?

  Yeah, one of the twins came back shorter, I think.

• 1:10:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I mean, it's just whenever you're, you're on earth, you're constantly fighting gravity. You don't feel like you're working out right now, but you are, right? Your muscles and your bones are fighting against gravity. And so anything that you do, they're constantly working. And when you get put in that space environment, they're no longer doing that. And so it's figuring out ways, you know, how can we exercise and, and still use those muscles to, you know, still not maintain what it's like on earth. But still maintain it a little bit better. A day on Mars is like 24 hours and like 30 minutes. So like the days are a little bit longer, but.

• 1:10:57Danny Jones?

  Only 30 minutes.

• 1:10:58Speaker 06

  Their, their actual like days are very similar to Earth. So there's a lot of similarities.

• 1:11:02Danny Jones?

  You get a similar circadian rhythm.

• 1:11:04Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's, it's really not too big of a leap, which is another kind of benefit with Mars is that, you know. There are differences, of course, in like living on Mars, but it wouldn't necessarily be the biggest extreme that, that we could see.

• 1:11:17Danny Jones?

  Yeah, I'd be curious. I mean, it's how many miles, how many miles away is Mars?

• 1:11:21Speaker 06

  Oh, gosh.

• 1:11:22Danny Jones?

  How many millions of miles? It's a million miles? More than a million?

• 1:11:27Danny Jones?

  Steve, that's a quick Google search for you, bud.

• 1:11:28Speaker 06

  I have no idea actually off the top of my head, the mile, the miles of it. I know it on the scale of like football field.

• 1:11:33Danny Jones?

  It's a thousand times the moon, right? You know what, in football fields?

• 1:11:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, like if the, if like the moon, or if the earth was basketball, it'd be like 300 football fields.

• 1:11:43Danny Jones?

  Oh, wow.

• 1:11:43Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:11:44Danny Jones?

  That's crazy.

• 1:11:45Speaker 06

  140 million, that sounds.

• 1:11:47Danny Jones?

  140 million miles.

• 1:11:48Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's the other thing, there's always like those fluctuations.

• 1:11:51Danny Jones?

  Yes, right. So, uh, the distance is constantly changing as both planets orbit the sun, ranging from a minimum of 33 million miles. Wow, that's a huge difference.

• 1:12:07Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:12:07Danny Jones?

  And maximum 250 million miles.

• 1:12:11Speaker 06

  And that's why the trajectories are so important, right?

• 1:12:12Danny Jones?

  That's crazy.

• 1:12:13Speaker 06

  You certainly don't want to, to launch when you have 250 million miles to, to, to go across, so, um.

• 1:12:21Danny Jones?

  Yeah, that would suck.

• 1:12:22Speaker 06

  I think that's almost one of the craziest things about the space industry as a whole, is like people not grasping really how far things are. I mean, even with the moon, right? You know, you look up at the night sky and you're like, the moon's right there, but it takes, you know, multiple days to get to the moon, even just going, um, somewhere like our closest possible place to go is still far away.

• 1:12:42Danny Jones?

  Yeah, totally. And then what about like the time dilation stuff? Like an interstellar, when they're at that planet and like every minute here is 10 years on earth?

• 1:12:50Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, that was certainly.

• 1:12:51Danny Jones?

  Does that change at all?

• 1:12:51Speaker 06

  That would certainly be a case for like deeper space travel. So, yeah, within like the scale that we're traveling, um, to like the moon and Mars and that sort of thing, I would like consider a lot of those things more irrelevant. Yeah.

• 1:13:05Danny Jones?

  That's more, more like in a different star system?

• 1:13:07Speaker 06

  Right, like if you're going, um, like outside of our solar system, I think it would be like something to, to consider, but like within our solar system, um, yeah, I wouldn't, I wouldn't consider it like a big issue.

• 1:13:19Danny Jones?

  And then like terraforming Mars, do we have to detonate nukes on the, on the poles, or do you do like, can you put like some big mirrors in orbit to like heat it up, or like?

• 1:13:28Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, the idea of terraforming has been like talked about for so long, and it, it really is like a question of, you know, are all of these ideas even possible? But yeah, I mean, it's, it's crazy, cause like, yeah, probably the best solution to it would be to nuke the whole planet, which is just insane. Like, why is that even like a conversation? Um, but yeah, that would probably be like your, your. Main way of of being able to actually heat up an entire planet. Because again, you know, the scale that you're talking about.

• 1:13:59Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:59Speaker 06

  And terraforming an entire planet. I mean, Mars is smaller than Earth, but it's still a big planet, you know, and to to fully change the the entire dynamic of the planet. I mean, that is just like such a challenge. Um, and of course, you know, then it becomes like, is that even something that we want to be doing? Like, who who's to say that we can just go and and go crazy and start doing stuff like that? And so.

• 1:14:22Danny Jones?

  I think the aliens are getting mad that we have nuclear weapons on Earth. Imagine what they're gonna do when we start nuking Mars.

• 1:14:28Speaker 06

  Yeah, I certainly.

• 1:14:29Danny Jones?

  We're gonna get a full invasion.

• 1:14:30Speaker 06

  I, yeah, I certainly, uh, I don't know if if that route to to terraforming is is really a realistic approach. And, you know, I think that that's a challenge with even the conversation of terraforming. You know, even if you were to choose that endeavor and and humans were to do that, it would still take, you know, so long to like, for everything to slowly come back to like a normal state. And it's such a such a long, long process and like, you know, fully transforming a planet into something else. And, you know, then you have like even more radiation on the planet. I mean, it would.

• 1:15:05Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 1:15:05Speaker 06

  Sounds just like potentially a disaster, so.

• 1:15:08Danny Jones?

  Does anybody have any better ideas?

• 1:15:10Speaker 06

  Honestly, I don't think so. I've, at the moment, I think like the full idea of terraforming is so theoretical right now that, uh, yeah, I think if there someone were to come up with a better idea, I think any other idea would be would be better. So.

• 1:15:26Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:27Speaker 06

  Well, we'll see.

• 1:15:27Danny Jones?

  Well, you had to figure out a way to melt the ice, right?

• 1:15:30Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, the biggest, yeah, the biggest case is going to be, you know, warming up the planet. I mean, that's like you're going, your task number one is going to be warming up the planet. A big goal is you'd want to start forming like a thicker atmosphere, right? Because Mars's atmosphere is so thin. And so, let's say you went to Mars right now and you start pumping, you had all these like things pumping oxygen or whatever, that oxygen is just going to leave the planet. You're not actually like, it's not insulated in a way to kind of hold a lot of those gases in. And so the big goal is going to be, you know, you're gonna need like an active. Magnetosphere, you're going to need like an atmosphere that's really holding a lot of that stuff in to start forming. And that's, those are are the challenges. And I mean, again, even just like the timeline of terraforming.

