Podcasts about nasa haughton mars project

It has been nearly a month since NASA’s Perseverance rover landed on Mars. So far, the rover hasn’t detected any signs of past life on the planet. But scientists have determined that several of the rocks on Mars are chemically similar to volcanic rocks on Earth. This, of course, has caused quite a bit of buzz. So, the double-secret-selection committee decided it was a perfect time to invite the chairman of the Mars Institute onto the show to get his take on the Perseverance and the Mars Mission so far. Actually, this is Dr. Pascal Lee’s second appearance on STEM-Talk. Pascal is a planetary scientist and director of the NASA Haughton-Mars Project at NASA Ames Research Center who was our guest in 2016 on episode 17.  Back then we talked to Pascal about his annual visits to the High Arctic’s Devon Island, which is the Earth’s largest uninhabited land that has geological characteristics similar to what scientists believe we will find on Mars. Today we catch up with Pascal and his Haughton-Mars Project. We also talk to him about Perseverance and a host of other Mars-related topics. We ask Pascal if he thinks we’ll find signs of life on Mars, or if he believes we will ever find signs of alien life in our galaxy. We also get Pascal’s thoughts about future manned missions to Mars and whether humans will ever colonize the Red Planet. And after listening to today’s interview, be sure to check out Pascal’s artwork and his recent paintings of Mars. Show notes: 00:03:15 Dawn opens the interview welcoming Pascal back to STEM-Talk, mentioning that the last time he was on the podcast he was about to spend his 20th consecutive summer on Devon Island, the Earth’s largest uninhabited land with geological characteristics similar to what Pascal believes we will find on Mars. Dawn goes on to mention that due to COVID-19, last year’s trip to Devon Island was canceled and asks him about his disappointment. 00:05:11 Ken asks if Pascal is confident that he’ll return to Devon Island this coming summer. 00:05:36 Dawn mentions that it takes several stops and trips to reach Devon Island. She asks who makes those travel arrangements and how the journey plays out. 00:08:25 Ken asks about Pascal’s polar bear guard dog, Apollo, inquiring as the protocol when Apollo alerts the team about a nearby polar bear. 00:10:48 Dawn mentions the Webby Award-winning documentary filmed by a team at Google who came to visit Pascal on Devon Island in 2018 called “Mars on Earth: A Visit to Devon Island”. Dawn asks Pascal what he thought of the documentary. 00:12:20 Ken asks Pascal to elaborate on the space suit that he was planning to test on Devon Island last summer but couldn’t because the trip was canceled. 00:16:39 Dawn asks about the glove Pascal wants to test that may enable single-handed drone operation. 00:20:11 Dawn mentions that the atmosphere of Mars is around 60 times less dense than the Earth’s. She asks Pascal about the challenges of flying a drone on Mars. 00:22:15 Dawn asks Pascal to elaborate on his recommendation that scientists study the Inuit culture and history in relation to long-duration space travel. 00:26:01 Ken mentions NASA’s Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in February and relates that Steve Jurczyk, the NASA acting administrator, described Perseverance’s landing on Mars as a pivotal moment for the United States and space exploration. Given that NASA has landed rovers on Mars before, Ken asks Pascal what makes this particular landing especially significant. 00:28:10 Dawn mentions that NASA recently released recordings of the Perseverance rover driving on the surface of Mars. Dawn goes on to ask what the particular significance is of the audios. 00:29:41 Dawn asks what NASA means when it describes Perseverance as a “robotic astrobiologist.” 00:32:36 Ken asks Pascal to discuss the Mars helicopter, Ingenuity, that made its flight to mars attached to the belly of Perseverance.

This is Part II. Dr. Pascal Lee is a planetary scientist with the SETI Institute. He’s also Chairman of the Mars Institute, and Director of the NASA Haughton-Mars Project at NASA Ames Research Center. His research includes the history of water on Mars and planning future human exploration of Mars. Pascal has a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Space Sciences from Cornell University. In Part I, we chatted about his background and how he became a planetary scientist. We had just started discussing the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), when an internet outage stopped us cold. So I invited Pascal to return for Part II and discuss his analysis of the Drake Equation and its implications for the existence of other advanced, intelligent life in our galaxy.

Dr. Pascal Lee is a planetary scientist with the SETI Institute. He’s also Chairman of the Mars Institute, and Director of the NASA Haughton-Mars Project at NASA Ames Research Center. His research includes the history of water on Mars and planning future human exploration of Mars. Pascal has a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Space Sciences from Cornell University. We chatted about how he spent his very early years in Hong Kong, inspired by American and British SciFi TV shows. Later, he migrated to Paris where he continued his education and, inspired by Dr. Carl Sagan, made his way to Cornell in the 1990s. He was Dr. Sagan’s last teaching assistant. Next, we talked about his trips to the remote Canadian island, Devon, to study Mars-like conditions. We wrapped up with an introduction to his thoughts on SETI.

