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Tiffany Montague (New Business Development Manager, Google) talks about her experience on Devon Island this season with the Haughton-Mars Project.
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Copyright 2010 Mars Institute
July HMP 2010 archives | August HMP 2010 archives
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| Copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
Much of the camp was out in the field today. The The K10 robot team led by Dr Matthew Dean (NASA Ames) set up networking at locale 9. Dr Perry Johnson-Green and Lauren Artman (both ecologists at CSA) had a short day out after breakfast and were back by mid afternoon. Kelsey Young and Byron Adams (both Ph.D. candidates at ASU) went to a new location in the Haughton impact structure. Dr Steve Hoffman (NASA JSC) spent a long day out in the field, assisted by [yours truly] Elaine Walker (E/PO, Mars Institute).
Star Amarualik flew back to Resolute Bay out today. She will be training as a canadian ranger. We wish her well!
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
Dr Steve Hoffman (NASA JSC) is making steady progress in the field. Today he was assisted by Vicky Glass (Fire Captain / HMP safety officer).
Dr Valerie Meyers (NASA JSC) continued with her medical immunology research with the help of willing HMP participants.
Dr Perry Johnson-Green and Lauren Artman (both ecologists at CSA) had a good day collecting and analyzing more samples.
Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier (both of Hamilton Sundstrand) finished with the last test subject, collecting feedback on the concept suit ports. They will be packing up this evening with the help of Jesse Weaver and Travis Oaks (camp technicians).
We had two very enjoyable lectures this evening, including the CRUX team who presented as a group, and the two men of Hamilton Sundstrand.
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
The Hamilton Sundstrand team, Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, had another day of extensive testing of their new concept suit ports on the Mars-1 Humvee Rover. Several more very willing HMP participants lent themselves as suit port subjects.
The CRUX drill team: Dr Brian Glass (Senior Scientist, Drilling Automation, NASA Ames), Dr Sarah Thompson (NASA Ames), Shannon Statham (Georgia Tech, Ph.D. student) and Mateusz Szczesiak (Honeybee Robotics) succeeded in their goals of detecting potential failure modes and taking corrective action. The team also succeeded in imaging the bore hole.
Dr Stephen Braham (Chief Field Engineer and Associate Director, HMP / SFU) has completed the setup of the dishes and got the C-band online, which will be tested with NASA Ames tomorrow.
Dr Steve Hoffman (NASA JSC) had a good day out in the field taking slope measurements until the fog and rain moved in.
Dr Perry Johnson-Green (plant ecologist, CSA) and Lauren Artman (general ecologist, CSA) had a great day collecting samples for their research and look forward to another full day tomorrow.
Kira Lorber (Mars Institute, HMP Logistics Manager) introduces herself from the top of a hill near the HMP Base Camp on Devon Island.
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Copyright 2010 Mars Institute
July HMP 2010 archives | August HMP 2010 archives
Byron Adams is a fourth year Ph.D. candidate at the Arizona State University School of Earth and Space Exploration. His primary research focuses on utilizing thermochronology, cosmogenic radionuclide dating, and structural and geomorphological mapping to study the tectonic history and geomorphology of the Bhutan Himalaya. He is advised by Kip Hodges, Kelin Whipple and Arjun Heimsath.
Byron has a B.S. in Geology from Ball State University in Indiana and a M.S. in Geology from the University of Cincinnati in Ohio. While at Cincinnati, he worked in the Lahul Himalaya of northern India investigating exhumation and river incision rates with Craig Dietsch and Lewis Owen.
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Byron Adams
School of Earth and Space Exploration
Arizona State University
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Credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project
July HMP 2010 Archives: www.marsonearth.org/2010/07/
August HMP 2010 archives: www.marsonearth.org/2010/08/
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
Dr Valerie Meyers (NASA JSC) is continuing her medical immunology research taking cortezol measurements from willing HMP participants.
The K10 robot team: Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz (all of NASA Ames) had a very successful day, and has pulled down the tent at their current location. They will be moving to the next one. Their team was supported by Jesse Weaver (camp technician) and his assistant, Travis Oaks.
