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Researchers: Sterilizing Mars spacecraft is largely a waste of money

School of the Environment’s Dirk Schulze-Makuch and a colleague suggest lifting unnecessary and expensive environmental restrictions — on Mars.
Rethinking: read the article at WSU News

UPDATE – It’s OK, Infect Mars With Our Germs
Read the related story at Discovery News

UPDATE – Is NASA Being Too Protective of Mars?
Writing in Nature Geoscience, Alberto Fairén, of Cornell University’s department of astronomy, and Dirk Schulze-Makuch, of Washington State University’s School of Earth & Environmental Sciences, argue that this “planetary protection”—beyond what’s … Read the related story at IEEE Spectrum

CAS in the media: November 2, 2012

Elections and politics

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Professor collaborates on ‘roadmap’ to interstellar space travel

Book coverBy Robert Strenge, WSU News

To Washington State University astrobiologist Dirk Schulze-Makuch and seven of his space-minded colleagues in an initiative called Star Voyager, it has never been enough for humans to simply dream about traveling to the stars. To them, interstellar travel is not so much a dream as it is an ultimate ambition.

With the release this month of their book, How to Develop the Solar System and Beyond: A Roadmap to Interstellar Space, the eight collaborators—scientists, engineers, economists, and assorted other professionals—lay out mankind’s plausible pathways to the stars. They present multiple scenarios for mankind’s space-faring future over the next hundred years, providing a comprehensive overview of the human, technological, and financial challenges of interstellar travel.

Among the first manned starship proposals, the Star Voyager Roadmap describes potential scenarios for our space faring future. From the development of earth-orbital operational platforms to systems of asteroid capture and deflection, the book describes the strategies and resource developments that will support and contribute to the overall goal of achieving interstellar travel. As with previous advances in space-focused technologies, new interstellar travel technologies will have benefits that advance science and technologies across the globe. Continue story →