2075 And Beyond

 

2075. A Grand Possibility!

Humans have set foot on Mars, and they are living in honey comb-like settlements, where everything is conditioned to meet the needs of the human body. Most of the inhabitants of Mars lead a life of well managed interdependencies, this makes the role of every individual unique, thus rendering it indispensable for the survival of the Martians. This leads to respect, and makes every Martian a valuable member of the Martian society of men and women. 

Recently, when few of the settlers went out to examine soil samples, they were struck by a sand storm, and one of the members got caught in this whirlwind that tossed him against the ground, causing his body suit to tear, which became the cause of his instant death. Since then the Martians have been waiting for the Earth based command centre to send them a replacement as quickly as possible, because he was an expert at renewing the protective layer on the domes of these settlements, which are exposed to regular bombardment of sand particles. And this protective shield needs to be examined and repaired almost every week. One of the domes is already showing signs of depletion of this protective layer and if it is not repaired in a few days, the entire settlement will be rendered unfit to sustain human life. Moreover, the honeycomb like structures have no provision to seal off a dome completely in case it develops any technical failure or is classified as unfit to support human life. 

Caught in this quandary, one of Martians, decides to fix it himself and not wait for the support from Earth based command centre. With his protective body suit  he ascends the dome and tries to repair it. He uses the gel like material to cover the exposed area and while he was flattening it with his planer, he sees a heavy sand storm approaching his way, he is left shocked, because their weather prediction system had not predicted any such event in this zone for a week.

He panics, and quickly gathers his gadgets and secures them in his bag. As he begins to descend, he sees a huge rock-like formation hurtling towards him at an incredible speed. He looks towards the ground, runs some quick calculations, and with his bag he jumps, and touches the ground with his feet, without losing his balance. As soon as he touches the ground, the rock hits the dome and crashes into it, leaving everything shattered. And, through the vent created by it, it exposes the dome to the natural elements of Mars- Merciless and relentlessly brute, if you give it the chance. And the stray rock offered it the gateway to unleash the Martian fury on the settlers and their honeycomb like domes.

The echo of alarms sounding from every dome, dominates the vocal frenzy across the human settlement on Mars. And everyone moves to secure whatever he/she can. And with change in pressure, those without protective body suits rush to the only secure dome, designed keeping such incidents in mind. And they wait for their companions to return with their body suits.

But now, the entire equation has changed. The domed settlement is designed to accommodate 150 residents, and the safe dome can only hold 50 residents. Although right now there are only 30 residents inside the safe dome, the 120 residents already wearing their body suits would need the protection of the safe dome as well. Because it is impossible for a human to live in the body suit continuously for many weeks. And to repair the dome and restore pressure, will take months if not weeks. That is a fact if we go by the rule book!

Nevertheless, the 30 residents inside the safe dome, receive their protective body suits and they too join others to assess the scale of damage, and then work on a strategy to repair it. While everyone is keenly observing different areas of the settlement based on his/her skills and expertise, and trying to establish the scale of effort required from him/her. Exactly then one of them shouts, “in the green area the plants are already wilting and we have food reserves, that will last us only a month.”

On hearing this, all of them gaze at him and then at the domes meant to function as green zones for food production. And most of them kneel on the ground, and a silent sense of panic imprisons each one of them. Most of them appear hopeless and for them this might be the end of all their hopes and desires.

It is then, someone named, Javid, stands up on a table, and addresses them, “We have lost the dome. We have lost the green zone. And it is very likely that if we do nothing, we will lose our lives too. For us it is important to work on three major priorities:

1- Ensure our water generation systems do not fail

2- Make sure oxygen extraction units work properly

3- To stabilize the pressure we should repair the dome

If we can do this, we shall have hope on our side, without these life supporting elements, we shall be even forsaken by the Gods, though at this height, I feel we are closer to Heavens. And I have a solution that would help us seal the vent.”

With these words, he jumps down from the table, and walks towards the dome that played host to the stray rock. There he, along with a few other members, move to the laboratory. Where they scan the Martian landscape and pinpoint the spot rich in loose sand like deposits. Which actually is not only sand, but a mix of many minerals. And when it is exposed to extreme heat, it turns into a silicon like substance , which is then given the required shape and dimension based on magnetic particles that arrange and rearrange based on the 3D digital diagram, and at final stage they mix few compounds and coat it on the silicon like patch, needed to plug any lost cell of the dome.

But right now, the question is, who will go out and bring this sand? And given the size of the hole in the dome, they would need around 300 kgs of this sand.

