Through my research, I found that a trip to Mars is in a much more advanced state than I originally thought. I have realized that a successful trip to mars could unveil secrets that scientist have been waiting for. For years there has been successful drone missions to Mars. These missions have collected tons of data and we used that data to determine that we could in fact travel to mars.

The first article is titled, "Manned Mission to Mars By 2030s is Really Possible" by Miriam Kramer. I believe starting with this article is important because it lays out the timeline on when an actual mission will be possible. The basis of this article is on the ideas of a group of more than thirty government, industry, and academic experts who evaluated if a mission to mars is realistic. These experts came up with an achievable solution to restore the budget to "pre-sequestration" levels, so that a trip to mars is attainable. Chris Carberry, the executive director of Explore Mars Inc., states that, for a flight to Mars to even be possible NASA would need to reevaluate their budget. From 2012 to 2013 NASAs budget was cut from seventy six billion to less than eighteen billion dollars. A flight will never be able to happen under the government's budget restraints. NASA is not the only one capable of a mission to mars. Mars One, a private company is working on colonizing the planet. They are planning to send an unmanned shuttle in 2018. NASA, Boeing, Orbital Sciences Corp. and people attending the Affording Mars Workshop came up with six agreements that space agencies could use to plan a mission to mars. These agreements range from using the International Space station to preform deep space missions, continuous missions of robotic exploration through the 2020s, to the idea that human exploration could be possible by the 30s. If we used the International Space Station as a model and implemented the same idea of an "international" space flight, a mission could be possible.  The international space station could have been cut off years ago, but because of international treaties and agreements it is still here.

The article titled, "NASA Craft Is Orbiting Mars, to Study Its Air," by Kenneth Chang is my second article. The article is about MAVEN and its mission plan. The article is aimed at your average person who doesn't know much about the topic. MAVEN short for Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission is the space probe that was sent to Mars. It will be observing and analyzing the planet in a few different ways. It arrived to the planet on September 21, 2014. MAVEN will be orbiting mars to study the planets atmosphere and water. The probe is orbiting earth on a thirty-five hour loop. "The spacecraft is to spend five days observing how the comet's dust, traveling at 125,000 miles per hour, might heat up and expand Mars' atmosphere, and how water ice from the comet might bump up the levels of hydrogen."(Chang) Increased levels of hydrogen are one step of many to a habitable planet. On October 19th, the probe will be within 82,000 miles and sensors on the craft with activate and observe the planet. At one point in the planets past, the environment was a lot warmer and was a lot wetter according to Dr. Jakosky, a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado. Since then the air has thinned out which in turn left the planet very cold and dry. Scientist will study the upper atmosphere to observe how quickly the atmosphere is diminishing.

"After a Two-Year Trek, NASA's Mars Rover Reaches Its Mountain Lab" by Kenneth Chang aimed at people who are curious about what is happening up on Mars. The rover that is on Mars is called, Curiosity. One of Curiosity's main objectives was to look for microbes on an ancient lake. Microbes are single cell organisms and without them on earth humans cannot breathe. Scientist now are conducting research hoping to find carbon-based compounds. The compounds can be found inside rocks and studying them could have "served as the building block for life"(Chang). The rover has taken on a new mission to travel to Mount Sharp to study different rock levels. The rover encountered a rock that was high in silicon content. That rock at one point was altered by water, which means there actually was water on this planet. Finding evidence of water on the planet isn't much of a big find anymore. But more and more finding mean that there may have been a lot more water than what we thought or predicted.

On a different view we can look at "International Space Station Gets Life Extension through 2024." This article is important because the space station could prove to be a huge asset for the future of long distance space flight. This article is written for a vast audience. The space station was given a extension through the year 2024. The space station can run experiments for testing different hypothesis for space flight. There was a projection that the space station would be shut down in 2020. New information has emerged and now scientist project that the space station is to be useful well past the 2020 mark. Some say it could still be in use by 2028. The space station has an annual 3 billion dollar budget that will last through the extension. In my opinion the space station should be replaced with a newer more advanced space station capable of housing a lot more astronauts and scientist. Because of the extension the United States may no longer have to partner with the Russians when sending Americans to space, on Soyuz, the Russian spacecraft that taxis to and from the space station. The United States is looking to buy flights from U.S. companies around the 2017 mark. "Several companies, such as SpaceX, Boeing, Sierra Nevada and Blue Origin, are developing vehicles to view for NASA space taxi-contracts." The only reason the United States has not switched to the American companies is because they are bound by a contract through 2016 on Russian Soyuz. Because of limitability the United States will be purchasing seats on Russian Soyuz past 2016 as well.

