Plume Mitigation for Mars Terminal Landing: Soil Stabilization Project

<p>A sustained human presence on the Moon, Mars, or other celestial bodies, will require numerous disciplines to create technologies, solve current known problems, and anticipate new ones. One problem identified during the Apollo missions is plume ejecta: the expulsion of dust, regolith, or other loose material from the force of launch or landing.  Rocket plume effects on Mars will be different from those on the Moon. Because Mars has an atmosphere, ejected particles will not travel as far, meaning that infrastructure could be placed at a safe distance from the launch pad and not receive blast effects. However, the presence of an atmosphere will cause the rocket exhaust to collimate, which will probably produce much deeper craters than the Apollo missions produced on the Moon. </p><p>Plume ejecta was observed and photographed during the recent landing of the Mars rover, Curiosity. Even though the sky crane landing system was designed to minimize plume effects on the Mars surface, areas of surface erosion were observed after landing. Curiosity is the largest vehicle that has landed on Mars. A human-sized lander will be considerably larger, will have more powerful rockets, and therefore, will probably disturb the surface soil much more. Deploying a landing pad or stabilizing the soil can mitigate this problem.</p><p>The goal of this project was to develop technology for building a landing pad through the following tasks:</p><ol><li>Demonstrate microwave sintering under Mars like conditions.</li><li>Investigate surface stabilization methods used for terrestrial applications and develop recommendations for a Mars landing pad based on these methods.</li><li>Develop a plan for implementing a microwave sintering system on a mobile rover.</li></ol><p>The project was completed successfully, achieving the first ever sintering of a Mars simulant under Mars like conditions.  In addition, a design for a rover mounted sintering system was created.  Recommendations for initial soil measurements were developed based of off terrestrial experience.</p>

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