Sun, Sep 27, 2020 page16

• Upstart company wants to beat NASA in search for life

  The discovery of a gas called phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus has sparked a flurry of enthusiasm among scientists who back the theory that tiny organisms could live in the planet’s clouds

  • By Ivan Couronne / AFP, WASHINGTON
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  Can a small US aerospace company reach Venus before NASA returns to Earth’s superheated planetary neighbor?

  That is what Rocket Lab chief executive officer Peter Beck is hoping as he sets his sights on launching a low-cost probe in 2023.

  Over the past decade his company has become very good at putting satellites in to orbit — and his dream of taking the next step, an interplanetary mission, has recently received a shot of adrenaline with the surprising discovery of a gas linked to living organisms in Venus’ corrosive, sulfuric atmosphere.

  

  The interplanetary variant of the Photon spacecraft developed by Rocket Lab is pictured in an undated artist’s render received on Thursday. The image depicts the moon as a destination, but the spacecraft would be very similar for a Venus mission.

  Photo: AFP / Rocket Lab / Handout

  “What we’re looking for on Mars is signs of previous life,” Beck said. “Whereas Venus, it’s signs of potential life now.”

  With its hellish landscape, Venus has been largely neglected by the major space agencies since the 1980s in favor of the solar system’s more distant bodies.

  Dozens of missions have notably been sent to Mars seeking signs of ancient microbes.

  

  The planet Venus in a composite of data from NASA’s Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter. Could a small US aerospace company get to Venus before NASA returns there?

  Photo: AFP / NASA / JPL-Caltech

  However, the discovery by Earth-based radio telescopes of a gas called phosphine in Venus’ atmosphere, reported on Sept. 14, sparked a new wave of enthusiasm among scientists who had for years defended the hypothesis that tiny organisms could live in the planet’s clouds.

  Phosphine is not definitive proof of life, but it is possible its presence is linked to living organisms, as it is on our planet.

  The finding led NASA to declare it was time to once more prioritize Venus.

  However, Beck has always been in the pro-Venus camp, and for two years has been contemplating sending an entirely privately funded probe there, he said.

  He calculated, with the help of a doctoral student, that a small satellite called “Photon” that Rocket Lab developed in-house could be adapted into a spacecraft for an interplanetary voyage.

  Such bids have historically been the domain of national space agencies, given the enormous costs involved, but Beck thinks he has developed a budget solution.

  “I would expect a mission to Venus to be sort of US$30 million,” he said by video from Auckland, New Zealand.

  “When you can measure interplanetary missions in tens of millions of dollars instead of billions, and months instead of decades, the opportunity for discovery is just incredible,” he said.

  Rocket Lab’s specialty is sending small satellites into Earth orbit with its small 18m high rocket — a highly lucrative market in the past few years as demand for microsatellites has exploded.

  The company’s Venus probe would be very small, weighing about 37kg and just 30cm in diameter.

  The trip from Earth would take 160 days, then Photon would launch the probe into Venus’ clouds, where it would take readings as it falls, without a parachute, at almost 39,600kph.

  The probe would have between just 270 and 300 seconds to analyze an atmosphere that is almost a hundred times denser than Earth’s before it disintegrates or crashes on the planet’s fiery surface, where temperatures are hot enough to melt lead at 480°C.

  The hardest part is deciding on the scientific instrument: What molecules should it look for? Miniaturization is another problem. The probe would need to weigh 3kg, which some experts doubt is possible, but Beck disagrees.

  Rocket Lab would need help from leading scientists, and has already recruited Massachusetts Institute of Technology astronomer and planetary scientist Sara Seager.

  The adventure is the latest chapter in a new era of space exploration fueled not by governments but by individual curiosity and ambition, one that so far has been best symbolized by Elon Musk, the iconoclastic founder of Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SpaceX).

  SpaceX revolutionized the sector through its reusable rockets that have now sent astronauts to the International Space Station, and has its sights set on colonizing Mars.

  NASA is no longer afraid to subcontract missions to privateers, and Rocket Lab would be paid US$10 million to send a microsatellite into lunar orbit next year.

  As for Venus, Beck would like to offer his services to NASA. The space agency is considering returning to Venus, but not until 2026 at the earliest.

  Its last Venus orbiter was Magellan, which arrived in 1990, but other vessels have made flybys since then.

  “We want to do many, many missions a year,” Beck said.
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