A team of engineers claims to have created the world's lightest material. The substance is made out of tiny hollow metallic tubes arranged into a micro-lattice - a criss-crossing diagonal pattern with small open spaces between the tubes. The researchers say the material is 100 times lighter than Styrofoam and has "extraordinarily high energy absorption" properties. Potential uses include next-generation batteries and shock absorbers.

Nasa’s most advanced mobile robotic laboratory, which will examine one of the most intriguing areas on Mars, is in final preparations for a launch from Florida's Space Coast on November 25. The Mars Science Laboratory mission will carry Curiosity, a rover with more scientific capability than any ever sent to another planet. It will set down inside a huge crater and use its highly advanced instruments, including cameras and lasers, to find out more about the planet’s environment, which will help pave the way for human missions. Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at Nasa Headquarters in Washington, said: ‘Mars Science Laboratory builds upon the improved understanding about Mars gained from current and recent missions. ‘This mission advances technologies and science that will move us toward missions to return samples from, and eventually send humans to, Mars.’

The Women and Mars Conference is just a few days away.
Register today at www.womenandmars.eventbrite.com.
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Explore Mars is also pleased to announce that NASA has arranged for the Women and Mars Conference to be webcasted, freely available to anyone. ”We hope that as many people as possible will come to the conference as possible, since it will be a great event,” commented Explore Mars Executive Director, Chris Carberry. “However, for those who can’t be there in person, this webcasting will allow everyone to view the conference from anywhere in the world. We know for a fact that a group of women working at ESTEC in the Netherlands, will participate in the conference in this way”

For those interested to viewing the Women and Mars Conference online, please visit the LiveStream link at - http://www.livestream.com/exploremars

NASA intends to upgrade one of its Apollo-era treaded crawlers and an inactive mobile platform built for the canceled Ares launcher program to support the agency's colossal super-rocket, officially called the Space Launch System, in time for a test flight in 2017.

A NASA-led team has used radar sounding technology developed to explore the subsurface of Mars to create high-resolution maps of freshwater aquifers buried deep beneath an Earth desert, in the first use of airborne sounding radar for aquifer mapping. The research may help scientists better locate and map Earth's desert aquifers, understand current and past hydrological conditions in Earth's deserts and assess how climate change is impacting them. Deserts cover roughly 20 percent of Earth's land surface, including highly populated regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, west and central Asia and the southwestern United States.

NASA is ready to move forward with the development of the Space Launch System -- an advanced heavy-lift launch vehicle that will provide an entirely new national capability for human exploration beyond Earth's orbit. The Space Launch System will give the nation a safe, affordable and sustainable means of reaching beyond our current limits and opening up new discoveries from the unique vantage point of space. The Space Launch System, or SLS, will be designed to carry the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, as well as important cargo, equipment and science experiments to Earth's orbit and destinations beyond. Additionally, the SLS will serve as a back up for commercial and international partner transportation services to the International Space Station.

NASA’s Desert Research and Technology Studies (RATS) team has commenced testing communication scenarios for near-Earth asteroids. The RATS team also is evaluates technology, human-robotic systems and extravehicular equipment in the high desert near Flagstaff, Arizona. Field testing provides a knowledge base that helps scientists and engineers design, build and operate better equipment, and establish requirements for operations and procedures. The Arizona desert has a rough, dusty terrain and extreme temperature swings that simulate conditions that may be encountered on other surfaces in space.

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory have designed a suitcase-sized nuclear plant that can power up to eight normal-sized homes. Thanks to its size and durability, the plant can provide fission power not only on Earth, but on the moon, on Mars, or any other place NASA requires a power generator. While most nuclear power plants generate hundreds or thousands of megawatts of electricity, this portable generator would create only 40 kilowatts. This smaller size is ideal for the type of conditions seen in space, said James Werner, lead researcher on the project. "Just taking it down to that size has a lot of significant differences," Werner told InnovationNewsDaily. The generator is more flexible and can be placed in craters or caves on uninhabited planets, for example. It is also exponentially less heavy than standard nuclear power plants, which Werner said is essential for a generator to work properly in space.

