And that, in the end is really the critical thing.
Understanding how planetary scientists go about the business of doing
planetary science, and how they understand the solar system, the galaxy around them.
We'll let you interpret, we'll let you make sense of all of these
discoveries that will clearly be happening in the decades to come.
What's going to be happening in decades to come?
Well on Mars, the Mars 2020 Rover is on its way It's not on its way,
it's being developed to go on its way to Mars to collect materials to eventually
bring them back to the Earth with the purpose there not of
understanding habitability but understanding inhabitation.
Curiosity Rover is still there making important discoveries.
There will be orbiters on Mars looking at the atmosphere,
trying to understand geochemical and biological processes.
The Juno Mission is on its way to Jupiter.
It's again, I think it's the one that's going to get the least press,
because it's hard to get people who don't really understand why it matters,
it's hard to get them excited about the interior of Jupiter.
And yet, as you now know, the interior of Jupiter is fascinating and important for
understanding the entire history and formation of the solar system.
But along with Jupiter itself, there will be many many discoveries still to be made
about giant planets around other stars that will be hot Jupiter.
They will be, I hope someday,
Jupiter found at the distance of Jupiter and with the circular orbits of Jupiter.
Right now we don't know of any of those.
When those are discovered then I will start to feel like I have found something
similar to our own solar system.
The small bodies and the missions to small bodies are always in the news.
The Dawn spacecraft is on its way to Ceres after it's just left Vesta.
And I have to tell you, I am really looking forward to seeing,
just seeing what Ceres looks like.
It's going to be a fascinating little world to study.
And of course new horizons is on it's way to go screaming past Pluto, and
I can't wait to see what that looks like.
I have to say though, scientifically I'm actually
much more interested not in Pluto but I'm interested in its moon Charon.
Its moon Charon is a little too small to have all those frosts that Pluto has on
it, which means that you'll be able to see the geology better.
You'll be able to see that impact record better, and
we'll get a better understand of what sorts of objects
are out there in the outer solar system from looking at the craters on Charon.
For small bodies though, I have to say that spacecraft are great, but
spacecraft will give you a detailed view of one small body at a time.
But really, as I think I've tried to give you the case.
The interesting things about the small bodies are not the individuals, but
it's the collection.
So the collections we will be continuing to study
with the biggest telescopes we have here on the ground.
And in the future with what is going to soon be my favorite new telescope,
it's the LSST.
Not a lame acronym large scale synoptic telescope.
The large scale synoptic telescope is an 8.4 meter telescope,
it's about the same as a super telescope in that the mirror size.
Its 8.4 meter telescope with what will be far an above the hugest camera
on a telescope in the world.
And it is designed to just take pictures of the sky night after night,
after night, covering the whole sky in something like five days going back and
doing it over again.
It will be the telescope that defines for many decades to come.
The small body populations of the inner and outer solar system.
It's going to be one of the most exciting telescopic projects that I
can think of coming up.
And finally, of course, life in the universe.
That's a little bit exciting too.
You're going to hear about things on Mars all the time.
Habitability on Mars perhaps, but eventually in the decades to come,
we will find out about inhabitation.
I think we will get samples back from Mars.
And we will be able to use our laboratory's here on the Earth
to really try to infer what's been going on there at Mars.
Europa there's a mission that is, perhaps in the planning stages of trying to
get to Europa to try to, sadly not land on the surface and drill down into the ocean.
But at least have those close flybys of Europa to really start to learn about
the conditions on the surface, and
really learn more about what the ocean is like on the inside.
Enceladus, Titan, they're kind of far away.
It may take a long time before we ever go back to those locations,
although Cassini is still there making beautiful measurements of them.
And of course, the inevitable I think is that we will start to get data
on the atmospheres of terrestrial planets around other stars.
And of all the things that might be discovered,
perhaps the most profound discovery that will be made is when
we find an atmosphere of a planet that really is something that we have a very
hard time explaining without the presence of some sort of biological processes.
Are there such planets out there?
