The BBC is reporting that Lunar Mission One are crowd funding a project to land a robotic probe on the Moon.
A British-led consortium has outlined its plans to land a robotic probe on the Moon in 10 years' time.
Its aim is to raise £500m for the project from donations by the public.
In return, donors would be able to have photos, text and their DNA included in a time capsule which will be buried under the lunar surface.
Lunar Mission One aims to survey the Moon's south pole to see if a human base can be set up in the future.
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(Score: 2) by dublet on Wednesday November 19 2014, @02:43PM
Not sure I understand the need to people to have their DNA or photo on the moon but regardless of that their initial target of £600k doesn't seem like much money given the context, nor is it a big chunk of the £500m they need. They'll need 834 kickstarters if that's the rate at which they're aiming to raise funds.
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome. [dublet.org]"
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Wednesday November 19 2014, @03:03PM
I want my DNA to be dug up a million years from now by the next species and cloned!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 19 2014, @03:15PM
Good luck with that [nature.com]
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday November 19 2014, @03:44PM
There is the interesting assumption that by the time they launch this beast, which is probably not next week, full sequencing will be "cheap" "affordable" and probably another area of NSA surveillance (He's got patriotic genes! Thats a pre-crime! Missile him before he gets us!)
So its probably easier to ship a sequenced genome than little test tubes.
Of course how do you store a recorded genome such that it decays slower than DNA. Thats a whole nother problem. Not a flash drive LOL charge will leak away in years or months with the higher radiation load. I suppose optical? Some future "ultraviolet-ray disks" that distribute 3-d pr0n might have enough space.
(Score: 2) by scruffybeard on Wednesday November 19 2014, @03:49PM
Your article suggested that DNA could be readable for up to 1.5m years, meeting his 1m year expectation.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Wednesday November 19 2014, @09:14PM
Well I wasn' t really serious but your article does say 1.5 million years before the DNA is unreadable so I guess I am all set! I just need to be sure there are lots of copies of everything as there will certainly be holes.
Also, it says that the main culprit is water. How much water will the contents of this lunar time capsule be exposed to? It looks to me like this article is mostly about how DNA degrades in a natural earthly environment. It is totally applicable to finding DNA of extinct animals in fossils. I'm not convinced it applies at all to DNA carefully stored in a time capsule burried 20 meters under the lunar surface.
Oh.. and before anyone says radiation or cosmic rays present at the lunar surface let me repeat... "burried 20 meters under the lunar surface".
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Wednesday November 19 2014, @04:48PM
A lot of people that grew up in the 60s through 80s thought that there was a good chance one day they'd be taking a holiday on the moon. This is the closest they're likely to get.
Those that grew up in the 90s and 00s know that it just won't happen thanks
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday November 19 2014, @03:53PM
look to amsat to see if its reasonable. In summary, yes, it seems to be.
Phase 3D was a semi-commercial launch and was $5M, and reportedly if all the donated / borrowed / scavenged / volunteered stuff and labor was properly accounted for it cost about $80M to build, at least thats the rumor. And there were serious operational issues.
The thermal and telemetry environment is much tougher. On the other hand unlike a AMSAT communications satellite they don't seem to plan to "do" anything other than some telemetry and cargo delivery, which makes life a little easier. The thermal environment on the moon itself must be hell, not to mention the electrical issues with being in the dark for half a month. So after it lands whatever is there isn't going to operate for long, regardless of what they may desire.
I'd estimate they could do it today for $500M with maybe 75% chance of success or launch five each with only 50:50 odds but that boosts overall mission success to virtually certain.
As for funding, again look to amsat. Those guys are the original FOSS fundraising model in that it seems impossible they'll ever pull it off, but somehow they keep paying the bills, mission after mission. I suspect these guys could pull off their $500M goal.
I wonder if they're already talking to AMSAT about a team mission or cost sharing, if not just plain old telemetry.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 19 2014, @06:38PM
s/t