With plutonium-238 supplies running low, the race is on to find new power sources for spacecraft Most of us have a clear image of what a real-world spacecraft looks like. Whether it’s a communications satellite, an Earth observation platform or even the International Space Station, the picture that would generally spring to mind is of a relatively small, probably irregular-shaped body dwarfed by the spreading oblongs of solar panels, providing the power for whatever systems are on board. That’s fine for Earth orbit or the inner Solar System. But what happens if you need to send a spacecraft further away, where the sun is too weak to provide enough power, or to a place where there is no constant access to sunshine, such as the dark side of the Moon or to Mars?

One giant leap was taken for mankind in the Pilbara this week when NASA scientists tested spacesuits and technology designed to be used on Mars. US space buffs from NASA's California research centre joined their WA counterparts from Mars Society Australia to study the Mars-esque environment in the North West. Volunteers were put through their paces in a prototype spacesuit designed to help simulate tasks, such as bending to pick up rocks, which astronauts would have to undertake on the red planet.

The spacesuits astronauts will wear on Mars could accidentally contaminate samples and the Martian surface in the search for life on Mars.

What would it take to make a manned mission to Mars a reality? A team of aerospace and textile engineering students from North Carolina State University believe part of the solution may lie in advanced textile materials. The students joined forces to tackle life-support challenges that the aerospace industry has been grappling with for decades. “One of the big issues, in terms of a manned mission to Mars, is creating living quarters that would protect astronauts from the elements – from radiation to meteorites,” says textile engineering student Brent Carter. “Currently, NASA uses solid materials like aluminum, fiberglass and carbon fibers, which while effective, are large, bulky and difficult to pack within a spacecraft.” Using advanced textile materials, which are flexible and can be treated with various coatings, students designed a 1,900-square-foot inflatable living space that could comfortably house four to six astronauts. This living space is made by layering radiation-shielding materials like Demron™ (used in the safety suits for nuclear workers cleaning up Japan’s Fukushima plant) with a gas-tight material made from a polyurethane substrate to hold in air, as well as gold-metalicized film that reflects UV rays – among others. The space is dome-shaped, which will allow those pesky meteors, prone to showering down on the red planet, to bounce off the astronauts’ home away from home without causing significant damage.

Mars is in reach and NASA and the European Space Agency are preparing themselves for the day man walks on the Red Planet. One space ship manufacturer executive predicted the event would come in 10-15 years. NASA, and other space agencies, have given it a little more time, saying it will happen by 2030. Regardless of the date, NASA and the other space agencies will be prepared. Recently, NASA and the European Space Agency tested out space suits for missions to Mars. The ESA tested out the Aouda.X suit, which was developed by the Austrian Space Forum, in the semi-desert of Rio Tinto, Spain. It took three years to make, and Austrian Space Forum says it's the best of its kind. Meanwhile, NASA tested the NDX-1 space suit, designed by De Leon, in Antarctica. The space suit endured frigid temperatures and winds of more than 47 mph (75 kph) as researchers tried out techniques for collecting soil samples on Mars. The prototyp suit cost $100,000 and was created with NASA funds. It is made out of more than 350 materials, including tough honeycomb Kevlar and carbon fibers to reduce its weight without losing resistance. Here is a look at these possible Mars space suits.

Two of the robotic missions NASA selected for further study last week would be powered by experimental nuclear generators, a new technology under development to boost the efficiency of electricity production in deep space. NASA picked robotic missions to Mars, a comet and Saturn's moon Titan as finalists last week for a launch opportunity in 2016, and two of the probes would employ a cutting edge nuclear power source never tested in space. The space agency plans to settle on a single mission in June 2012, fully funding the winner for development and launch later this decade. Although NASA requires the missions to launch by the end of 2017, scientists in charge of all three probes target blastoff in 2015 or 2016.