• 1:16:16Speaker 06

  Even with crazy ideas, it's just such a long period of time. So yeah, it's certainly a far-fetched idea.

• 1:16:24Danny Jones?

  From all, from everything you're saying, it does sound like where it's it so far. All of these ideas are very theoretical and not being tested. As much as we think. So. Just based on on that alone, it's like, are you?

• 1:16:40Danny Jones?

  Are you optimistic? Do like if you were to gamble on it, do you think that we would make it there in our lifetimes?

• 1:16:46Speaker 06

  To Mars? I think it is a hundred percent possible in our lifetime that we're gonna send humans to Mars. Yeah, I don't uh. I don't think that, you know, a lot of what's. The ideas of terraforming, a lot of that is, I guess, more so down the line of like. Long term, like sending people to like stay on Mars perhaps like we'd want Mars to be more like Earth if you know you were. Like living there for long periods of time. Yeah, that I think is outside of our lifetime. I don't think we're going to be like having Mars as like a second place to live and like a second Earth. Within our lifetime. I don't think that's necessarily possible, but I think the initial missions there. And kind of maybe even starting some of the groundwork of even understanding how to stay on Mars.

• 1:17:30Speaker 06

  I think it's certainly possible to see a a human mission to Mars within the lifetime.

• 1:17:34Danny Jones?

  How close is Venus to us?

• 1:17:37Speaker 06

  Um, Venus is is pretty close.

• 1:17:39Danny Jones?

  It's the next one, right? But closer to the sun.

• 1:17:41Speaker 06

  Right. So if you look Venus on either side of us is Venus and Mars. Um, and Venus is much more of like a similar size to Earth. The issue with Venus is it's the hottest planet in our solar system and it is a basically.

• 1:17:55Danny Jones?

  It's hotter than the one that's closer to the sun?

• 1:17:57Speaker 06

  Yes. So there's Mercury, which is the closest, but Venus is hotter. It has a extremely thick atmosphere. And so it has a ton of greenhouse gases that are constantly heating up the planet.

• 1:18:12Speaker 06

  So still like we think volcanically active.

• 1:18:14Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:15Speaker 06

  And so there is a lot of heat. So it's it's certainly hotter than than Mercury, even though it's technically further from the sun. Because of how thick the atmosphere is. And even our understanding of Venus is pretty minimal. Because we've had or we've tried to land, um, you know, multiple countries have sent uh, things to Venus to try to attempt to land on it. And we get like one image and then it's just burned to a crisp. And yeah, we're not able to actually get a whole lot. So we know pretty minimal. It's also very high pressure.

• 1:18:45Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:45Speaker 06

  Which is really challenging when it comes to technology and landing there. And so that's why Mars is certainly the the direction to go, just because of how like dangerous Venus is in terms of.

• 1:18:57Danny Jones?

  Well, I mean, if if if Mars was at one point like Earth. And in that sort of Goldilocks zone, then reason would suggest that Venus will one day. Be in that same sort of zone that Earth is in now, right?

• 1:19:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, there is um, there is an idea of, you know, like how the the planets are like moving over time. And that's that's something that scientists are kind of learning about by looking at other solar systems, right? We can understand a lot more about how our solar system is eventually going to look. By looking at solar systems that are older than ours and like, what are they currently doing? And so that's a lot of really trying to compare what we know about our current solar system and then kind of having that as comparison to to other places. So looking at places with like similar suns to to our sun. Seeing how those solar systems are evolving and then we can kind of start making assumptions. I mean, of course, there's the overarching. You know, we know our sun's not gonna last forever. We know Earth is not gonna last forever. You know, you can't have

• 1:19:58Speaker 06

  have a sun that's just never going to die. It's eventually going to run out of fuel. And again, very long, long periods of time here, but you know, we know that the sun can't just burn forever. And so that's really where a lot of these. Ideas of, you know, living on Mars or terraforming or kind of pushing towards deep space come from is because we know Earth isn't going to be a place that humans can live forever and ever and ever and ever. You know, our solar system will reach a point where, you know, the sun just won't be able to to have fuel anymore and supply that heat. And without any heat, you know, the the Earth isn't going to be very habitable anymore. And so that's why there is ideas of space travel being so important. It's like, how do we get to a point, you know, over, you know, the next millions and millions of years

• 1:20:43Speaker 06

  to where we're at a point that we can survive something like that?

• 1:20:46Danny Jones?

  Or like develop a space platform to where we don't have to rely on a planet?

• 1:20:50Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, of course, I mean, then you start talking, of course, in like sci fi and like, you know, all the ideas that come from that. But that's really where all of it comes from, right? Because we know for sure that our solar system isn't like sustainable forever. And so it's it's that idea of like, if humans were to continue past that, there's going to have to be some sort of solution, whether it's moving somewhere else, living somewhere else into like a younger solar system, or, you know, like you said, just like living in space fully.

• 1:21:17Danny Jones?

  Right. And it's interesting, like, the more that technology advances here, the more we learn about what's happening out there, like with with one of those latest satellite or telescopes.

• 1:21:30Speaker 06

  Yeah, the James Webb.

• 1:21:32Danny Jones?

  Was it the James Webb or was it? I don't remember which one. The one that that discovered the interstellar objects that were coming through?

• 1:21:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's James Webb. Yeah, James Webb. Yeah, it's looking deeper or like, obviously, like, again, when you look into space, you're kind of looking into the past. And so it's James Webb has like looked further than anything else we've had. And it's getting some of those like early images. Because we're kind of almost like looking into the past and looking into kind of the beginnings of the universe.

• 1:22:00Danny Jones?

  Because it's like, it's crazy that the first interstellar object that we discovered or image was in 2019, I think.

• 1:22:05Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah, yeah. So you're talking, yeah, okay, totally. I get what you're saying now. Yeah. So you're talking about probably Hubble was kind of our our initial telescope that was looking at a lot about that. And then our current one, well, James Webb was kind of the next iteration of of Hubble. So it's newer technology and it's able to like look further and look with like crisper images. So we're getting much better images of like the early, early universe.

• 1:22:28Danny Jones?

  Yeah. And so what what was the name of the telescope that discovered the the Amuamua, I think it was, or the three I, the third one, the Atlas one?

• 1:22:42Danny Jones?

  It makes you wonder, once we start getting like crazy, super sophisticated satellites, you know, because this stuff is advancing at an incredible rate. So like, we've only seen three now, but imagine when we're able to get telescopes that are like 10 times more advanced than our current most powerful ones, we're going to see these things everywhere and realize that we're constantly being bombarded by all these crazy things that we were missing before.

