The space shuttle, which was completed in 1976, was NASA's
first. Though it never actually flew a mission into outer space, it performed
critical tests around the Earth's atmosphere and is widely credited with paving
the way for five future shuttles. Of the six shuttles NASA built, only four
remain. The other two experienced disasters during their missions, killing
their crews: The Challenger exploded in 1986 and the newer Columbia disintegrated in
2003. President Richard Nixon first announced
NASA's intention to construct the Enterprise in 1972 amid heightened tensions
during the Cold War. With U.S. officials fearing the Soviet Union would to dominate the novel realm of space travel, the Enterprise was designed to be a
reusable spacecraft that could also land safely — allowing NASA to conduct
launches more frequently and with greater efficiency. Previous space crafts
could neither land nor be reused for future missions. When it is tests to including then Enterprise mission began in 1977, the shuttle would sit atop a 747 carrier aircraft
that helped get it off the ground. Once it reached an altitude hundreds of
thousands of feet in the sky, the Enterprise would separate from then flight and
two pilots would glide the shuttle for several minutes before making a smooth
landing. This was thanks in part to an aerodynamically designed tail cone. Fred Haise, an Apollo 13 astronaut who piloted the
Enterprise on five flights, said flying the shuttle was "nearly
perfect." "It's something exciting, especially when you put five
years of development into getting it ready," said Haise, 78.
Of the moment
right after his first takeoff in the Enterprise, Haise said: "I was
immediately happy and grateful." Through a labyrinth of hallways deep
inside a 1960s-era building that has housed research that dates back to the
early years of U.S. space travel, a group of scientist in white coats is
stirring, mixing, measuring, brushing and, most important, tasting the end
result of their cooking. Their mission: Build a menu for a planned journey to
Mars in the 2030s. The menu must sustain a group of six to eight astronauts, keep them healthy and happy and also offer
a broad array of food. That's no simple feat considering it will likely take
six months to get to the Red Planet, astronauts will have to stay there 18
months and then it will take another six months to return to Earth. Imagine having to shop for a family's three-year
supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for
that length of time. "Mars is different just because it's so far
away," said Maya Cooper, senior research
scientist with Lockheed Martin who is leading the efforts to build the menu.
"We don't have the option to send a vehicle every six months and send more
food as we do for International Space Station. "Astronauts
who travel to the space station have a wide
variety of food available to them, some 100 or so different options, in fact.
But it is all pre-prepared and freeze-dried with a shelf life of at least two
years. And while astronauts make up a panel that tastes the food and gives it a
final OK on Earth before it blasts off, the lack of gravity means smell — and
taste — is impaired. So the food is bland.On Mars though, there is a little
gravity, allowing NASA to consider significant
changes to the current space menu. That's where Cooper's team comes in. Travel
to Mars opens the possibility that astronauts can do things like chop
vegetables and do a little cooking of their own. Even though pressure levels
are different than on Earth, scientists think it will be possible to boil water
with a pressure cooker, too.One option Cooper and her staff in the Johnson
Space Center in Houston are considering is having the
astronauts care for a "Martian greenhouse." They would have a
variety of fruits and vegetables — from carrots to bell peppers — in a
hydroponic solution, meaning they would be planted in mineral-laced water
instead of soil.
The astronauts would care for
their garden and then use those ingredients, combined with others, such as nuts
and spices brought from Earth, to prepare their meals."That menu is
favorable because it allows the astronauts to actually have live plants that
are growing, you have optimum nutrient delivery with fresh fruits and
vegetables, and it actually allows them to have freedom of choice when they're
actually cooking the menus because the food isn't already pre-prepared into a
particular recipe," Cooper said.The top priority is to ensure that the
astronauts get the proper amount of nutrients, calories and minerals to
maintain their physical health and performance for the life of the mission,
Cooper said.The menu must also ensure the psychological health of the
astronauts, Cooper explained, noting studies have shown that eating certain
foods — such as meatloaf and mashed potatoes or turkey on Thanksgiving — improve
people's mood and give them satisfaction. That "link to home" will be
key for astronauts on the Mars mission, and there are currently two academic
studies looking further into the connection between mood and food. Lacking
certain vitamins or minerals can also harm the brain, she said.Jerry Linenger,
a retired astronaut who spent 132 days on the Russian Mir space station in
1997, said food is important for morale and the monotony of eating the same
thing day after day is difficult."You just wanted something different. I
didn't care if it was something I wouldn't eat in a million years on Earth. If
it was different, I would eat it," Linenger said, recalling with a laugh
how he would even drink up a Russian sour milk-like concoction for breakfast or
drink up some borscht because it offered variety. Already, Cooper's team of
three has come up with about 100 recipes, all vegetarian because the astronauts
will not have dairy or meat products available. It isn't possible to preserve
those products long enough to take to Mars — and bringing a cow on the mission
is not an option, Cooper jokes. To ensure the vegetarian diet packs the right
amount of protein, the researchers are designing a variety of dishes that
include tofu and nuts, including a Thai pizza that has no cheese but is covered
with carrots, red peppers, mushrooms, scallions, peanuts and a homemade sauce
that has a spicy kick. To keep this menu going, and get the most out of any
research about food sustainability on Mars, Cooper says it's possible NASA will
choose to have one astronaut solely dedicated to preparing the food — the
Emeril of the Mars mission. Still, since it remains unclear how much time
mission planners will want to spend on food preparation, Cooper is also
building an alternate pre-packaged menu, similar to how things are done for
crews that do six-month stints on the International Space Station. For this
option, though, the food will need to have a five-year shelf life compared with
the two years available now.
