arrow space

Jacob and his cousin Matthew discuss the challenges of space travel to Mars and starting a colony. They mention radiation as a major problem and the need for better protective suits. They also talk about the difficulty of transporting supplies and the development of nuclear propulsion for rockets. Matthew believes that Mars colonization is a goal worth pursuing but acknowledges the need for major breakthroughs and luck to achieve it in their lifetime. Hi, this is Jacob with the Red Planet. This is our resident aerospace engineer, Matthew, my cousin, and he's going to be talking about some of the issues and solutions when it comes to space travel and the hope of getting to Mars and starting a colony. Say hi, Matthew. Hi, everyone. All right. And so first question, I guess, is just how realistic is it to be able to send people there? And what are some of the problems and solutions when it comes to pushing that many people in spacecraft that far? Well, really the biggest problem is probably the radiation. There's studies about how bad it is. One thing is OSHA, it won't let astronauts or workers be in space for more than two months at a time, usually, unless they'll either do specific courses. So that's a big problem is having to deal with the radiation because there's not really much material you can put on a rocket that's not too heavy to stop you from getting to Mars. So one thing we'd have to do is get better about either like a suit or something that can help minimize the effects of radiation. And then obviously there's the transportation time, which is, you know, you've got to feed anyone on the spacecraft for those nine months there. And then you've got to worry about getting stuff there, too. So it's really just can you get enough onto the spaceship to get people there, too. Right. So is there anything that you know of currently in development to try to solve some of those radiation problems or anything like that? I'm not sure that there's really anything that they're doing in terms of like helping with spacecraft. You know, there's different materials that they've made that can help filter out the radiation. And they're using as much of those as possible, but most of them are just so heavy that it's not really plausible to put them on a rocket. Right. OK. And then in terms of the lift capability, because you were talking about that, how close are we in order to create rockets that could independently like take materials that far or towards Mars without manned personnel? So the best way would probably be by using nuclear power. And I know NASA right now is working on nuclear propulsion and rockets and trying to get it safe and approved and everything. But that's really going to be our best chance at being able to get these huge rockets to Mars. Right. I got you. Do you have any. How do you feel about the idea of Mars colonization? Do you think that it is within our lifetimes? And do you feel like it is a goal that we should be aspiring towards? What's your personal goal? I think it's a goal we should be aspiring towards, but I think it would definitely take like one or two major breakthroughs that we still haven't gotten yet. I think it's mostly in place, but there's definitely going to be like a lot of luck that we're going to need to if we're going to want to be able to do it in our lifetime. Right. I got you. All right. I think that'll work. All right.