• 1:23:06Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, we're a...

• 1:23:08Danny Jones?

  It was named after the telescope Atlas. Oh, it's called the Atlas Telescope, NASA-funded Atlas asteroid.

• 1:23:16Speaker 06

  So yeah, okay, you're talking about like a ground-based system.

• 1:23:19Danny Jones?

  It's called the Asteroid Terrestrial Impact Last Alert System? That's a comforting name, located in Rio, Hora, uh, Hurtado, Chile.

• 1:23:31Danny Jones?

  Interesting. Oh, I remember him saying it was in Chile.

• 1:23:34Speaker 06

  This is like a ground-based system, and then Hubble and James Webb are in space. And James Webb, one of the cool things about it, it's like at a, what's called like a Lagrange point, so where it's, it's basically like where the gravity is equal out a bit. So there's like certain points in our solar system that almost like the gravity is balanced, like you think of like, you know, how Earth has its gravity that orbits the moon, and then obviously the sun has more gravity, so we orbit the sun.

• 1:24:01Danny Jones?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:24:02Speaker 06

  And so we kind of have these points where those like balance out. So it's kind of further out in, like away from Earth than a lot of like other systems that we have. So like Hubble didn't necessarily go that far, but James Webb is kind of at this like further point.

• 1:24:14Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:15Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's super cool because it's, it's not necessarily as, as like insulated by Earth and a lot of things, it's much further in space.

• 1:24:24Danny Jones?

  Hmm. Isn't there, how many satellites do we have orbiting Mars?

• 1:24:29Speaker 06

  Oh, gosh.

• 1:24:30Danny Jones?

  We have the reconnaissance one, right? The reconnaissance orbiter?

• 1:24:33Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean...

• 1:24:35Danny Jones?

  And that one took a good photo of the Three Eye Atlas when it passed by it. I remember it got pretty close to there.

• 1:24:40Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, gosh, there probably has to be...

• 1:24:45Danny Jones?

  That's one of the things that freaks me out is like the amount of satellites that we put into outer space, like we're littering space. Have you seen the Kessler syndrome? Have you heard? I just learned about this the other day.

• 1:24:56Speaker 06

  Yeah, I have. It's insane.

• 1:24:58Danny Jones?

  There's like thousands and thousands of objects where it's like a shotgun blast of stuff.

• 1:25:02Speaker 06

  Right.

• 1:25:03Danny Jones?

  That's just rotating our planet.

• 1:25:04Speaker 06

  Yeah, space junk is quite literally one of the biggest and most concerning things, I think, that we have in with the space industry because one thing that you don't want to, humans don't want to get themselves into is trapping ourselves here.

• 1:25:20Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 1:25:21Speaker 06

  There's so much junk.

• 1:25:22Danny Jones?

  Where we can't get out.

• 1:25:23Speaker 06

  Right. And I mean, even if you think about like the movie like Wally, right? They like go through this like wall of like junk whenever they like leave the planet. And that's something that that certainly is like a concern. You don't want it to get to this point where.

• 1:25:35Danny Jones?

  The irony.

• 1:25:36Speaker 06

  Yeah, you just trap yourselves here.

• 1:25:38Danny Jones?

  Yeah, we're focused so much on getting off the earth. We ended up creating our own prison.

• 1:25:42Speaker 06

  Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I think space junk is is like a really big issue. And it's going to be interesting to see over the next few years if that's something that that these government agencies that, you know, are putting a lot of this stuff into space, if that's something that becomes more of a priority to them. Or if it becomes more of like a a commercial endeavor where like someone has a system to like clean up space.

• 1:26:06Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:06Speaker 06

  But it's certainly going to be interesting to see how that evolves. Because I mean, from just what we've already done so far, there's so much space junk. And it's even, you know, the idea of just things that no longer work, right? You could have had a fully functioning satellite, but it's only going to have so long of a lifespan. Maybe it works for 10 years, maybe it works for 20 years, but it's going to reach a point where it's just dead.

• 1:26:27Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:26:27Speaker 06

  Yeah, those satellites aren't going to last forever. And so you kind of hit a point where, you know, then it becomes junk. And then you run the risk of it hitting something else. And and those things are tracked, but you know, sometimes you can't track something. That's like a little piece of paint.

• 1:26:41Danny Jones?

  Yeah, they're supposed to decommission them by like crashing them into the ocean, right?

• 1:26:45Speaker 06

  Well, there's a lot of ideas about how to get rid of space junk. Really a big ideas like how we kind of push them back towards the atmosphere. And basically, the the junk would burn up in Earth's atmosphere.

• 1:26:58Danny Jones?

  Oh, they would just burn up, right?

• 1:27:00Speaker 06

  So rather than like them fully like crashing into the ocean. It's kind of like using Earth's atmosphere as a way to to uh to burn up that material. But you need some sort of system that's gonna knock it out of its current orbit and like towards Earth. And that's kind of the challenge is, you know, what's gonna do that? Who's gonna do that? Go around and kind of have this cleanup.

• 1:27:20Danny Jones?

  Will that work with the International Space Station when they try to decommission that?

• 1:27:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, um, honestly, I uh I don't know. I know that, you know, a big.

• 1:27:32Danny Jones?

  That thing's old.

• 1:27:32Speaker 06

  Yes, uh, you know, with the idea of like decommissioning it. I know there is the idea of like de-orbiting it. Um, and with that, it could be, you know, parts of it gets burned up in the atmosphere. And then parts of it does like come all the way and like land in the ocean. Um, yeah, I don't know, I um.

• 1:27:50Danny Jones?

  Find out when they're supposed to decommission that thing. Or what are the plans with the International Space Station? They were supposed to decommission it fifteen years ago. Were they really? And why didn't they? They kept it running. Can you find out? Like, what are the plans for it?

• 1:28:02Speaker 06

  I know that originally, like, they were going to sell the International Space Station to Axiom. And then Axiom was gonna take it over. And now Axiom wants to, which is a private company. And now they would rather basically build their own space station rather than, I think, taking over the current space station. Um, but I mean, the International Space Station is like the size of a football field. So it is a.

• 1:28:24Danny Jones?

  Is it really?

• 1:28:24Speaker 06

  It's very large, so it is a big thing to decommission. And um, yeah, I don't know. I have a lot of, I think, conflicting.

• 1:28:31Danny Jones?

  Did they build it out there?

• 1:28:33Speaker 06

  Mm hmm. So that was the point of the space shuttle program. So NASA had the space shuttle program. It built the International Space Station and it launched satellites. It launched Hubble.

• 1:28:42Danny Jones?

  And that was the point of it, to build a space station?

• 1:28:44Speaker 06

  Mm hmm.

• 1:28:44Danny Jones?