Once again, Javid volunteers to venture out, but he would need two more residents to help him secure 300 kgs of sand. As he was waiting for someone to express his/her willingness to join him, one of the talented residents of Mars, named Irma, volunteers to venture out. Now it is Javid and Irma, but they need one more. And without wasting time, Javid, asks one of his fellow residents to join him. He is someone who specializes in maintaining the green zone, and without hesitation, he joins them and they walk out of the dome and start walking towards the area with sand deposits.

It is confusing for them, because they are experiencing strange pelting on their helmets, and their protective suits as well. It is surely not a sand storm, but the small particles are like sand granules, only that they are raining on them with very low density, not more than 2 to 3 sand grains in a minute. They all look upwards, towards the sky, and they see mini particle-like formations falling from the sky. “But how and what is its source?” Asks Irma.

At this point, they launch their mini aerial probe and allow it to gain height, but its scanners and sensors return no data that could establish the source of these mysterious granules falling from the sky.

And then, Irma, manages to catch one granule on her palm, and they all could tell these are not sand granules but chipped pieces of magnets. For now it is a mystery they are unable to solve. And they focus on collecting the sand and hope that the density of these drizzling magnetic particles does not increase. Because then it will be impossible for them to move and the magnetic particles will lead to holes in their body suits. With this fear, they collect the sand and start moving towards their settlement. 

And they can see a black dust-like halo covering their honeycomb-like settlement, and this is causing severe disruptions in their communication systems. When they reach the main dome, they see almost everyone, gripped by an ever deepening feeling of helplessness. But they waste no time and head to the laboratory. Where they begin the melting process of the sand, and they also prepare the solution of this special compound used to cover the patch, meant to repair the vent in the main dome. 

Finally after 4 hours, they are ready. But due to the increased density of these raining magnetic particles, they will have to launch their drone with umbrella shields, used by them whenever they undertake outdoor repair works. They launch the drone but it takes them longer than usual to set it at the right spot, because the magnetic rain interferes with its communication system.

Finally, Javid and his two volunteers climb the dome and begin to repair the vent. Which they accomplish in 2 hours. They also spray a form of algae like concentrate on the repaired patch, followed by a spray of genetically engineered bacteria that feeds on this algae, and its efficiency to feed increases exponentially in an ecosystem with higher concentration of CO2 gas and some concentration of CO gases. And the bacteria multiply by millions and form a thick coral like layer on the repaired patch, as they decompose after their death. Their lifecycle is engineered in such a way, that they reproduce and die in few days, and when the sensors on the dome detect the right thickness of this organic but extremely strong protective layer over the repaired patch, they release higher concentration of CO gases, which results in causing an end to the reproduction cycle and thus the last layer of bacteria on the repaired patch, offers its humble sacrifice to maintain the durability and sturdiness of the dome, that now can cope with the outer ecosystem and its threats.

With this task fulfilled, Irma descends the dome, followed by Javid, and the green zone expert.

Now they check the sensors that measure the pressure and oxygen levels in the dome. According to Irma, who makes these critical calculations, they would need 12 hours to establish safe levels of oxygen, and for the right pressure, she estimates a couple of hours to be more than sufficient.

The community of Martians, now feels encouraged, and Javid and the green zone expert head to the domes where they grow vegetables and other food items needed by the Martians as a part of their healthy diet. When they look at the plants, they have no choice but to wait for these isolated domes to attain stable pressure, and according to them the plants should be able to recover the loss of water. These plants are genetically modified to survive in thin atmospheres, an idea that the Martians had tested based on their knowledge of plants and vegetations that thrive in very high altitudes like Tibet, Ladakh, Chile, certain regions in Peru, these plants have a special adaptation to cope with thin atmospheric pressure. For example, free green leafy vegetables from Tibet and Ladakh , along with a few varieties of potatoes, are unique to these regions and not found anywhere else. But due to the thin atmosphere, the size of potatoes tends to be smaller and the same applies to vegetables as well.

This genetic advantage, induced in these plants, is supposed to auto trigger a process to control transpiration and not let the plants dehydrate. And it should help them to cope with the low pressure that had developed in these domes. 

And it was Irma, who had suggested this during the design conception phase of these domes. She had advised the engineers to separate the pressure-maintaining ducts feeding the green area domes, from the main settlement domes, and also isolate oxygen filtration units for these green domes. Because this ecosystem is unique and would thrive better if it is offered individual engineering precision. Had the engineers considered this idea, today the Martian settlement would not have to face a situation that had almost destroyed their capacity to be self-sufficient in terms of food production.  

