Mars Society
The Mars Society is a non-profit organization that is committed to the exploration and colonization of the planet Mars. It was founded on August 15, 1998 at the Mars Society Founding Convention in Boulder, Colorado ( USA) with a founding declaration of the Mars Underground movement of the 90s by scientists, engineers and space fans from around the world. President has since Dr. -Ing. Robert Zubrin. The founding members were, for example, also the director James Cameron and former Apollo astronauts. In many countries there are regional organizations that Chapter.
The Mars Society carries out information activities and carries out its own technical and scientific projects. The U.S. organization working in simulated Mars habitats in Utah (USA) and in the Canadian Arctic on Devon Island.
Managing Director of the Mars Society is currently Susan Holden Martin.
German Mars Society
In Germany, founded in October 2000, the Mars Society Germany eV ( MSD), which is a charitable organization recognized. The organization has about 230 members, including former astronauts, engineers, media professionals and space enthusiasts.
The board of the Mars Society Germany eV is currently (2013 ) consists of:
- Kai Gehreth (1st Chair)
- Klaus Bayle (2nd Chair)
- Nicolay Kübler ( Checkout )
The organization has the promotion of manned and unmanned exploration of Mars goal and provide information events and their own research projects. The focus is the 2018 along with AMSAT Germany planned Archimedes Mars balloon mission.
The MSD is represented on the International Steering Committee of the Mars Society and works closely with the other European Mars Societies together. She organized the 12th European Mars Conference, which was held from 12th to October 14th, 2012 at the University of the Bundeswehr in Neubiberg near Munich.
Project Archimedes
Archimedes is a sonde which is dimensioned so that the heat dissipation at the entrance to the atmosphere, and further the slow fall down to the ground can be combined with low weight. As early as 2003 began packaging and deployment tests, followed by zero-g tests and in April 2006 and October 2008 Space tests:
- During flight test REGINA (residual gas inflation test for Archimedes ) a model of the deployment system on the sounding rocket REXUS 3 from the Esrange in Kiruna, Sweden, in 90 km altitude was brought in 2006 and tested under space conditions.
- MIRIAM ( Main Inflated Reentry Into the Atmosphere Mission test) followed in October 2008. Here was also launched in Kiruna, the complete cycle of operation of the system was tested by inflating the balloon until it enters the atmosphere, including the data transmission. These were brought to 140 km altitude with sensors and cameras with a REXUS 4 rocket a balloon with four meters in diameter. The experiment did not go completely as planned, but showed the proper functioning of the essential components and provided important sensor data and images for the unfolding process.
Another test MIRIAM II is planned for 2014, the flight to Mars with AMSAT P5A is scheduled for 2018.
See also Main article: Archimedes ( spacecraft )