  I I'm just learning this today. That's crazy.

• 1:28:47Speaker 06

  Yeah, so. Um, yeah, I thought I saw 2030 was the, the big year that they were, they were looking at.

• 1:28:54Danny Jones?

  Okay. So the end of 2030 is when they planted and did decommission it.

• 1:28:58Speaker 06

  Yeah. And so part of it is going to like burn up in the atmosphere, but obviously it probably won't be able to burn up an entire football sized.

• 1:29:06Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:07Speaker 06

  Piece of material. So some of that will, will certainly crash land. So kind of before the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle program, NASA had Skylab, which was like originally, I guess, some sort of space station. And that was originally trying to figure out, how do you live in space? So after the moon, it was like, okay, now how do we live in space? And Skylab was kind of the initial, like a very small module about figuring out how to live in space. And astronauts would go up to Skylab. They would probably stay there for like a few months. And then once the idea of Skylab happened, it was like, okay, how do we create a more permanent version? And then that's when the idea of like building a full International Space Station came about.

• 1:29:46Speaker 06

  And then the Space Shuttle was a reusable vehicle that could go on multiple missions and kind of help in contributing and building to this like much larger space station that could be used for science. But yeah, I mean, there was 135 Space Shuttle missions. So.

• 1:30:01Danny Jones?

  Yeah, it's crazy.

• 1:30:02Speaker 06

  It was a massive, um, just massive program that did a lot of stuff. But yeah, it was, it was through, uh, through the Space Shuttle that we were able to have the International Space Station.

• 1:30:13Danny Jones?

  Will we use reusable rockets to get to Mars when we decide to go there? Or will we do expendable rockets?

• 1:30:19Speaker 06

  You know, I think it's going to be probably a mix of kind of what we're seeing currently with the Artemis mission where like parts of it are reusable. But as a whole, the entire rocket isn't reusable.

• 1:30:31Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 1:30:31Speaker 06

  So I think that's kind of, I mean, even with the Space Shuttle, it's considered NASA's most reusable rocket that it did. But still the external tank was trashed every single time.

• 1:30:40Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 1:30:40Speaker 06

  Um, and so that you had 135 of those that were built. So it's almost.

• 1:30:45Danny Jones?

  And where did they all go?

• 1:30:46Speaker 06

  Um, those burned up in the atmosphere.

• 1:30:48Danny Jones?

  They all burned up?

• 1:30:48Speaker 06

  Yeah. And so, cause that went, um, that, that was still attached pretty high up. You know, they would, they wouldn't jettison that until they were almost like in space. And so that one would burn up in the atmosphere. Whereas everything else was reused for that rocket. So I think, you know, it's difficult to have something that's, you know, a hundred percent reusable. So I think it's gonna be like a combination for when we look at what's gonna take people to Mars, where parts of it are reusable and parts of it are not. Especially if the idea is that you like launch from some vehicle and then dock on something else that takes you to Mars. I'm sure that almost like back and forth may be a reusable vehicle.

• 1:31:25Danny Jones?

  Yeah, well, it does seem like such a better, like such a better idea to do it from the moon. If you could figure out how to get, how to build something on the moon where you could

• 1:31:36Danny Jones?

  get all this stuff on these big rockets that could be, it would be much easier to have reusable rockets if you launched them from the moon. And if you could get enough stuff to Mars where you could be self-sustainable, right? Like that's, that's the goal, right? To be, to make it sustainable to stay there and not have to constantly have shipments coming all the time. You wanna create factories or you wanna build the stuff you need there and use the, either the resources that are already there if we can find them or have enough. I mean, you'd need probably like a million tons of stuff to like be there before you can actually have a sustainable place for people to live.

• 1:32:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I, I think a big idea too is like a lot of that would be sent beforehand. Like before you were to ever send a mission with humans on it, you're sending a lot of these like pre-missions almost to have like a lot of that already landed on the surface. And then like once humans arrive, they have this like stuff there. So like a habitat, for instance, you would like send that beforehand rather than like sending humans to go build, go like build a habitat for when like they first arrive. So a lot of that material would be like prior missions.

• 1:32:42Danny Jones?

  And like solar panels, you need probably a ton of solar panels. You know, satellites that are doing whatever, like maybe reflecting more sun back or like even if we can find like some natural resources there, like maybe some like natural gas that could be frozen that we could like melt or. You know, there's gotta be, there's gotta be resources there that we could,

• 1:33:01Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:33:01Danny Jones?

  we could tap into and utilize to, to do manufacturing.

• 1:33:04Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I think that a lot of that has already been learned about with the International Space Station. I mean, of course, we do have some supply missions, you know, of course, that goes to the International Space Station. But as a whole, I mean, it's had to be relatively self-sustaining in a way, just because those supply missions are so expensive. And so it's like even just to send like a gallon of water to the International Space Station is so expensive.

• 1:33:27Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:27Speaker 06

  And so it's like, it has to be in a way, to a degree, self-sustaining. And so even though that there are supply missions, there's so much like reusability that is important. And I think the International Space Station has been such an integral part about learning about living in space and, and like living for like long durations and sustainability within space. That's why I feel like I always have like such conflicting ideas about them getting rid of the International Space Station, just because I think it's one of our greatest human feats that we've been able to have a international work environment in space that has done so many scientific studies, has been able to teach us so much about living in space. And I mean, again, even just the sheer size of it, it's incredible that we

• 1:34:11Speaker 06

  like built something like that, just orbiting around the earth. And it's such a incredible piece of technology.

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• 1:35:18Danny Jones?

  Yeah, well, what is still being like, is there any like research currently being done there now? Like what sort of like groundbreaking research can you do up there?

• 1:35:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, so I mean, they probably have missions that like rotates to the National Space Station like every six months. I think I think they just had the I think it was really only a few weeks ago. They had the new crew launch to the National Space Station. So there's constantly people up there. They're constantly working, learning about again, things that will be useful for going to the moon, going to Mars. So learning how to grow like plants in space. They do a lot of research there, working in microgravity. It kind of just depends on, I guess, what is currently like scientifically interesting. But yeah, there's always really something going on up there. And so that's why and it's, you know, again, still an international endeavor. There's still, you know, people from multiple countries up on the National Space Station working.

• 1:36:07Speaker 06

  And yeah, it's something I think is so easily forgotten. Like there's always people up there and it has been since since the space station kind of got created.

• 1:36:17Danny Jones?

  Yeah. What I really want to know is what the hell are those things on Sedonia? And those anomalies on the surface of Mars that we see like there's these shapes, these geometric, not geometric, but they're like perfectly square shapes. There's like something that looks like a pyramid there. There's like another thing that looks like a face like these anomalies are crazy. And I wish they would send something there, some sort of a vehicle or reconnaissance, something there to like, look at that stuff and see what it is because damn, there's that one that that one anomaly looks so much like a pyramid. And like some of them look manmade.

