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NASA will pay you up to $750,000 to come up with a way to turn CO2 into other molecules on Mars
Missions to Mars will need to be as lean as possible, meaning that using any available resources on the Red Planet will be of utmost importance. With that in mind, NASA just announced the CO2 Conversion Challenge, which asks teams of scientists and inventors to come up with a way to turn CO2 into molecules that can be used to produce all manner of things. And there's big prize money on the line.
To start, NASA is asking teams to focus on converting CO2 to Glucose, but the language of the challenge suggests you can approach that goal from any angle you wish.
[...] Teams or individuals who want to participate will need to register by January 24, 2019, and then officially apply by February 28. Experts will review each plan and award up to $250,000 spread across up to five individuals or teams.
The next phase of the competition is still a bit light on details. NASA says it'll announce the rules and criteria once Phase 1 is complete, but the administration has revealed that it's ready to award up to $750,000 to the individual, team, or teams that can demonstrate that their system(s) work as intended and could be used by astronauts on Mars.
"Future planetary habitats on Mars will require a high degree of self-sufficiency," NASA explains. "This requires a concerted effort to both effectively recycle supplies brought from Earth and use local resources such as CO2, water and regolith to manufacture mission-relevant products. Human life support and habitation systems will treat wastewater to make drinking water, recover oxygen from CO2, convert solid wastes to useable products, grow food, and specially design equipment and packaging to allow reuse in alternate forms."
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:33PM (2 children)
Lots of problems are going to have to be solved, if there is to be a viable base, let alone a colony, on Mars. This is a good start. Define a problem, then make it public, and offer rewards for solutions. Your name doesn't have to be Musk or Bezos to come up with some critical solution to a seemingly insoluble problem. All that is required is a modest to an excellent education, and the ability to think outside the box. (Said education should probably be STEM related - but maybe the "soft sciences" will offer something worthwhile?)
This makes me believe that NASA is getting serious.
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(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:42AM
If this is an indication that NASA is serious about Mars, then they've been serious about space elevators for nearly 20 years now.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:52PM
Come on, has the "soft sciences" ever offered anything worthwhile before?