SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
NASA wants to uncover the mystery behind the asteroid “16 Psyche.” that may contain a priceless treasure trove of minerals. “We’ve been to all the different planets, we’ve been to other asteroids. But we’ve never visited a body that has been made of entirely metal,” said Carol Polanskey, project scientist for the Psyche mission. Now NASA, led by researchers at Arizona State University, plans to send an unmanned spacecraft to orbit 16 Psyche – an asteroid roughly the size of Massachusetts, made of iron and other precious metals. The mission’s leader estimates that the iron alone on today’s market would be worth $10,000 quadrillion.
Previously: NASA Selects Two Missions to Visit Asteroids
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
NASA Asteroid Mission -- Metals "Worth" Ten Thousand Quadrillion Dollars
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 70 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Moon, n.:
1. A celestial object whose phase is very important to hackers. See
PHASE OF THE MOON. 2. Dave Moon (MOON@MC).
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 20 2017, @03:41AM
The iron in earth's core has little if any value. It's difficult to get at, not to mention that getting to it would involve processes that are probably going to damage the ecosystem. Not to mention - we don't really need a lot more iron on earth.
Far more profitable to mine that iron in space, outside of the gravity well - then USE IT in space.
Build the foundries and factories right there, on the asteroid. Construct a habitat with the materials mined from the asteroid. All that is required are some people, some water, some oxygen - just build the colony on or beside the asteroid, and go into business selling hi-tech stuff to people who want to explore the rest of the solar system.
No need to drop all that stuff on the earth.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 20 2017, @04:08AM
just build the colony on or beside the asteroid
Or, even better, inside the asteroid. Kilometers of free radiation shielding, and the more you mine, the more living/manufacturing space you have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 20 2017, @04:59AM
But zero access to Facebook not even Facebook Zero. Life without social media is not living.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 20 2017, @02:29PM
Hmm, currently 20.6 light minutes away. We'll have to route over DTN [nasa.gov], but I bet it could be done. Maybe hook up a proxy Earth-side vacuum up the AJAXy crap, transmit one blob, and have a server at 16 Psyche decompress and present the relevant URLs over TCP+HTTP locally.
Though perhaps a simple RSS feed would work better. Perhaps bridge Freenet over DTN so it can lazy-fetch content you might want over the 41 minute round trip then freely browse from the 16 Psyche node.
All is not lost!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 20 2017, @03:06PM
I really don't think Facebook is all that time sensitive. It's hardly any more time sensitive than discussions right here, on Soylent. You comment while the Aussies are asleep, few hours later, they post their comments on your comment, that Asians comment whenever they feel like it, etc, ad nauseum. The time lag would in no way affect our ability to carry on a conversation, here, or on Facefook.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 20 2017, @05:07AM
I'm pretty sure the post was being sarcastic, Admiral Aspergers.