NASA recently recognized Engineering Prof. Robert E. Johnson when his team was selected as a finalist in a competition to fully develop a mission to orbit Mars. If successful, his team's plan, the Great Escape mission, will be implemented by 2011.
The NASA assignment is primarily focused on studying the upper atmosphere of Mars, Johnson said. Project participants aim to examine the content of the martian atmosphere and the evidence of water discovered by past missions.
One objective behind this mission is to understand and predict Earth's atmospheric changes.
"Without the ability to predict, by the time anything occurs, it will be too late to adjust,"Johnson said.
Another ambition is to discover additional evidence that might indicate how life formed on Earth, Johnson said.
According to Johnson, Venus, Mars and Earth had similar atmospheric origins but now have evolved into environments with extremely different conditions.
"If we find any remnants on Mars that would suggest life started ... it helps to better understand the origins and conditions that we had on Earth to let life start," Johnson said.
Finalist teams for the Scout mission have been granted $2 million to further develop their mission concepts, Johnson said. Following the initial studies, one team's proposal will be chosen and implemented with additional funding of approximately $500 million.
According to S. Alan Stern, Great Escape mission team member and executive director of the Space, Science and Engineering Division in the Southwest Research Institute, his group's proposal promises "the most science for the least amount of technical risk."
The Great Escape mission plan differs from other proposals in that the space craft's path will dip along different layers of the martian atmosphere for two and a half earth years. This will allow NASA to measure the effect of the sun and other elements on the upper atmosphere, Johnson said.
Johnson is also involved with several other NASA grants, including the current Cassini-Huygens mission, which focuses on Saturn and its moons.
According to Johnson, his involvement in such NASA studies helps him to "bring students into the latest topical subjects, instead of only learning out of old books, with related problems and excitement."
-- Matt Dickey contributed to this story
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