Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to re: Nothing Wrong With Geology or Emphasis on Life

That's a Big No On The Resource Issue, Maybe On Life
Marsby — (archived)

The Moon is extremely deficient in water, carbon, and nitrogen compared to Earth and Mars. These three contain the primary elements for life and are the primary consumables. This is a clear mile high slam dunk for Martian superiority in terms of sustainable presence. At best the Moon has a lakes worth of water in a few isolated areas while Mars has an ocean's worth over most of the planet to supply H2 and O2. CO2 is everywhere on Mars in reasily recoverable form capable of easily supplying C, O2, and can be converted to CH4 using H2 electrolysized from water . I'm not aware of anywhere C is available on the Moon. N2 is also a significant fraction of the Martian atmosphere. If nitrogen bearing minerals exist on the Moon they will have to be mined and processed at high temperature like the rock for O2 and Hydrogen. I've looked for info on this stuff in Spudis book "The Once and Future Moon" and he is woefully lacking in material processing details compared to Zubrin. I was so dissapointed I never did more than skim my copy.

I agree with you on the potential for the life search backfiring, but it is such a big question that I'm willing to risk it. That is the one scientific question I most want to see answered in my lifetime. I don't need to see humans colonize space in my lifetime, but would prefer it to start so that I can believe it will happen eventually. If we sniff DNA in material vented from or on the surface of Enceladus or Europa the search for life on Mars will have much less priority for me. Fossils as we understand them will be easier to find and interpret on Mars.
I feel Mars is the best place for humans to look for evidence of life as fossils or living though and that they will be better at it than robots. I want all the potential habitats for life in the solar system to be priority robotic targets.

Regards,
Mark

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