mars and jupiter?

Question

i was wondering since there is ice on mars and a gyeser on 1 of jupiters moon wats stopping us from taking the ice from there and converting it to water. Also does anyone know when the sun will have a supernova?

Answer 1

Why would we do that? We have plenty of water here :)

Also, the sun will probably never turn into a supernova because it does not have enough mass. It will most likely turn into a red giant in about 5 billion years.

Answer 2

The ice you are talking about is on average than 2cm inch thick. If you melted it down it wouldn't make a decent size lake on earth. Often it is only a dusting of snow. The water NASA is really after is subsurface.

Also the average temperature at their poles is not good. Its hard to melt since it is about -40º in the summer. As for Jupiter, Why go there? That moon has no strategic value at the moment. Our future lies outside the solar system not within it.

There is a dispute on when the nova will occur. We won't know for as the Sun runs out of fuel it will have swollen and engulfed the entire Earth by that time. Some say another 2 billion years, others put it longer. You're not planning on being around then are you?

Better get yer tickets now.

Answer 3

Ice is converted to water with heat. The thing stopping us from doing that is NASA's miniscule budget. They can barely send a probe to those distances or launch space shuttle into low-earth orbit, let alone set up water purification plants on the moons of Jupiter. Also, the sun won't supernova, it doesn't have enough mass. It will become a white dwarf in about 5 billion years, though. That is, after it turrns into a red giant and swallows the earth (still about 5 billion years).

Answer 4

Two very unrelated questions...

First the sun will not have a supernova. It is not nearly massive enough to end its life in this way. In about 5 billion years it will balloon up to about the radius of the orbit of Earth, becoming a red giant. Eventually it will shed its outer layers into a nebula, and the core will collapse into a white dwarf about the size of Earth, and eventually die.

As far as the water ice on Mars, well what's stopping us? We are not there to do it. Certainly though the fact that it exists there is an important element to keep in mind for future manned missions to Mars.