Kelsey Young and Byron Adams (both Ph.D. candidates at ASU) traversed to Breccia Cliffs and made good progress with their research on the Haughton impact structure. Their traverse was supported by Ben Audlaluk from Grise Fiord.
Dr Perry Johnson-Green (planet ecologist, CSA) and Lauren Artman (general ecologist, CSA) completed 55 sample points today.
The Hamilton Sundstrand team, Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, continued testing the concept suit ports on the Mars-1 Humvee Rover. Several HMP participants lent themselves as suit port subjects as Ron and Todd are gathered valuable feedback.
Star Amarualik (from Resolute Bay) and Kira Lorber (Mars Institute, Logistics Manager) flew back to camp today, and Peter Eckalook (from Resolute Bay). Tiffany Montague (New Business Development Manager at Google) and Peter Eckalook (from Resolute Bay) will be with us one more day due to weather in Resolute.
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
The Hamilton Sundstrand team, Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, began extensive testing of their new concept suit ports on the Mars-1 Humvee Rover.
Dr Perry Johnson-Green (planet ecologist, CSA) and his assistant, Lauren Artman (general ecologist, CSA), had a great day and took 40 of their sampling points. They have a few more busy days planned in the field.
Kelsey Young is a geologist in the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. Kelsey earned her undergraduate degree in geology from the University of Notre Dame where she studied Earth-based analogs for Mars. Specifically, she conducted fieldwork to study the interactions of lava and water in conjunction with examining similar features on the surface of Mars. While completing this work, she became interested in using terrestrial analogs to work on issues associated with manned space exploration. Kelsey is now working on her Ph.D. in geology, and is pursuing this interest by combining geology with the logistics of planetary surface exploration.
Working in terrestrial analog sites like Haughton Mars Project gives her first-hand experience on active processes happening on other planetary surfaces. While at HMP- 2010, Kelsey will be collecting impact breccia samples from inside the crater in order to date the age of the impact using (U-Th)/He thermochronology.
Kelsey is currently working under one of NASA’s Graduate Student Researcher Program’s (GSRP) Fellowships, so she is working closely with NASA Johnson Space Center on incorporating a spectrometer into the Desert RATS field test (another analog test run by NASA). She will be supporting D-RATS as both a member of the sciencebackroom, and as one of four geologist crewmembers for the test.
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Kelsey Young
School of Earth and Space Exploration
Arizona State University
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Credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project
July HMP 2010 Archives: www.marsonearth.org/2010/07/
August HMP 2010 archives: www.marsonearth.org/2010/08/
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
Dr Steve Hoffman (NASA Ames), Dr Pascal Lee (Director of HMP / NASA Ames, Mars Institute, SETI Institute), Tiffany Montague (Google) and Jesse Weaver (technician) set up the Iridium Deep Field Data Transmitter at Constellation Hill, outside of the Haughton impact structure.
The CRUX drill automation team, Dr Brian Glass (Senior Scientist, Drilling Automation, NASA Ames), Dr Sarah Thompson (NASA Ames), Shannon Statham (Georgia Tech, Ph.D. student) and Mateusz Szczesiak (Honeybee Robotics), at Drill Hill, tested automated recovery from drilling faults for 3 of the 5 planned for this season, while reaching 1m depth on their first borehole. The control software and prototype drill is being proposed for a 2016 Discovery mission to the northern polar region of Mars. Another success today was the first operational field test of an extremely-compact and durable downhole imager, which returned images from several depths in the Haughton impact breccia.
Dr Matthew Deans is the Deputy Group Lead of the Intelligent Robotics Group (IRG), in the Intelligent Systems Division (Code TI), at NASA Ames Research Center. He has significant experience in Field Robotics, participating in field experiments in Antarctica, the Arctic, Atacama Desert, Canadian Rockies, and several sites in the continental US. He was the field team lead for the K10 test at Haughton Crater, Nunavut Canada, in July 2007 and again in July 2010. The K10 experiment is looking at how to use robots to augment human space exploration. The K10 will follow up on field work done by humans by adding additional surveys, context imaging, 3-dimensional scanning, and in situ analytical instruments. These measurements will complement and extend the investigations that were started by field geologists last year.
