Talk:Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment

A news item involving Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment was featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the In the news section on 23 April 2021.

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Collaborators

The NASA TechPort page ([1]) states Imperial College London, Columbia University, Ceramatec, and JPL are also involved, but I don't see their role mentioned or discussed -- is the introduction of this article out of date?JamusDoore (talk) 14:33, 19 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Cheers, Rowan Forest (talk) 16:18, 11 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Is it a cyclic process or continuous

Is it a cyclic process or continuous - if cyclical, how long and how many steps ? - Rod57 (talk) 13:10, 3 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

My guess is that it is cyclic, since it is a lightweight prototype without a storage tank. Over 50 sols (time allotted) the cycle will likely be repeated a few times to determine the error bars on O2 purity. Rowan Forest (talk) 14:16, 3 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Is the amount of oxygen produced sustainable for human use? Shipgirl your waifu (talk) 15:04, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Shipgirl your waifu Not right now, as only 10 one-hour cycles will be done over the course of two Earth years, and even then it only produces 1/6 of the oxygen a single astronaut needs in that hour. The plan is that for the final Mars missions a larger instrument will be used with the lessons learned in mind, to produce oxygen 24/7/365 (or whatever the equivalent is on Mars), as well as a quantity of oxygen that would sustain multiple astronauts, which you can read about under 'Implications'.

Do you think this needs to be made more clear in the article? Uses x (talk • contribs) 19:44, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Working on a rewrite of the "Objectives" section

This is what I have so far:

MOXIE's objective is to produce oxygen of at least 98% purity at a rate of 6–10 grams per hour (0.21–0.35 oz/h), and to meet those requirements for a minimum of ten operational cycles in most environmental conditions, even during a dust storm.

Any thoughts on this? Thanks. Deauthorized. ^(talk) 17:52, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Deauthorized I recommend including that it's intended to work day and night as well, just to show it's continuous, but with that it's all good to copy-and-paste right into the article. Uses x (talk • contribs) 19:38, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Deauthorized. ^(talk) 20:14, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What is the energy source?

What is the energy source? SlowJog (talk) 18:41, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@SlowJog There's an internal 4-amp power supply. There's a short bit about it here (CTRL + F and search for "A power supply capable of delivering up to 4 A"): [1]. The power needs to be shared with other components on board too ("The instrument must cycle on and off to share precious battery power with other instruments onboard."), which you can read about here: [2]

Do you think the amperage should be in a more prominent location than under 'Mars experiment'? For the second bit I didn't feel that the sharing power is relevant to this exact experiment, as it's more suitable for the Perseverance rover article; if you feel otherwise, there's no harm in adding it. Uses x (talk • contribs) 19:22, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Mea Culpa. In reading the article, I saw it was part of the Perseverance rover. Somehow, I quickly forgot that, and imagined the Oxygen generator as a standalone device, dropped off and sitting on Mars somewhere. When reading about devices that produce (store) chemical energy, I always wonder what the energy source is. The answer I was looking for is that it's energy source is the MMRTG aboard Perseverance. SlowJog (talk) 23:41, 9 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Finances?

Space flight is always expensive and competes for tax dollars with other human needs. Can anyone find the to-date cost of this experiment? My searches seem to end in annual expenditure requests for the entire rover mission but nothing more granular or cumulative. Justaxn (talk) 22:51, 23 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Per https://govtribe.com/award/federal-contract-award/definitive-contract-nnh17ch01c, about $6.1 million. 73.234.49.155 (talk) 01:13, 24 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What are they currently doing with the stored oxygen?

What are they currently doing with the stored oxygen? Is it being released? Do they have some type of storage? Lecky333 (talk) 17:52, 20 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]