• 1:36:55Speaker 06

  Yeah. Yeah, certainly. I think kind of the biggest thing with some of these like interesting features on the surface of Mars is really just like wanting to actually get something actually to it. To actually get better images.

• 1:37:09Danny Jones?

  Yeah. Yeah. So how big would that thing be, Steve? That that pyramid on Sedonia, the Rosetta Stone, do they have an idea of like what the size of it would be? Because like if we know that life was here one time, or if we know at the very least that this planet was was able to sustain life, you know, billions of years ago, who's to say that there wouldn't have been some sort of a civilization there that was technological or advanced in some way? You know, there's the, there's this hypothesis called the Solarian hypothesis that this guy, Adam Frank, came up with, which is basically like if we if we wanted to figure out if

• 1:37:52Danny Jones?

  there was a previous like industrial civilization on Earth, like before our recorded history, how would we find out? Well, the hypothesis is like we, we wouldn't. We would have no evidence of that. There could be a completely like, uh, super, hyper advanced industrial civilization living right here on Earth, millions and millions of years ago. And over time, you know, through like all the cycles of Earth and the catastrophes that have washed across Earth and, you know, just all that time, we would have, we would have no clue. It would just, all that evidence would be gone. So what's to say that couldn't have happened here if life was, if this place was habitable for life back then?

• 1:38:35Danny Jones?

  Okay, so this says the D N M Pyramid, a prominent feature in the Sedonia region of Mars, first image in 1976, is a large eroded mesa roughly, okay, it's five miles. Wow. Significantly larger than the Great Pyramid in Giza, which is about 1.5 miles.

• 1:38:57Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, if you think about Mars and the stuff that we've seen on Mars, I mean, Mars has some very large features. I mean, Olympus Mons that's on Mars is three times.

• 1:39:05Danny Jones?

  What did you just say?

• 1:39:06Speaker 06

  Olympus Mons, it's like the big, um, it's in like all your typical images of Mars, like the big like volcano.

• 1:39:14Danny Jones?

  Okay.

• 1:39:15Speaker 06

  And it is, we think, three times taller than Mount Everest.

• 1:39:19Danny Jones?

  Whoa.

• 1:39:20Speaker 06

  And then, um, so yeah, Olympus Mons is kind of that big massive feature on, on Mars.

• 1:39:26Danny Jones?

  So is this like the biggest mountain on Mars?

• 1:39:28Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 1:39:29Danny Jones?

  It's like a giant pimple on the face of Mars.

• 1:39:31Speaker 06

  Yes, this is, this is certainly um, one of the biggest features. So if you just look up like, you know, the surface of Mars, like you're gonna see Olympus Mons there and.

• 1:39:41Danny Jones?

  Look how much bigger it is than Mount Everest.

• 1:39:44Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:39:44Danny Jones?

  That's nuts.

• 1:39:46Speaker 06

  Yeah, we think it's three times as big. And then even Valles Marineris, which is the canyon that's on Mars.

• 1:39:52Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:52Speaker 06

  You know, we think it's like the size of the entire United States. So it is, we think Mars.

• 1:39:59Danny Jones?

  This planet is smaller than our planet.

• 1:40:00Speaker 06

  Yes, Mars is is smaller. So Mars does have some very um, large features to it, um, which I think is super interesting, uh, cause there's, there's really some stuff that uh, that we have big interest in and just, you know, how, how these features came to be. Um, but yeah, very much larger features than, than what's on Earth.

• 1:40:23Danny Jones?

  Yeah, I'm super curious of how we can start getting like, deep core samples of these parts of Mars that dig down and do some like, serious excavations of it and see what, what we can pull out because we would learn so much from that. And wouldn't that be easier than getting humans there?

• 1:40:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, I certainly agree. I think that um, I would think some sort of, you know, drill or, you know, investigation into the subsurface uh, is really important and really going to lend itself and, and help understand maybe some of the things that we still don't know about Mars. I would see it as something maybe, you know, before a human mission, but you know, really, it's just, I don't know who, who's gonna be doing that, you know, I'm, at the moment, it doesn't sound like NASA has any plans of doing like a, a deep subsurface mission. Um, so it's, it's unsure, you know, maybe there's another agency that does something. Um, I think that's just really the question of, of who's going to do it. And then that will kind of maybe direct the timeline. But I think like, at the moment,

• 1:41:21Speaker 06

  if I were to guess, I think NASA's goals would maybe lend itself more to just like a human mission. Um, and then maybe a plan of like, human doing like a drill investigation or research, but, but I'm not sure. It's certainly a, uh, I think a big important thing, um, that we'll kind of maybe start seeing within the next bit of time and understanding more about Mars from the subsurface's standpoint.

• 1:41:42Danny Jones?

  Right, right. Um.

• 1:41:45Danny Jones?

  So did you ever like, did you ever talk to any of these astronauts that did any of these recent moon missions like this Artemis stuff and all this like, how many astronauts have you talked to that have actually like been on space trip, space trip, not just like, have you been talking to any of the Apollo astronauts?

• 1:42:01Speaker 06

  Um, I've met a lot of them over, um, over periods of time. Um, you know, we're, we're certainly getting to a point now where a lot of the Apollo astronauts are passing away. I think has been, um, uh, kind of unfortunate, but yeah, I've certainly met a lot of them over time. I think they're all, all very great people. Um, I haven't met any one from like the most recent Artemis mission, um, or like the most like recent crew that did the lunar flyby. So I haven't met any of them, but I mean, I guess over time I've met a good, good handful of astronauts.

• 1:42:31Danny Jones?

  Mm hmm. So that, I don't know if you told this, you might've told me this story before we started recording about your trip when you, so you watched the Artemis shuttle launch in Cape Canaveral and then you basically drove across the country and watched them splash down in off the coast of San Diego. Is that right?

• 1:42:50Speaker 06

  Yeah. So I did a documentary, which is titled Driven to Explore. And the goal of it was really having like a, a similar mission to the Artemis two mission, but on earth. And so since the Artemis two mission was a 10 day mission from launch to splash down, we had a similar 10 day mission on earth where we were in Cape Canaveral for the launch and got to see that. And then the second it launched, we hit the road and drove cross country and ended up in San Diego for the splash down, uh, on April or at, at the end of those 10 days. And really the, the goal of it was to go and meet women in STEM kind

• 1:43:34Speaker 06

  of along the way and hear some of their stories. So we had some interviews with women that worked on the, the SLS. Maybe they worked on the capsule. Maybe they worked on the actual rocket itself. We met women that were just kind of scientists in their own fields in, in the space industry. Um, and it was really fun. Yeah. We got to learn a little bit about, you know, different. Different fields that that women have or are representing in and really a lot of this too because since Christina Cook was really becoming the first woman to go the furthest that that there's ever been and really all the astronauts honestly on the Artemis two went further than any other previous moon mission as far as like how far they went

• 1:44:15Speaker 06

  around the moon it was just very cool to kind of bring a lot of that journey to some of the the cool stuff happening on earth as well.

