Monthly Archives: April 2021

For the first few months of 2021, the Martian atmosphere was buzzing with new visitors from Earth. First, it was the UAE Space Agencys Hope probe, followed by the Chinese Tianwen-1 entering orbit.

More recently Nasa landed the biggest-ever rover on Mars and its companion, an ingenious helicopter, both of which have been setting new milestones since.

The next visitor to the planet will be Tianwen-1 missions lander, which will attempt to reach the surface of the Mars in mid-May. To enter the Martian atmosphere, it will use a slightly different technique to previous missions.

Landing on Mars is notoriously dangerous more missions have failed than succeeded. A successful Mars landing requires entering the atmosphere at very high speeds, then slowing the spacecraft down just the right way as it approaches its landing location.

This phase of the mission, known as entry-descent-landing, is the most critical. Previous missions have used several different ways of Martian atmospheric entry.

Perfecting entry to Marss atmosphere has been helped by the experience of returning spacecraft to Earth. Earth may have a significantly different atmosphere to Mars, but the principles remain the same.

Read more: Mars missions from China and UAE are set to go into orbit here's what they could discover

A spacecraft orbiting a planet will be moving very fast, to keep itself bound to that orbit. But if the spacecraft entered an atmosphere at such high speed, even one as thin as Marss, it would burn up. Anything entering the atmosphere needs to be slowed down significantly and to get rid of the heat generated during this brief journey. There are several ways to go about it.

Spacecraft are protected from the heat generated during atmospheric entry using heat shields. Various missions in the past have used techniques such as absorbing heat, an insulating coating, reflecting the heat back into atmosphere or by ablation burning up the shield material.

From Apollo missions of 1960s to the more recent SpaceXs Dragon, these techniques have been used successfully, and they work really well for Earth. But when it comes to Mars, engineers need to employ some additional measures.

Orbiters are designed to monitor a planets surface from the orbit and act as a communications relay station. When approaching a planet, the spacecraft is usually directed along successively smaller elliptical orbits, slowing down each time, until it reaches its target orbit. This technique can also be used to lower the orbit of a spacecraft ahead of a landers atmospheric entry.

The entire manoeuvre occurs over a few months and doesnt need any additional equipment an efficient way to conserve fuel. Since it uses the planets upper atmosphere to apply brakes, its called as aerobraking. Aerobraking has been used for various Mars missions including ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Aerobraking can significantly slow down the spacecraft, but for missions with rovers to land it gets more complicated. On Mars, the atmospheric density is just 1% of Earth and there are no oceans for the spacecraft to safely splash into. The blunt shape of the spacecraft alone is not enough to reduce the speed.

Previously, successful missions have used extra measures. Mars Pathfinder spacecraft used parachutes to decelerate, while relying on a unique airbag system that sprung into action in the final few seconds to absorb the landing shock. The Spirit and Opportunity rovers landed successfully on Mars with the same technique.

A few years later, Curiosity rover used a new landing system. In the final few seconds, rockets were fired, allowing the spacecraft to hover while a tether a skycrane lowered the rover to the dusty Martian surface. This new system demonstrated delivery of a heavy payload to Mars and paved the way for bigger missions.

More recently, the Perseverance rover which landed in early 2021, used the the reliable skycrane as well as two more advanced technologies. These new features which used live images taken from its cameras enabled a more accurate, reliable and safer landing.

The Chinese Tianwen-1 rover landing is the next Mars mission. The ambitious mission has orbiting, landing and roving components the first mission to include all three on its first attempt. It has already been circling the red planet since it entered Marss orbit on February 24 and will attempt to land its rover Zhurong which means fire god in mid May.

In size, Zhurong falls between Spirit and the Perseverence and it is carrying six pieces of scientific equipment. After landing, Zhurong will survey the surroundings to study Martian soil, geomorphology and atmosphere, and will look for signs of subsurface water ice.

Traditionally, the Chinese authorities dont reveal a lot of information before the event. However, based on an early overview of the mission by some Chinese researchers, we know the landing sequence the spacecraft will attempt to follow.

On May 17, Zhurong protected by an aeroshell (a protective shell surrounding the spacecraft which includes the heat shield) will enter the atmosphere at a speed of 4 km/s. When it slows down enough, parachutes will be deployed. In the last phase of the sequence, rockets with variable thrust engines will be used for further deceleration.

In contrast with its American counterpart, Tianwen-1 will employ two reliable technologies a laser range finder to work out where it is relative to Martian terrain and a microwave sensor to determine its speed more accurately. These will be used for navigational correction during its parachuted descent phase. During the powered descent phase at the end, optical and Lidar imaging will assist in hazard detection.

Just before touchdown, an automated obstacle avoidance sequence will begin for soft landing. If the mission is successful, China will be the first country to land a rover on Mars in its first attempt. A few days after that, Zhurong will be ready to explore the surface.

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The Chinese Mars lander: how Zhurong will attempt to touch down on the red planet - The Conversation UK

The crafts April 25 flight was conducted at speeds and distances beyond what had ever been previously demonstrated, even in testing on Earth.

