LIFE AS AN EXTRATERRESTRIAL

Life as an extra-terrestrial. Have you considered it? Sounds very cool at first. I personally would love the opportunity to go to space – anywhere, no matter how far. But really think about it.

Picture it, a compound on Titan, working robots mine the other moons of the system as well as Saturn herself. It is an architect’s dream place, with the very high ratio of atmospheric density to surface gravity. Skyscrapers extending far up into the sky.

Of course the super low temperatures cause minor problems, but then there are the major ones. The human race is a delicate one. We need oxygen, gravity, we need an Earth-like planet. This planets out. For those who don’t know as yet, the Earth won’t last forever. Actually it will last much longer than we will, eons longer. But as far as allowing human-life to survive. That’s not likely to occur.

Thankfully there are scientists around the world working on really cool solutions. Things that will allow us to have that air we crave so bad even though we aren’t on Earth, something to allow us to walk as if there were more gravity than there actually is. (Not for ease of activity, for ease of body functions, digestion, swallowing, blood flow…)

So back to life as an extra-terrestrial. What would it entail? Probably a “bubble” type dome to keep Oxygen in and Methane or whatever the prevailing “air” is on whatever planet we colonize. This ‘Bubble” or shield is being worked on in several forms in many countries.

What about the gravity? In 2011 a NASA proposal for a space transport vehicle included a rotational artificial gravity space habitat. Sure, it’s basically just a centrifuge, but such a machine could be built under a colony. Still, not the ideal method.

Mars Direct has a plan, artificial gravity for the trip there would be provided by the spent upper stage of the booster – tying it to the habitat unit and sending them both rotating with a common axis.

Still, that doesn’t do much for the colonist once he/she arrives on the planet. Most likely the answer is in the Casmir Effect. With the use of the charged metal plates changed to three from two. Actually two charged and one not, the effect is a downward force. Use of an astronaut’s suit made of a metamaterial to limit the force over some areas of the body. Still, that requires a vacuum. I imagine something could be worked out using that jumping off point.

With those two areas handled we have the oxygen problem. That one is easy; take your pick – there’s the OGS system that converts waste water to O2, or a chemical oxygen generator that could take the O2 from SiO2, NaClO3, BaO2…., or a ceramic oxygen generation system using a solid oxide electrolysis process. Actually there are any number of ways of adapting or manipulating one substance into another with left overs.

So what does that leave? Water. Water is the most prevalent substance in the Universe. In various states from frozen to vapor, it is in Quasars, Comets, Black Holes (though I’ll wait here; you go ahead), or the soil of the planet.

Is there anything we need that the technology isn’t possible? Not likely. And who knows perhaps we only have to ‘get by’ until we can terraform the planet. There really is no end to the possibilities and no end to the solutions the mind can find.

So what do you think? Life as an extraterrestrial; want to try it? Me too!