• 1:44:23Danny Jones?

  And then when you got to California you realized you couldn't actually see them splash down they were too far offshore.

• 1:44:30Speaker 06

  Yeah, so we kind of knew from the beginning that the splash down is a little difficult to see because I mean a lot of stuff you know has always kind of splashed down off the coast of San Diego so it kind of depends on the mission about how far offshore because we were reading that depending on the day and visibility sometimes you can see it a little bit sometimes you can hear like hear them break through like the sound barrier but really it depends on how offshore that they are and like how offshore the capsule is for this Artemis mission they were certainly pretty far out there so we just watched kind of the live stream for the actual splash down as kind of like a conclusion and we did we went scuba diving off the coast of San Diego as well for the documentary and we got to

• 1:45:14Speaker 06

  see the vessel that was bringing the Orion capsule back so whenever they splash down in the ocean the astronauts were in the capsule and they had a Navy vessel also out there kind of near where they splash down they sent like a smaller boat out to the capsule and that's what recovered the astronauts and got them out the capsule and then they brought them to the Navy vessel as like their initial medical check before like sending them to Houston and then that vessel will then brought the capsule back in because the capsule will then hopefully get refurbished and used for another Artemis mission so they took it towed it in and so the Navy vessel you know was obviously out in the water a little bit longer tugging that.

• 1:45:56Danny Jones?

  And you saw that ship come in?

• 1:45:58Speaker 06

  Yeah, the Navy vessel was probably honestly really not too far from us and we just kind of got lucky from the site that we went to to go scuba diving we got a call in on the the vessel that that the dive captain was like if you guys want to look the Navy ship just called in and said that they're entering the area and so we got to see it kind of off in the distance.

• 1:46:18Danny Jones?

  Really, has any civilian ever seen one of those things splash down? Have there been like non cleared people out there like fishing and seen this thing come out of the sky?

• 1:46:28Speaker 06

  I would say no, mainly just because of how offshore it is. It's like sixty miles offshore.

• 1:46:33Danny Jones?

  Sixteen?

• 1:46:34Speaker 06

  Sixty.

• 1:46:35Danny Jones?

  Oh, sixty.

• 1:46:36Speaker 06

  Yeah, so it's pretty far out.

• 1:46:38Danny Jones?

  There's a lot of fishermen out there.

• 1:46:39Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, I would certainly not say never. But I'm sure there is obviously a lot of like searches of the air because they have the Navy vessel. They have obviously helicopters going around because they're trying to spot the capsule as it's coming down as soon as possible, so.

• 1:46:55Danny Jones?

  They probably make it like a, they probably rope it off.

• 1:46:59Speaker 06

  Yeah, like a no, no entry.

• 1:47:01Danny Jones?

  Don't let anybody enter it, right?

• 1:47:02Speaker 06

  And I mean, it's crazy how timed all of this is, right? I mean, the splashdown, they splashed down at like the literal minute that was predicted per like the trajectory of the mission, so.

• 1:47:14Danny Jones?

  That's nuts.

• 1:47:14Speaker 06

  It was insane because it's all calculated, right? They know when the astronauts are going to come in and splashdown. I mean, I think it was like 5:07 PM or whatever it was. It was like that, and that was the time that they splashed down. So it was very, very much calculated. But yeah, it was a very, very fun trip and I'm very excited, obviously, now moving into post-production with the documentary, but very fun to kind of be able to keep up with the Artemis II mission while kind of being on our own kind of mission across the country. And it was fun because you know, you were, you felt more involved every step of the way because so many people will watch the launch, but really that's just the beginning of the mission, right? And so there's so many crucial steps at every step of the way, like when they did their, their engine burns,

• 1:47:57Speaker 06

  actually start their lunar trajectory. I mean, there's a lot of, a lot of parts of the mission that were like big steps.

• 1:48:03Danny Jones?

  What did you, what did you see scuba diving in San Diego? That's a place I would never imagine going scuba diving.

• 1:48:10Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was actually my first time ever like scuba diving on the West Coast.

• 1:48:13Danny Jones?

  Yeah, it'd be pretty creepy.

• 1:48:15Speaker 06

  Yeah, we went to a kelp forest, actually.

• 1:48:17Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:48:18Speaker 06

  Uh, which was pretty cool because I'd never been to like a kelp forest before. But yeah, there's lots of sea lions, a lot of wildlife, actually. Um, which was interesting. None of them got like too close to us, but it was funny because we were like diving and then like maybe.

• 1:48:31Danny Jones?

  How deep?

• 1:48:32Speaker 06

  Uh, we didn't go too deep. We probably around forty, forty-five feet.

• 1:48:37Danny Jones?

  Okay.

• 1:48:37Speaker 06

  Um, uh, just to kind of get to the bottom of where we were.

• 1:48:41Danny Jones?

  Did you go off the beach or like off a cliff or something?

• 1:48:43Speaker 06

  No, we, uh, we just took a, a dive boat out. They had like, they had like a location that, um, you know, depending on what you want to see. Um, you know, they have like different spots that they typically bring divers. So like for this kelp forest spot, we like went to where they typically go and like go diving. So we just like went to a particular kelp forest and then we just like jumped off the boat from there.

• 1:49:03Danny Jones?

  God, it had to be so crazy.

• 1:49:05Speaker 06

  It's very cold.

• 1:49:06Danny Jones?

  I've seen footage. I've never scuba dived. I've surfed through kelp forests, but I've never scuba dived in a kelp forest before.

• 1:49:11Speaker 06

  It was, it was a bit challenging, uh, because I had never scuba dived in a kelp forest either. And you can get tangled. It's really cold and you can get like tangled pretty quick.

• 1:49:20Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:20Speaker 06

  Um, and so that was certainly, uh, a new, a new situation to kind of learn and adapt to. But also the cold was really interesting because they, I feel like they kept warning us, you know, since we had never dove in, you know, off the west coast about how cold it is and like kind of the shock. Well, we were at the surface for a good while, just kind of getting set up and everything. I was like, I don't think the water is that bad. And then when we went down to the bottom, I was like, I'm freezing. Oh, my gosh. The temperature dropped so quickly as we like descended. I was like, oh my gosh, they were not kidding. This is, this is freezing.