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Credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project
July HMP 2010 archives | August HMP 2010 archives
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| copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
The K10 team from NASA Ames, Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, led by Dr Matthew Dean, scouted the site B location and made some upgrades to prepare the robot for more follow up missions.
The Hamilton Sundstrand team, Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, finalized and assemble the suit ports and stairs on the Mars-1 Humvee Rover. They fitted the suit and stairs for the geologist, Kelsey Young, who will be conducting EVAs in the suit. Kelsey is a Ph.D. candidate at Arizona State University, in the School of Earth and Space Exploration.
There were several new arrivals today, including Kira Lorber of the Mars Institute. Kira is the HMP Logistics Manager for the Mars Institute and typically works out of Resolute Bay during the HMP seasons. She has just had her first meal at camp!
Two of Star's uncles, Paul Amarualik and Joe Amarualik (former HMP deputy base camp manager) flew in and stayed part of the day before departing again. Dr Brian Glass's sister, Vicky Glass, has arrived. She is a fire captain in Atlanta will be our safety officer this season and will working with Dr Valerie Meyers (NASA JSC) on her immunology study.
Other new arrivals were Dr Perry Johnson-Green and Lauren Artman, both ecologists from CSA, Steve Hoffman (NASA JSC), Tiffany Montague (Google), Dr Stephen Braham (Chief Field Engineer and Associate Director, HMP / SFU), and Stephen's assistants, Vik Kumar, Parna Niksirat and Isaiah Mandryk.
Nathan Kalluk and Star Amarualik flew back to their home town of Resolute Bay. We thank them for all of their hard work this season!
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| copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
The K10 team from NASA Ames, Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, led by Dr Matthew Dean, finished up at locale 8 on Von Braun Planitia, sending back data from the instruments, including a gigapan camera, LiDAR, microscopic imager, ground penetrating radar and an x-ray fluorescence spectrometer. Byron Adams and Kelsey Young analyzed the data. They are both Ph.D. candidates at ASU in the School of Earth and Space Exploration. All of Dr Mark Helper's objectives for robotic follow up were met at locale 8. Dr Helper is a Distinguished Senior Lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin.
The CRUX Drill team, led by Dr Brian Glass (Senior Scientist, Drilling Automation, NASA Ames), transfered and positioned a load of gear to a location near the drill site in the morning, and went out again after dinner to set up the drill tent and other equipment.
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
The K10 team from NASA Ames, Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, led by Dr Matthew Dean, drove the robot out to Von Braun Planitia. Thanks go to our camp chef, Jeff Fagen, for organizing lunch shifts for the K10 team so that they could work continuously.
The Hamilton Sundstrand team, Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, began installing the suit ports into the Mars-1 Humvee Rover. Thanks to Jesse Weaver and Travis Oaks (technicians) for helping.
After dinner, we celebrated Dr Brian Glass's 50th birthday! Dr Brian, from NASA Ames, was first involved with the HMP in 1998 and has not had a birthday at home since that year. Dr Brian's birthday has become somewhat of a mid-season ritual, which usually occurs at the peak of the season. He began work at HMP doing wireless communications for field science, and research with rovers, and in the last 5 or 6 years has focused on automated drills. This season he is continuing testing with the the CRUX (Construction Resource Utilization Explorer) Drill.
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| copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
Today was overcast with no precipitation.
Byron Adams and Kelsey Young, both in the Geology Department at ASU, traversed to Wyle Hill above Trinity Lake and collected samples of impact breccia. This is research they are doing in addition to working with the K10 robot team.
The K10 team from NASA Ames, Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, led by Dr Matthew Dean, set up a repeater at location 8 on Von Braun Planitia and have their robot nearly ready for testing.
The CRUX (Construction Resource Utilization Explorer) Drill team, Dr Brian Glass (Senior Scientist, Drilling Automation, NASA Ames), Dr Sarah Thompson (NASA Ames), Shannon Statham (Georgia Tech, Ph.D. student) and Mateusz Szczesiak (Honeybee Robotics), successfully tested their communication systems, scouted for locations and picked out a drilling site.