NASA, the Department of Defense and a variety of other agencies are researching ways to make that possible, Cooper said. The ideal, though, would be to combine the two options. "So they would have some fresh crop and some food that we would send from Earth," Cooper said. One of the biggest obstacles, at the moment, may be the budgetary constraints. President Barack Obama's budget proposal in February canceled a joint US-European robotic mission to Mars in 2016, and the rest of NASA's budget has also been chopped. At the moment, Michele Perchonok, advanced food technology project scientist at NASA, said about $1 million on average is spent annually on researching and building the Mars menu. NASA's overall budget in 2012 is more than $17 billion. She is hopeful that as the mission gets closer — about 10 to 15 years before launch — that the budget will grow, allowing for more in-depth, conclusive research. The mission is important: It will give scientists the chance for unique research on everything from looking for other life forms and for the origin of life on Earth to the effects of partial gravity on bone loss. It also will let food scientists examine the question of sustainability. "How do we sustain the crew, 100 percent recycling of everything for that two and a half years?" Michele said.
Outer Place, astronauts who have gone on spacewalks consistently speak of space's extraordinarily peculiar odor. They can't smell it while they're actually bobbing in it, because the interiors of their space suits just smell plastic-y. But upon stepping back into the space station and removing their helmets, they get a strong, distinctive whiff of the final frontier. The odor clings to their suit, helmet, gloves and tools. Fugitives from the near-vacuum — probably atomic oxygen, among other things — the clinging particles have the acrid aroma of seared steak, hot metal and welding fumes. Steven Pearce, a chemist hired by NASA to recreate the space odor on Earth for astronaut training purposes, said the metallic aspect of the scent may come from high-energy vibrations of ions. "It's like something I haven't ever smelled before, but I'll never forget it," NASA astronaut Kevin Ford said from orbit in 2009. But astronauts don't dislike the sharp smell of space, necessarily. After a 2003 mission, astronaut Don Pettit described it this way on a NASA blog: "It is hard to describe this smell; it is definitely not the olfactory equivalent to describing the palette sensations of some new food as 'tastes like chicken.' The best description I can come up with is metallic; a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation. It reminded me of my college summers where I labored for many hours with an arc welding torch repairing heavy equipment for a small logging outfit. It reminded me of pleasant sweet smelling welding fumes.
NASA, the Department of Defense and a variety of other agencies are researching ways to make that possible, Cooper said. The ideal, though, would be to combine the two options. "So they would have some fresh crop and some food that we would send from Earth," Cooper said. One of the biggest obstacles, at the moment, may be the budgetary constraints. President Barack Obama's budget proposal in February canceled a joint US-European robotic mission to Mars in 2016, and the rest of NASA's budget has also been chopped. At the moment, Michele Perchonok, advanced food technology project scientist at NASA, said about $1 million on average is spent annually on researching and building the Mars menu. NASA's overall budget in 2012 is more than $17 billion. She is hopeful that as the mission gets closer — about 10 to 15 years before launch — that the budget will grow, allowing for more in-depth, conclusive research. The mission is important: It will give scientists the chance for unique research on everything from looking for other life forms and for the origin of life on Earth to the effects of partial gravity on bone loss. It also will let food scientists examine the question of sustainability. "How do we sustain the crew, 100 percent recycling of everything for that two and a half years?" Michele said.
Outer Place, astronauts who have gone on spacewalks consistently speak of space's extraordinarily peculiar odor. They can't smell it while they're actually bobbing in it, because the interiors of their space suits just smell plastic-y. But upon stepping back into the space station and removing their helmets, they get a strong, distinctive whiff of the final frontier. The odor clings to their suit, helmet, gloves and tools. Fugitives from the near-vacuum — probably atomic oxygen, among other things — the clinging particles have the acrid aroma of seared steak, hot metal and welding fumes. Steven Pearce, a chemist hired by NASA to recreate the space odor on Earth for astronaut training purposes, said the metallic aspect of the scent may come from high-energy vibrations of ions. "It's like something I haven't ever smelled before, but I'll never forget it," NASA astronaut Kevin Ford said from orbit in 2009. But astronauts don't dislike the sharp smell of space, necessarily. After a 2003 mission, astronaut Don Pettit described it this way on a NASA blog: "It is hard to describe this smell; it is definitely not the olfactory equivalent to describing the palette sensations of some new food as 'tastes like chicken.' The best description I can come up with is metallic; a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation. It reminded me of my college summers where I labored for many hours with an arc welding torch repairing heavy equipment for a small logging outfit. It reminded me of pleasant sweet smelling welding fumes.
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