Dr. Pascal Lee is not the first Renaissance man to be interview on STEM-Talk, but his impressive biography merits that moniker. “An artist, helicopter pilot, polar researcher, planetary scientist, and a pioneer in thinking about possible human futures in space,” as described by IHMC Director Ken Ford, Lee has an impressive list of accomplishments to his name. He is co-founder and chairman of the Mars Institute, director of the NASA Haughton-Mars Project at NASA Ames Research Center, and senior planetary scientist at the SETI Institute. Born in Hong Kong, he was sent to boarding school in Paris as a child, and later graduated from the University of Paris with a degree in geology and geophysics. During his year of civil service after college, he lived with 31 other men in Antarctica—a formative experience that gave him a thirst for field work and hands-on exploration. As Lee himself says in this interview, “Forever in my life there will be before and after Antarctica.” Lee went on to study astronomy and space science at Cornell University, where he was also Carl Sagan’s teacher’s assistant. He then did a post-doc at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, where he has been ever since. He continues to search for “new life” in the universe, with a particular interest in preparing for future exploration of Mars. This summer marks Lee’s twentieth summer field trip on Devon Island, the largest uninhabited earth with geological evidence similar to what Lee suspects would be found on Mars. Lee is also the author of a children’s book, called Mission: Mars, about what it would take for humans to travel to the planet. He is also currently working on a book for adults addressing similar questions. Several of Lee’s lectures are available on YouTube, or at his page on the SETI website: http://www.seti.org/users/pascal-lee. His personal web site is http://www.pascallee.net. In this episode, STEM-Talk Host Dawn Kernagis and IHMC senior research scientist Tom Jones, also a veteran NASA astronaut, interview Lee. 00:49: Ken Ford describes Lee’s accomplishments, adding, “Pascal and I share a passion for the moons of Mars—especially Phobos.” 2:10: Ford reads a 5-star iTunes review from “podcast file”: “The STEM-Talk podcast is a must listen. I appreciate how the format of a podcast stays focused and on topic. It is packed with outstanding content that lives up to its name. I truly found useful information and perspectives that impacts how I understand and see the world.” 3:57: Lee describes his upbringing in a Hong Kong that was booming. His father was ethnically Chinese, and his mother was French. As a child, he was sent to boarding school in France—without yet knowing how to speak French. “I started a new life at age eight. I stayed there for fifteen years.” 5:10: He always loved space travel. “I thought that was really inspiring and exciting. It wasn’t just the travel itself. [It was also the fact that there was] more to the universe than what we had on earth. Mars came into the picture a little later, as a teenager. That’s when I got serious about becoming a scientist.” 6:05: Carl Sagan’s book Cosmic Connection “really changed my life at the time…. From that day on, I decided that the planetary sciences were what I wanted to do. The rest was easy because once you have a goal and a focus, it makes a lot of decisions for you.” 6:38: Lee studied science and physics at the University of Paris. He spent his obligatory year of national service in Antarctica. 7:30: “On my way South [to Antarctica], I posted a letter to one graduate school—where Carl Sagan taught. In the middle of winter, I get this Telex from Cornell that I’d gotten in.” 8:28: Lee says his 402 days at a station in Antarctica “was an other-worldly experience. We were 31 people. All men. Forever in my life there will be before and after Antarctica.” 9:48: He went on his first helicopter ride off the coast of Antarctic...

We all may prefer the goldilocks zone – not too hot, not too cold. But most of the universe is bitterly cold. We can learn a lot about it if we're willing to brave a temperature drop. A chilly Arctic island is the closest thing to Mars-on-Earth for scientists who want to go to the Red Planet. Meanwhile, the ice sheet at the South Pole is ideal for catching neutrinos – ghostly particles that may reveal secrets about the nature of the universe. Comet ISON is comet ice-off after its passage close to the Sun, but it's still giving us the word on solar system's earliest years. Also, scientists discover the coldest spot on Earth. A champion chill, but positively balmy compared to absolute zero. Why reaching a temperature of absolute zero is impossible, although we've gotten very, very close. Guests: Francis Halzen – Physicist, University of Wisconsin-Madison, principal investigator of The IceCube Neutrino Observatory Ted Scambos – Glaciologist, lead scientist, National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado Pascal Lee – Planetary scientist, SETI Institute, director, NASA Haughton-Mars Project, and co-founder of the Mars Institute. His new book is Mission: Mars Andrew Fraknoi – Chair, astronomy department, Foothill College Vladan Vuletić – Physicist, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Descripción en español Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We all may prefer the goldilocks zone – not too hot, not too cold. But most of the universe is bitterly cold. We can learn a lot about it if we’re willing to brave a temperature drop. A chilly Arctic island is the closest thing to Mars-on-Earth for scientists who want to go to the Red Planet. Meanwhile, the ice sheet at the South Pole is ideal for catching neutrinos – ghostly particles that may reveal secrets about the nature of the universe. Comet ISON is comet ice-off after its passage close to the Sun, but it’s still giving us the word on solar system’s earliest years. Also, scientists discover the coldest spot on Earth. A champion chill, but positively balmy compared to absolute zero. Why reaching a temperature of absolute zero is impossible, although we’ve gotten very, very close. Guests: Francis Halzen – Physicist, University of Wisconsin-Madison, principal investigator of The IceCube Neutrino Observatory Ted Scambos – Glaciologist, lead scientist, National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado Pascal Lee – Planetary scientist, SETI Institute, director, NASA Haughton-Mars Project, and co-founder of the Mars Institute. His new book is Mission: Mars Andrew Fraknoi – Chair, astronomy department, Foothill College Vladan Vuletić – Physicist, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Descripción en español