Nevertheless, Irma, Javid and Samuel ( the green zone expert ) saved the Martian settlement from running into the risk of complete loss of important resources. And as they headed to their domes, someone from behind, who could not refrain from expressing his joyous feelings, shouted, “ Wow. All's well that ends well!”

After a few hours, Irma, Javid and Samuel meet in the central dome, to discuss the possible causes of these raining magnetic granules. And Javid pulls old weather data corresponding to the red planet. That hints at this magnetic rain. However, the data does not specify the cause. Then Samuel, Javid and Irma work on a few data patterns and conclude the following.

“The area where these sand deposits are found. Along with minerals and magnetic dust. Are carried by heavy winds into higher altitudes, where it gets showered on the surface in the form of heavy storms. However during the process, few magnetic pieces break apart into micro fragments, and as the wind subsides, they remain suspended in the air floating with currents of winds, constantly flowing across the Martian terrain. And when these currents of soft drifts of wind, collide with heavy wind storms, the micro magnetic particles combine based on their polarity and form clumps of loosely bound magnetic fragments, and as strong winds carry them and bombard then of the surface, they break apart again, and fall as tiny particles of magnets on whatever surface they come in contact with.

And based on their assessment, the pattern of these soft currents of winds carrying magnetic particles is a planet wide occurrence, and detecting where it will get deposited next is difficult to predict. Although, it is not impossible, if one studies the drift of soft wind currents, occurrence of heavy storms, zones with highest proneness to such showers of magnetic rain, and then plot it on a historical weather map of Mars. One can easily tell where to expect it next, and also isolate regions which would never receive such showers of magnetic rain.

But in 2075, the Martians are yet to develop a reliable weather forecasting system exclusive to Mars.

For now, the Martians are safe, and with their wit, prudence, scientific thinking, and the courage of a true man and a woman, they shall always manage to not meet the fate similar to Dinosaurs or Wooly Mammoths. And as they are waiting for the Earth based command centre to confirm the transportation of the next group of settlers willing to make Mars their new home. I too would like to conclude this blog post, where imagination went as far as Mars, and attempted to excite the general imagination of the science fiction readers by exposing them to new frontiers of scientific exploration on the red planet and beyond. And let us celebrate this hunger every day: Hunger for the new science, new human frontiers, new human ingenuity, new bravado that is needed to launch humans into the farthest reaches of the cosmos, where we shall uncover the last loop of infinity too. Because I believe infinity resides within finite sets , and if we study sets and subsets with a lot of attention, we can establish the sub-set of infinity, which eventually shall yield the main set of infinity. And when that happens, we shall be closer to the Heavens and in the proximity with Gods. 

And in an attempt to renew this hunger, I wrote my first science fiction novel. They Loved in 2075. That takes the reader into the scenarios that humans will be facing on Earth in 2075. And the scifi novel takes you on this revitalising journey into the future, via an exciting story. Which also attempts to ask a few questions that we should be addressing now, if we want a safe and secure future for our next generation of humans- Our children and our grandchildren.

The science fiction novel, They Loved in 2075, examines How humans will experience love in 2075. This science fiction novel navigates through the possibility of men and women falling in love with machines, without knowing they are robots imitating human emotions. Will you still dare to fall in love in 2075 or will you strive to tell the difference between a human lover and a robotic lover?

This Sci-fi novel tells the story of a man who falls in love with a real woman in 2075. And how he struggles to feel human and keep his emotional composition intact.

This Sci-fi story also aims at revealing why the man chose to love a real woman and not a never ageing and always beautiful woman with synthetic feelings. In 2075, this might be a choice we all will have to make. Especially our children!

Whether it is on Mars, or on Earth, 2075, will be the year of many changes and it remains to be seen if humans will outlive them as a single society or they will get segregated into different sects seeking their own proprietorship in the cosmic journeys beyond the Mars, and perhaps beyond the Milky Way. Which race of humans will get where, I do not know, but I know for certain that together we can go anywhere and everywhere in the universe. There, where Gods await our re-entry into the Garden of Eden. And maybe reaching for the Heavens will be easier from Mars. Who knows!

With that thought, I conclude this blog post, and I let you be the masters of your own destiny. Mars is there, it will always be there, as long as the Sun has fuel to burn. But if you have the passion to fuel your quest into these distant regions of the universe, there will always be a choice that you as an individual will have to make. Choose well and let humanity be Eden bound!