Qinghai Xizhou Dachadan Red Cliff Area - China's first Mars simulation base!

China's first Mars simulation base project will be located in Qinghai Province, Haixi State, Dachadan Red Cliff area, which has a typical Yadan landscape group, its unique topography, natural scenery, climatic conditions make it "China's most Mars-like place."
, China's first Mars simulation base project will be located in Qinghai news, attracted attention from all walks of life.
, the base will be a collection of scientific communication, tourism, leisure experience, scientific experiments in one.
local authorities said they hope to make it the country's first Mars cultural and creative experience base.
should we build a Mars simulation base? What implications will this have on Mars research and deep space exploration? Science and Technology Daily reporter interviewed experts in related fields, which was interpreted in detail.
why it was built in the Red Cliffs area of Dachadan, Haixi State, Qinghai Province, which is "the most Mars-like place in China" in the eyes of experts.
reporters learned that the region in terms of geomorphology, geology and material composition have similar characteristics to Mars.
such as the main landform is desert, vegetation cover is very small, geological distribution of rivers, lakes dried up sediments, the material composition of a large number of chlorides, sulfates and other water evaporation residues.
Zheng Yongchun, a researcher at the National Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told Science and Technology Daily that these features help to carry out comparative studies of the environment on Mars and Earth, and that according to the understanding of the evolution of the Earth's environment, it is useful to understand what Mars used to look like by pushing back.
said the region's previous salt lakes dried up and left a lot of salt deposits, similar to those that followed the drying of water on Mars.
scientists can study the conditions under which these salts were formed, and infer the salinity of past water and the ambient temperature of the time through the salt deposition process.
can also infer the flow of water on Mars based on the remains of the flow of water.
Why would you want to build a Mars simulation laboratory If this field simulation laboratory is a naturally formed Martian landscape to present the "exterior" of Mars, then the Mars simulation module built by scientists can simulate more invisible "inner".
Said, Mars' atmospheric pressure is about 1 percent of Earth's, about 96 percent of the atmosphere is carbon dioxide, the average temperature is about 20 degrees Celsius, the lowest night can reach minus 100 degrees Celsius, the sun on Mars light intensity is weaker than on Earth.
these environmental conditions can be simulated in the cabin to carry out experiments.
, for example, take salt samples from field simulation sites and place them in simulated Martian environments for crystallization experiments to see how the order of salt crystallization on Mars is similar to that on Earth.
can also carry out microbial survival experiments.
reporter learned that the planetary science team of the Institute of Space Science of Weihai University of Shandong University made important progress in using the Mars environmental simulation system to characterize the phase of oxygen chloride and spectral in-place characterization.
the study laid the foundation for remote sensing of matter on the surface of Mars, interpretation of in-place spectra, and in-depth study of the new origin of perchlorates on the surface of Mars.
Zheng Yongchun said that the Mars simulation module is usually not too large, according to different research purposes, it can be used to simulate the composition of the Martian atmosphere and pressure, temperature, lighting and other environmental conditions.
but there are some things that are difficult to simulate.
, such as the extremely weak magnetic field on Mars and only a third of Earth's gravity, are not entirely impersonable, but they are expensive.
whether it is a field simulation laboratory or an indoor simulation module, Zheng Yongchun believes that will play a role in the scientific research on Mars.
" by exploring the data, we already know what Mars looks like now, and the purpose of the study is to find out why it has become like this.
" he said, there is already a lot of evidence that Mars once had a dense atmosphere and large-scale water, once had a warm and humid climate, why the water escaped, how it developed into this state, to understand this, only through simulation experiments to reproduce the process.
" study of Mars can give us a lot of inspiration: what the Earth might look like in the future.
" Zheng Yongchun said that Mars and Earth are the "brothers" in the solar system, and that studying the similarity and differences between the two is a valuable basic study.
why Mars simulation experiments are carried out in addition to basic research areas, simulation tests also play a role in space engineering.
, a space expert and executive editor of Space International, said that several simulation tests have been carried out at home and abroad for Mars exploration.