NASAs Ingenuity Mars Helicopter continues to set records, flying faster and farther on Sunday, April 25, 2021 than in any tests it went through on Earth. The helicopter took off at 4:31 a.m. EDT (1:31 a.m. PDT), or 12:33 p.m. local Mars time, rising 16 feet (5 meters) the same altitude as its second flight. Then it zipped downrange 164 feet (50 meters), just over half the length of a football field, reaching a top speed of 6.6 feet per second (2 meters per second).

After data came back from Mars starting at 10:16 a.m. EDT (7:16 a.m. PDT), Ingenuitys team at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California was ecstatic to see the helicopter soaring out of view. Theyre already digging through a trove of information gathered during this third flight that will inform not just additional Ingenuity flights but possible Mars rotorcraft in the future.

Todays flight was what we planned for, and yet it was nothing short of amazing, said Dave Lavery, the projects program executive for Ingenuity Mars Helicopter at NASA Headquarters in Washington. With this flight, we are demonstrating critical capabilities that will enable the addition of an aerial dimension to future Mars missions.

The Mastcam-Z imager aboard NASAs Perseverance Mars rover, which is parked at Van Zyl Overlook and serving as a communications base station, captured video of Ingenuity. In the days ahead, segments of that video will be sent back to Earth showing most of the helicopters 80-second journey across its flight zone.

The Ingenuity team has been pushing the helicopters limits by adding instructions to capture more photos of its own including from the color camera, which captured its first images on Flight Two. As with everything else about these flights, the additional steps are meant to provide insights that could be used by future aerial missions.

This is the first time weve seen the algorithm for the camera running over a long distance, said MiMi Aung, the helicopters project manager at JPL. You cant do this inside a test chamber.

Vacuum chambers at JPL are filled with wispy air, primarily carbon dioxide, to simulate the thin Martian atmosphere; they dont have room for even a tiny helicopter to move more than about 1.6 feet (half a meter) in any direction. That posed a challenge: Would the camera track the ground as designed while moving at higher speed on the Red Planet?

Lots of things have to go just right for the camera to do that, said Gerik Kubiak, a JPL software engineer. Aside from focusing on the algorithm that tracks surface features, the team needs the correct image exposures: Dust can obscure the images and interfere with camera performance. And the software must perform consistently.

When youre in the test chamber, you have an emergency land button right there and all these safety features, Kubiak said. We have done all we can to prepare Ingenuity to fly free without these features.

With this third flight in the history books, the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter team is looking ahead to planning its fourth flight in a few days time.

The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter was built by JPL, which also manages this technology demonstration project for NASA Headquarters. It is supported by NASAs Science Mission Directorate, Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate, and Space Technology Mission Directorate. NASAs Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center provided significant flight performance analysis and technical assistance during Ingenuitys development. AeroVironment Inc., Qualcomm, Snapdragon, and SolAero also provided design assistance and major vehicle components. The Mars Helicopter Delivery System was designed and manufactured by Lockheed Space Systems, Denver.

News Media Contacts

Andrew GoodJet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.818-393-2433andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov

Karen Fox / Alana JohnsonNASA Headquarters, Washington301-286-6284 / 202-358-1501karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / alana.r.johnson@nasa.gov

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NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Flies Faster, Farther on Third Flight NASA's Mars Exploration Program - NASA Mars Exploration

For the first few months of 2021, the Martian atmosphere was buzzing with new visitors from Earth. First, it was the UAE Space Agencys Hope probe, followed by the Chinese Tianwen-1 entering orbit.

More recently, Nasa landed the biggest-ever rover on Mars, as well as its companion, an ingenious helicopter.Both have been setting new milestones since.

The next visitor to the planet will be Tianwen-1 missions lander, which will attempt to reach the surface of Mars in mid-May. To enter the Martian atmosphere, it will use a slightly different technique to previous missions.

Landing on Mars is notoriously dangerous more missions have failed than succeeded. A successful Mars landing requires entering the atmosphere at very high speeds, then slowing the spacecraft down just the right way as it approaches its landing location.

This phase of the mission, known as entry-descent-landing, is the most critical. Previous missions have used several different ways of Martian atmospheric entry.

Perfecting entry to Marss atmosphere has been helped by the experience of returning spacecraft to Earth. Earth may have a significantly different atmosphere to Mars, but the principles remain the same.

A spacecraft orbiting a planet will be moving very fast, to keep itself bound to that orbit. But if the spacecraft entered an atmosphere at such high speed, even one as thin as Marss, it would burn up. Anything entering the atmosphere needs to be slowed down significantly and to get rid of the heat generated during this brief journey. There are several ways to go about it.

Spacecraft are protected from the heat generated during atmospheric entry using heat shields. Various missions in the past have used techniques such as absorbing heat, an insulating coating, reflecting the heat back into the atmosphere, or by ablation burning up the shield material.

From Apollo missions of the 1960s to the more recent SpaceXs Dragon, these techniques have been used successfully, and they work really well for Earth. But when it comes to Mars, engineers need to employ some additional measures.