Thanks to Ben Audlaluk (from Grise Fiord) for supporting the traverses, and to Jesse Weaver (mechanic) and his assistant, Travis Oaks, for keeping the Kawasaki bikes in tip top shape.
Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier, both of Hamilton Sundstrand, have the two suit ports well underway. They will be installing them on the back of the Mars-1 Humvee Rover tomorrow.
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| copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
The K10 Robot team from NASA Ames, led by Dr Matthew Deans and including Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, tested instruments and components and traversed with the robot during a break in the weather. Kelsey Young and Byron Adams (both PhD students in the Geology Dept. at ASU) did traverse planning for this year's follow-up mission. The robot team will program the traverse coordinates into the robot accordingly.
The Arthur Clarke Mars Greenhouse team, Matt Bamsey (CSA), Talal Abboud (CSA) and Thomas Graham (Univ. of Guelph) wrapped up and packed and will be monitoring the greenhouse remotely until next HMP season. They departed this evening, along with Drs Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul (both faculty at the University of Florida).
The rest of the CRUX drill team: Dr Brian Glass (Senior Scientist, Drilling Automation, NASA Ames), Dr Sarah Thompson (NASA Ames) and Shannon Statham (Georgia Tech, Ph.D. student), arrived on Devon Island this evening. They reunited with their fourth team member, Mateusz Szczesiak (Honeybee Robotics), who has been at the HMP Research Station running tests as part of his research for Honeybee.
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| copyright 2010 Mars Institute |
The K10 Robot team from NASA Ames, led by Dr Matthew Deans and including Dr Trey Smith, Susan Lee, Vinh To, Eric Park and Dr Hans Utz, tested instruments and components and traversed with the robot during a break in the weather. Kelsey Young and Byron Adams (both PhD students in the Geology Dept. at ASU) did traverse planning for this year's follow-up mission. The robot team will program the traverse coordinates into the robot accordingly.
Ron Sidgreaves and Todd Glazier of Hamilton Sundstrand have almost completed the second suit and got started on the installation of two suit ports on the Mars-1 Humvee Rover; one for each back door. There will be some exciting research this season on this front.
This evening there were two lectures. The first was a dual talk by Drs Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul, both faculty at the University of Florida, in the area of space biology. It has been a very busy year for them, having flown life science experiments on various space missions. They have implemented a version of one of their experiments into the Arthur Clarke Mars Greenhouse.
Sean Alexander (Kawasaki) talked about the diverse history of Kawasaki, and also learned about his own colorful history and wide range of talents.
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
After brunch, Drs Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul (both faculty at the University of Florida) along with Kelsey Young and Byron Adams (both in the Geology Dept. at ASU), went to Drill Hill, Gemini Hills and Planet of the Apes Valley to conduct research, and were back in time for dinner. Their traverse was supported by Ben Audlaluk from Grise Fiord.
The Arthur Clarke Mars Greenhouse team will be in operational mode tonight, running a two day test of the system where they won't touch anything and just let it run. The two day operational mode will test the changes implemented this year as they get ready for their departure in a few days.
Hamilton Sundstrand's new suit port concepts will be interfaced into the Mars-1 HumVee Rover again this season and tested in the next few weeks. The idea of suit ports is that rather than going through an airlock, one can step into the spacesuit through the backpack and be outside within minutes.
Led by Dr Matthew Deans, the NASA Ames K10 robot team had a productive day. Vinh To set up the computer, Susan Lee got the K10 robot set up with help from Dr Hans Utz, Dr Trey Smith did the software checkout and Eric Park set up networking for the robot. The team ran some tests, moved the robot around and surprised passers by with the robot's Pac Man sound cues.
Dr Valerie Meyers (NASA JSC) collected saliva samples this morning from some lucky volunteers. She is conducting a viral reaction study with the microbiology group at JSC. The idea is that during space flight an astronaut's immune system is suppressed and the virus can be found being shed in the saliva. Outbreaks are rare, but it can be debilitating for long duration flights. The team wants to find out why it happens and learn how to keep it from happening.
