SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO : Award to Fund Video Images of Mars Data

Because federal budget cuts are shrinking many of their programs, NASA administrators are looking for innovative and less expensive ways to explore outer space.

One immediate benefactor will be the San Juan Research Institute. The local planetary study group recently received a $229,500 grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to create computer video images of Mars based on data from previous missions to the red planet.

“One of the things NASA is spending money on is to improve their capability for using robotics,” said Doug Nash, institute director. “All of our thrust is on using unmanned spacecraft. It’s a lot less expensive than projects involving humans,” such as NASA’s space station program.

Under the grant, the institute will hire a scientist and a computer programmer to create a computerized Martian environment out of data from the Viking mission to Mars in 1976. The program will incorporate interactive graphics and three dimensional computer images of the Martian topography.

Later, the program will be used in schools on Macintosh computers. “We have two goals: One is to improve efficiency of space research and the other to improve how the data is used for education purposes,” Nash said.

Students and educators using the computer program could punch in a specific mountain range or canal on Mars and in moments be driving on the planet’s dusty terrain in a four-wheel drive vehicle or flying above the surface in a glider.

The program “will give you the impression you are in the vehicle or doing a fly over,” Nash said. “And it’s all based on real data.”

But first, the research done by the San Juan institute will benefit NASA scientists. The space agency will use the program during the current Voyager mission, which is due reach Mars in August and orbit the planet for about two years.