• 1:49:54Danny Jones?

  And the bottom was like forty feet?

• 1:49:56Speaker 06

  Yeah. So it was like forty to forty-five feet was at the bottom. So we, we went all the way down.

• 1:50:00Danny Jones?

  Okay. So you're pretty close to the shore then?

• 1:50:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. We, we really weren't, weren't too far, um, mainly just for like time of like the documentary and like filming. We weren't trying to like spend an hour going like super far out. So just for our own timelines, we did something like near, pretty near the shore.

• 1:50:15Danny Jones?

  Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's just like that whole part of the, like the whole west coast of California. Like there's so, like it gets so deep.

• 1:50:22Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:50:23Danny Jones?

  It's so cold. There's like, the ocean is so kind of like unpredictable over there. And then like also you have nuclear submarines coming in and out of like the inlets there, like down, especially down like in the Newport area I've seen. And uh, yeah, it can just get hairy out there. So I've like never been interested in like going like scuba diving or freediving over there. Kind of like, I prefer the Caribbean. The water's warmer. It's super clear. Uh, no nuclear submarines.

• 1:50:52Speaker 06

  Yeah. Well, I mean, part of that really I had done most of my diving uh, out in Florida. And so Florida is Florida is a, a much more comfortable and like stable environment to go, to go scuba diving in. So that was certainly a new adventure.

• 1:51:04Danny Jones?

  Yeah. Here in the Bahamas and like everywhere in between around here is much more friendly.

• 1:51:09Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was, it was super cool. And I'm, I'm very glad. Cause like, I mean, really the Artemis two mission with there being like humans on board, I think really drew a lot of attention. And I think is, um, I think it's just really cool to see. I mean, realistically, this was not only the first time we have sent humans back to the moon since the 1970s. But also like really the first time we've had NASA astronauts launching from a NASA vehicle in, you know, since the space shuttle. Cause after the space shuttle ended, obviously NASA astronauts were going to the International Space Station via Russia. And NASA was like paying for their tickets on Soyuz. And then when SpaceX came into play, then SpaceX was, um, was essentially used as the charter vehicle to the International Space Station.

• 1:51:54Speaker 06

  And so this was really the first time we've had NASA astronauts on a NASA vehicle in, in quite some time.

• 1:52:00Danny Jones?

  And they didn't even touch the moon. They just went around it.

• 1:52:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, they went.

• 1:52:03Danny Jones?

  How many years has it been since, uh, what was it? Seventy-two was Apollo seventeen?

• 1:52:08Speaker 06

  Yeah. Seventy-two was the last time that we went out that far. And then again, this trajectory was a little bit, a little bit further. Um, so if you think about in comparison to the Apollo days, cause I think that was a big conversation, right? With Artemis two was like, why, why are they just going to the moon? Like, how silly? And you know, when you think about it, everyone, you know, thinks about Apollo 11 that landed on the moon, but there was eight, nine, and 10 that all went to the moon, but didn't land. And those were really like those preparation missions. So they were testing the rocket, literally Apollo 10 practiced almost like descending on the moon. And they were like, we can see it. We want to land. Like, let us land. And there wasn't like enough fuel to like land and like launch because that wasn't the

• 1:52:52Speaker 06

  actual goal of that mission.

• 1:52:54Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 1:52:54Speaker 06

  And so that's what we're seeing now with Artemis two. This was really one of those first missions to go to the moon, kind of practice this new trajectory. Um, cause this was a different trajectory than like what Apollo 11 did. And so test the systems, they were testing the life support systems. This is the first time this capsule has ever had humans in it and had to sustain humans for 10 days. And so you're really practicing all those systems before you're just jumping in and landing on the moon.

• 1:53:21Danny Jones?

  So it's been 60 years since we first went to touchdown and had humans on the surface of the moon. What was the, Steve, Google this. What was the time between the first, um, airplane? The first time we ever flew a plane? Humans ever had a powered aircraft?

• 1:53:44Danny Jones?

  What was the time? What, what, find out the year that happened. 1903. So almost the same amount of time to 1969. So from the first airplane till going on the freaking moon was the same time between the last time we landed on the moon to now, pretty much. That's kind of crazy to think about.

• 1:54:06Speaker 06

  Yeah, no, it is really crazy. And I think really like, you know, the space industry has really progressed, but just in a very different way.

• 1:54:14Danny Jones?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:14Speaker 06

  You know, it's just like, it's just progressed within low earth orbit rather than deep space. But yeah, it is really insane to think about like how long it's been since like we went. And, uh, I think it's a really exciting time, especially for people interested in the space industry, because I think we're just going to see more and more progress. And especially I think with a lot of the current pushes for, um, building, you know, some sort of permanent presence on the moon. And I think the Artemis missions are just going to be kind of a, a pretty heavy force of, you know, continuation of like, we'll just see missions more frequently than we have.

• 1:54:49Danny Jones?

  If I was gonna go to Mars, I would, I would maybe ask like if it's okay if I go to the moon first. Like, can I just do, try the moon first? Just as like a warm up?

• 1:54:59Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, well, it's really funny because with like the Artemis two. The three NASA astronauts that were on that mission were veterans. They've been to the National Space Station. They've been to space multiple times. The Canadian, it was his first ever mission. And so it was his first mission and he went further than any humans ever gone before. Um, so it's really crazy, kind of someone like that, uh, that balance between like, what's more important? I know, like with a mission to Mars, it's almost like the same idea, right? Do you have someone who has experience and has like done a mission before? Or is it, you know, with the timeline of how long the mission to Mars is? Do you want someone that's never been to space before? And they've never had any effects of microgravity on their body?

• 1:55:43Speaker 06

  They maybe have more of like a fresher, um, from like almost more of a medical standpoint of like, they've never had any effects because of living in microgravity, uh, to their body because of like the duration of the trip. But again, a lot of that's really just going to depend, I think, again, on like the timeline.

• 1:55:58Danny Jones?

  Full send, first time, baby, go all the way.

• 1:56:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I mean, even with like a mission to Mars, right? You're going to need such a diverse group of, you know, you're probably going to want someone who's more of a geologist to actually do some of the research that you get there. You're obviously going to want someone who's very experienced, a good pilot. I mean, there's just so many different roles to think about when you're actually like there and making a human mission to Mars.

• 1:56:23Danny Jones?

  Right, right. Um, now in like, so currently you're studying as in you're studying to be like a master, getting a masters in astrobiology? Is that correct?

• 1:56:35Speaker 06

  I'm getting my PhD in.

• 1:56:37Danny Jones?

  Your PhD?

• 1:56:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, so I'm three years into a PhD program.

• 1:56:41Danny Jones?

  Okay.