The article, "NASA to Test Making Oxygen, Key to Rocket Fuel, on Mars" by Associated Press, focuses on the production of oxygen on the planet Mars. By using the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the planet, machines will be able to produce oxygen. Because a planned mission to mars is crucial, having a huge supply of oxygen on another planet is a big factor in survival. Since the machine cant produce enough oxygen for a steady state, NASA plans on sending a machine called Moxie, two years before they plan on sending up the astronauts. The oxygen they make is also used for making rocket fuel. One of rocket fuels main element is oxygen. The rocket fuel will actually be made by Moxie, enough for their safe return home. This article proves that technology is an advanced state passed what some believed. Who would have thought that rocket fuel could be made by an unmanned machine or robot in another planet. Astonishing what accomplishments have been made for the advancement of exploration of space.

The article, "From India, Proof That a Trip to Mars Doesn't Have to Break the Bank" by Saritha Rai, focuses on why a flight to mars is cost efficient. India's most recent launch of their satellite only cost them seventy-five million dollars. NASA's mission, MAVEN is a similar project that cost a massive 671 million dollars. Granted NASA's satellite has three more instruments compared to India's five. The instruments on India's satellite are to study and measure methane gas. NASA's Maven studies the failure of the Martian climate. Because India only gets 0.34 percent of the country's annual outlay they only receive one billion dollars. The Indian Space Research Organization, or ISRO, has made due with what they are given. India has to participate in the space race on a huge budget. The ISRO saves the most money in low-cost engineering. "India's abundant supply of young technical talent helped rein in personnel costs to less than 15 percent of the budget."(AP) Lower level engineers make around $250 per week, way less than NASA engineers. Having a shorter development schedule rules out a lot of the cost as well. The entire project was completed in 18 months. They had to act quickly because they didn't want to miss the 26-month window where the Sun, Mars and Earth are line up for a launch to Mars.  Little time went into the testing of models, which is hard to believe that this mission had success.  "The building blocks are kept the same so we don't have to tailor-make for each mission" said Mr. Annadurai of the moon mission. A lot of people were upset that India has even spent a dime on space flight when their country starves. Mr. Narasimha, an aerospace scientist said, "My guess in that even the poorest Indians will happily forgo their chai to be able to see their country send a rocket all the way to Mars." I agree with Mr. Narasimha, people are happy with the success of their country and space success is something to be proud of.

The next article is, "A Habitable Environment of Martian Volcano?" published by Brown University. This article talks about the chance of past life on the planet Mars. Underneath a massive glacier is a volcano and 210 million years ago scientist predicted that that volcano erupted resulting in the melting of the glacier that "would have created substantial amounts of liquid water on Mars's surface." (Brown) The melting of the glaciers would have created englacial lakes. It is a lot younger than you may think; the lake is 250 million years old while the site is roughly 2.5 billion years old. "The fact that the Arsia Mons site is relatively young makes it an interesting target for the possible future exploration." Kat Scanlon, a graduate student at Brown used data to determine that lava erupted when there were oceans present. She found that the lava had similar characteristic compared to lava on earth when it interacts on top on water.

My last article, "Huge Mars Colony Eyed by SpaceX founder Elon Musk" by Rob Coppinger. Elon Musk CEO of SpaceX wants to start a colony of 80,000 people. The cost of the trip is valued at $500,000. The trip would start out at just roughly 10 people who would set up equipment to produce for example atmospheric C02 that can grow Earths plants in the mars soil. "As the Mars colony became more self sufficient the big rocket would start to transport more people and fewer supplies and equipment." (Coppinger) Musk hinted at the use of the Mass Cargo Transport, or MCT to transport people to the planet. In my opinion $500,000 is a lot of money, but you are getting to travel and live on another planet. So to me $500,000 is actually an affordable number. Musk says that " the ticket price needs to be low enough that most people in advanced countries, in their mid-forties or something like that, could put together enough money to make the trip." For the colonization of the Americas it took a large amount of money to get things started. $36 billion is what the total cost of the mission is. "Some money has to be spent on establishing a base on Mars. It's about getting the basic fundamentals in place," said Musk. This article was focused on the average middle class person who may or may not have been interested in space travel. I think it is targeting these people because the company wants a well-established group of people to get to experience another planet. I also believe the goal is to send people who are able to colonize and make a family.

All of these articles play a huge part in the success of a mission to mars its potential for colonization. The last article on the colonization really hit me the most. To think that in around 10 years humans could be living on Mars is astonishing to me. The other article that interests me the most the one about India and it cost efficiency space program. They have done something remarkable. They had a successful mission to mars while doing it basically with no money.

I believe that some of these sources will be useful in my final project. They will be useful because I find the information to be accurate and interesting. The topics also vary for one thing to the next. For instance they range from India's space budget to the colonization of mars. Although all these things revolve around Mars, they are varied based on their specific details and ideas.