4, 2011, six volunteers, including Chinese volunteer Wang Yue, walked out of the enclosed capsule, marking the end of the famous Mars 500 test.
, conducted by the European Space Agency in collaboration with the Russian Institute of Biomedical Research, simulated a 250-day flight to Mars, a 30-day landing on Mars and a 240-day return to Earth, according to Pang.
the experiment focused on the psychological response of astronauts living in small compartments for long periods of time, as well as the communication delays caused by the distance of the earth's fire, as well as the Mars rover's health insurance system.
2015, the United States conducted a year-long Mars survival experiment at Hawaii's Mount Monaroa volcano, which simulated the lives of astronauts at a Mars base.
, the area is animal-like and vegetation is scarce, similar to the Martian environment, said Pang Zhihao.
six volunteers live in a circular cabin 11 meters in diameter and 6 meters high, almost cut off from the outside world, and can only be contacted by e-mail with a delay of 20 minutes.
living materials are relatively scarce, every 4 months to provide supplies, eat canned, cheese powder, frozen dry goods and so on.
water is also provided every 2 months.
volunteers have out-of-cabin missions, need to wear heavy spacesuits, and have limited oxygen.
several emergencies, including power outages, tool damage, and emergency evacuations in the event of strong radiation, were simulated in the test.
Pang Zhihao believes that the experiment is more realistic than the "Mars 500", testing the psychological endurability of volunteers and emergency response capacity.
addition, the domestic "Moon Palace 365" "Space 180" and other experiments, are simulated in space for a long time.
's future Mars exploration program, Pang believes there are still many problems that need to be solved through experimentation.
such as the spacecraft landing on Mars "horror 7 minutes", and astronauts after a long space flight to Mars, micro-gravity into low gravity on body fluid transfer, bone, muscle and so on.
He also introduced that when China's Chang'e-3 lunar rover carried out ground tests, the test site simulated the lunar soil environment, and through horizontal and vertical traction, simulated the lunar gravity environment.
be the case when developing a rover in the future.
addition, Pang Said said there is no simulation of the damage to the Martian atmosphere.
, he said, the damage comes from three main sources: floating dust, static electricity and dust storms.
may cause obstruction, affecting antennas, solar panel heat exchangers, Mars suits, etc.
the Martian atmosphere is thin, but the air flow is fast, which can lead to dust storms, sometimes for months.
the first generation of the U.S. Mars rover, the Rover Traveler, was covered in dust storms that prevented it from generating electricity.
" are all issues to be solved before a manned landing on Mars in the future.
," he said.
Related links to The Martian topography of Mars is 22.794 million kilometers from the sun, about 1.5 times the distance between the sun and earth, and the angle between the spindle and the orbital plane is 24 degrees, with the same year-round changes as Earth.
what does the real terrain on Mars look like? Because the rocks, sand and sky on Mars are red, Mars is a striking red planet, which is also the name of its Chinese.
more than three decades ago, the spacecraft showed us that Mars was a rocky, cold, hairy place covered under a fuzzy pink sky.
scientists have found that today's Mars has had periods of volcanic activity, meteor impacts forming huge craters, and flash floods.
singular feature of the flying sand on Mars is the unimaginable winds of an unimaginable storm every year.
typhoon on Earth, with winds of more than 60 meters per second and winds of more than 180 meters per second.
storms can sometimes sweep across the planet.
dust storms on the surface of Mars are a unique phenomenon in the Martian atmosphere, and a four-in-a-half of the year is shrouded in flying sand.
the average temperature on Mars is minus 23 degrees Celsius, and because the Martian atmosphere is thin and dry, its temperature difference between day and night is very large, far greater than the temperature difference between day and night on Earth.
because of the low surface temperature and pressure on Mars, the atmosphere is generally saturated with carbon dioxide and water, as long as the temperature drops slightly, carbon dioxide and water vapor will condense.
there is very little water in the Martian atmosphere, and scientists estimate that if all the water ice on Mars were melted into water, it would only form a 10-meter-deep ocean on the surface of Mars.
the amount of water on Mars is insignificant compared to the waves on our earth's surface.
source: Science and Technology Daily.