• 1:56:42Speaker 06

  Um, and it's.

• 1:56:43Danny Jones?

  Sorry, I don't know anything about this stuff.

• 1:56:44Speaker 06

  No, you're all good.

• 1:56:45Danny Jones?

  I barely graduated high school.

• 1:56:47Speaker 06

  You're all good. Yeah, I mean, so I went straight, I guess, the lay down was I went straight from undergrad to a PhD program. So I essentially skipped a master, skipped over the masters.

• 1:56:56Danny Jones?

  How'd you do that?

• 1:56:57Speaker 06

  Um, it's actually really common, um, in a lot of the more, I guess, science fields. Um, they don't really require you to have a masters to pursue like a PhD program, which I think is just one, not very well known and two, just, um, I certainly didn't know about it. Actually, applied as a master's student. And then when I was trying to work with the professor that I wanted to work with, he was only interested in PhD students. And I certainly understand it a lot more now because of, a master's is so short that it's hard to really conduct meaningful research within only two years. And so he was saying, you know, by the time you get trained on all the, all the stuff to use for your research, you're graduating.

• 1:57:39Speaker 06

  And so it's certainly an interest of them to kind of have PhD students who are going to be around longer. And so they get like more research under their belt. So yeah, I'm in a PhD program in space and planetary science, but all of my research is still within astrobiology. So my bachelor's degree was directly in astrobiology. And then all of my current research interests are still astrobiology. And yeah, just continuing through the PhD program and, conducting my research, which is all about microbes and Mars and that connection, and contributing to that kind of gap in the field. And at the moment, really just continue with that and then post,

• 1:58:22Speaker 06

  post PhD, either staying within academia or working in the industry. But again, within research either way. And I'm officially, I guess, eligible to apply to the astronaut selection process whenever it opens up again. So since the requirement is you have to have at least a master's, like the PhD equivalent to that would be at least two years into your PhD program. So I would be eligible to apply whenever it opens. So would probably give it a stab whenever they open it back up as like my first, I guess, true application to NASA's selection process.

• 1:58:59Danny Jones?

  The people that you're working with, that you're like rubbing shoulders with at your college that are pursuing these PhDs and stuff like astrobiology, what sort of jobs in the industry do they typically go for? And like what sort of companies hire them? Are we talking like private aerospace or?

• 1:59:16Speaker 06

  Yeah, it really depends. You know, we have someone who's about to graduate and he's looking at a job with the Smithsonian. We have some people that pursue like government, so maybe even a little outside of, you know, just the space realm, but maybe just like working on like, um, you know, biomaterials for um, some government projects. Um, privately, I mean, it really is just depending on your area of research because we're all pretty different, right? I mean, my, my research focuses are, you know, that microbiology in Mars, but we have some people that study Pluto, some people that have a focus on Venus, you know, it kind of just depends on um, what your area of focus is

• 1:59:56Speaker 06

  and then also uh, money is a big thing too. So that's why it's kind of hard to tell, especially for me at this point, whether I would stay within academia or pursue industry because a lot of the funding for this comes from like grants and like interest in that science topic. And so that is very ever evolving because like sometimes, you know, right now Mars maybe isn't as big of a topic within astrobiology as like Europa is. So it's kind of always evolving to what the, what the current most fascinating topic within the field is. And so um, you certainly kind of flow a little bit with it.

• 2:00:32Danny Jones?

  And where do most of the grants come from?

• 2:00:34Speaker 06

  Um, some, a lot of them are like NASA grants. So like um, kind of the NASA budget also determines a lot of that and like which division within NASA you fall into. So you can apply for, for NASA grants. Um, sometimes there's um, more just like general science grants like NSF, um, kind of just funding a certain science interest. So that's kind of the main areas to, to look into.

• 2:00:59Danny Jones?

  What about like companies like Lockheed or, or um, like the Aerospace Corporation or any of these types of companies? Do they ever give grants to you guys?

• 2:01:08Speaker 06

  Certainly, but it, it really again depends on like your science interest. So I mean, if you're working in like material science or like, for example, if, you know, because since engineers are so focused on like the actual equipment rather than like the actual direct science you get out of it, a lot of material science can certainly get like funding from those areas because you know, you're actually testing that uh, equipment in, in those environments. But um, as far as like direct science, a lot of that maybe not so much since the engineering is just the actual vehicle rather than like the actual task that will be, you know, happening in space.

• 2:01:41Danny Jones?

  Right, that makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. Thank you for doing this.

• 2:01:45Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:01:46Danny Jones?

  It's been fun.

• 2:01:47Speaker 06

  Yeah, love talking about space.

• 2:01:49Danny Jones?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. What, um, where can people find out more about you or like follow you? Do you have a website or anything like that?

• 2:01:56Speaker 06

  Um, yeah, so all of my like socia ls and everything is under NASA Blueberry. Um, so website as well, NASA Blueberry.

• 2:02:03Danny Jones?

  NASA Blueberry.

• 2:02:04Speaker 06

  NASA Blueberry.

• 2:02:04Danny Jones?

  That's your handle?

• 2:02:05Speaker 06

  That is my handle. Had it ever since I started, started social media, which honestly just started out as posting photos for the family. Um, but since I always had kind of an interest in, in space, I was kind of posting what me and my dad were up to over the summer and like camps and stuff. And Blueberry is kind of like a nickname. So call signs are really common within like the space industry where you get like assigned a call sign.

• 2:02:31Danny Jones?

  Right.

• 2:02:31Speaker 06

  Um, and you like, don't choose it. And whenever I was going to, to space camp, I wanted one of like the blue flight suits that I saw everyone wearing, but I couldn't fit in any of them. So my dad bought this like knockoff, really dark shade of blue and I really stuck out. And so everyone started calling me Blueberry and it like stuck and everyone just kind of kept, oh, look, Blueberry's back. And so it just kind of naturally became, became a nickname.

• 2:02:54Danny Jones?

  I love it. That's very, that's very cool. Well, I hope you can find out if, uh, the UFOs and the aliens are real and let us know. Please let me know. Don't keep it a secret.

• 2:03:04Speaker 06

  I'll certainly keep you updated when I figure it out. I certainly think, uh, as far as like finding something out there, I think microbes are going to be the first thing that we find, so.

• 2:03:14Danny Jones?

  Yes, well, microbe counts to me, that's in my book, that's an alien.

• 2:03:17Speaker 06

  I agree.

• 2:03:17Danny Jones?

  So let me know.

• 2:03:18Speaker 06

  I will.

• 2:03:19Danny Jones?

  Awesome. Thanks again for doing this.

• 2:03:20Speaker 06

  Thank you.

• 2:03:21Danny Jones?

  All right. Good night, everybody.