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| photo credit: NASA/Mars Institute/Haughton-Mars Project |
The K10 robot team will be following up on work done during the 2010 field season by Dr Pascal Lee (Director, HMP / NASA Ames, Mars Institute, SETI Institute), Dr Mark Helper (Distinguished Senior Lecturer, University of Texas at Austin) and Dr Essam Heggy (Planetary Scientist, JPL). Last season they completed simulated lunar geological and geophysical traverses as part of their studies of robotic follow-up to human exploration, and of the efficiencies of pressured rover and EVA exploration.
Peter and Elaine's flight landed at HumVee Beach where the Moon-1 Humvee Rover and supporting vehicles are parked. Elaine took pictures and video of the site while Peter and the two Ken Borek pilots loaded all four of the Humvee Mattracks tracks onto the Twin Otter. They are quite heavy.
John Schutt (HMP camp manager) gave the new arrivals a tour of the HMP base camp and safety briefings, then lead the evening meeting in the mess tent. Our chef this year, Jeff Fagan, is a former Four Seasons cook. Jeff is from Vanouver, and so far he is a big hit. His food is excellent as well. He and John Schutt have additional support from Nathan Kalluk, Star Amurulak and Peter Ikaluk from Resolute Bay, and Terry Pijimini and Ben Audlaluk from Grise Fiord.
There are several research projects going on simultaneously including the ongoing Arthur Clarke Mars Greenhouse effort lead by Matt Bamsey (CSA), a space biology study led by Dr's Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul (Univ. of Florida), the K10 robot team led by Dr Matthew Deans, research on the immune system by Dr Valerie Meyers from NASA JSC, as well as geology research by Dr Pascal Lee and Kelsey Young, as part of her PhD thesis at ASU. Pascal and Kelsey hope to gain further understanding in the glacial evolution and geologic history of the Haughton impact structure, date the crater more accurately, and to learn more about the makeup and size of the impactor itself, using the geochemical trace that it left behind.
It was 6 celsius today with light rain. The mood is very high at camp and we look forward to a great season as we near the peak in camp population.
Resolute Bay, July 8 - The 102nd Rescue Wing of the Air National Guard (ANG) based on Long Island, NY, is providing critical airlift support to the Haughton-Mars Project this year. After a successful first flight in May to deploy the HMP's Northwest Passage Drive Expedition (a.k.a. NASA HMP-2010 Sea-Ice Traverse) team, and preposition critical supplies for the HMP-2010 summer campaign, a C-130 Hercules plane departed Long Island for Moffett Field, CA on 6 July, to begin this year's second airlift. After picking up NASA and Mars Institute cargo and personnel at NASA Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, the plane headed north to Vancouver on 7 July where it picked up additional HMP equipment and food supplies, and a few more HMP participants.
Members of the ANG C-130 crew, including LtCol Ken Hohorst (far right), Commander of the airlift mission, HMP Director Dr Pascal Lee (below his dog Ping Pong), HMP Logistics Manager Kira Lorber (second from right), and NASA Johnson Space Center-Wyle Labs human physiology researcher Valerie Meyers (far left). (Photo Haughton-Mars Project/Pascal Lee)
The C-130, with on board a total of about 18,000 lbs of payload and personnel, then flew direct from Vancouver to Resolute Bay where it landed in the evening of 8 July. The ANG crew, commanded by LtCol Ken Hohorst, performed superbly and got the HMP-2010 field campaign to a fantastic start.
Dr Pascal Lee's dog, Ping Pong, patiently waits for the HMP's new ATVs to get loaded onto the Air National Guard's C-130 Hercules transport plane at Moffett Field, CA. (Photo Haughton-Mars Project/Pascal Lee)
Resolute Bay, July 4 - Today, John W. Schutt (HMP Base Camp Manager), Jesse Weaver (HMP Lead Technician), Travis Oaks (HMP Assistant Technician), David Weaver (HMP Builder), and Nathan Kalluk (HMP Field Assistant) flew from Resolute Bay to the HMP Research Station on Devon Island to open up camp. Camp was found to be in good shape. Spirits are high. Dr Pascal Lee, HMP Director, is scheduled to arrive with additional team members on Thursday, 8 July, aboard a Air National Guard C-130 Hercules transport plane of the 102nd Rescue Wing based on Long Island, N.Y.