Orbiters are designed to monitor a planets surface from orbit and act as a communications relay station. When approaching a planet, the spacecraft is usually directed along successively smaller elliptical orbits, slowing down each time, until it reaches its target orbit. This technique can also be used to lower the orbit of a spacecraft ahead of a landers atmospheric entry.

The entire maneuver occurs over a few months and doesnt need any additional equipment an efficient way to conserve fuel. Since it uses the planets upper atmosphere to apply brakes, its called aerobraking. Aerobraking has been used for various Mars missions including ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Aerobraking can significantly slow down the spacecraft, but for missions with rovers to land, it gets more complicated. On Mars, the atmospheric density is just 1% of Earth and there are no oceans for the spacecraft to safely splash into. The blunt shape of the spacecraft alone is not enough to reduce the speed.

Previously, successful missions have used extra measures. Mars Pathfinder spacecraft used parachutes to decelerate, while relying on a unique airbag system that sprung into action in the final few seconds to absorb the landing shock. The Spirit and Opportunity rovers landed successfully on Mars with the same technique.

A few years later, theCuriosity rover used a new landing system. In the final few seconds, rockets were fired, allowing the spacecraft to hover while a tether a skycrane lowered the rover to the dusty Martian surface. This new system demonstrated the delivery of a heavy payload to Mars and paved the way for bigger missions.

More recently, the Perseverance rover which landed in early 2021, used the reliable skycrane as well as two more advanced technologies. These new features which used live images taken from its cameras enabled a more accurate, reliable and safer landing.

The Chinese Tianwen-1 rover landing is the next Mars mission. The ambitious mission has orbiting, landing, and roving components the first mission to include all three on its first attempt. It has already been circling the red planet since it entered Marss orbit on February 24 and will attempt to land its rover Zhurong which means fire god in mid-May.

In size, Zhurong falls between Spirit and the Perseverence and it is carrying six pieces of scientific equipment. After it lands, Zhurong will survey the surroundings to study Martian soil, geomorphology and atmosphere, and will look for signs of subsurface water ice.

Traditionally, the Chinese authorities dont reveal a lot of information before the event. However, based on an early overview of the mission by some Chinese researchers, we know the landing sequence the spacecraft will attempt to follow.

On May 17, Zhurong protected by an aeroshell (a protective shell surrounding the spacecraft which includes the heat shield) will enter the atmosphere at a speed of 4 km/s. When it slows down enough, parachutes will be deployed. In the last phase of the sequence, rockets with variable thrust engines will be used for further deceleration.

In contrast with its American counterpart, Tianwen-1 will employ two reliable technologies a laser range finder to work out where it is relative to Martian terrain and a microwave sensor to determine its speed more accurately. These will be used for navigational correction during its parachuted descent phase. During the powered descent phase at the end, optical and Lidar imaging will assist in hazard detection.

Just before touchdown, an automated obstacle avoidance sequence will start to ensure a soft landing. If the mission is successful, China will be the first country to land a rover on Mars on its first attempt. A few days after that, Zhurong will be ready to explore the surface.

This article byDeep Bandivadekar, PhD candidate, University of Strathclyde, is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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China to land a rover on Mars in mid-May here's how it'll work - The Next Web

According to the immortal words of Ian Malcom (Jeff Goldblum) Life..uhfinds a way. Back in 2005, an article in Nature used the famous quote from Jurassic Park to describe the possibility of life surviving on Mars. It encapsulates the hope that lifes adaptability, which it has proved itself so many times over on Earth, could hold true on other planets as well. Now a new paper in Astrobiology shows that there might very well be a place where life can sustain itself on the red planet right underneath the surface.

One thing that all life needs is an energy source. Typically, on Earth, that energy source is the sun. However, there are instances where life utilizes other energy sources, such as hydrothermal vents deep in the ocean. In fact, such environments are also thought to have existed on Mars in the past. The team behind the new paper, led by Jesse Tarnas, then a PhD student at Brown, found a slightly different non-solar energy source on Mars.

Water is a key ingredient to many chemical processes. Some of those processes release energy when they occur. Radiolysis occurs when rocks break apart water that is trapped in their porous structure and then bombarded with radiation from the decay of radioactive isotopes in the rock formation. The broken water molecules release elemental oxygen and hydrogen.

Each of those constituent molecules plays an important role in the biological process that sustains some types of microbes. The hydrogen is absorbed back into the water directly while the oxygen can react with other materials, such as pyrite (fools gold) to form a type of material known as sulfates. Bacteria have been found in isolated parts of the Earths subsurface that eat the dissolved hydrogen in the water and then use the sulfates the oxygen formed to burn away the hydrogen and produce the energy necessary to life. Entire colonies of these sulfate-burning bacteria have been found living a kilometer underground with no energy source other than the radiolysis process.

Dr. Tarnas team was interested in whether the materials needed to support that radiolysis process would be present in the Martian subsurface. Three of the main ingredients they were looking for were radioactive elements such as thorium or potassium, sulfides that could be converted into sulfate with the addition of oxygen, and porous rocks that could trap the water for long enough for the radiolysis process to take effect.

To find these ingredients, the team took a look at the most convenient sources Martian meteorites. They found that all three of the key ingredients for a radiolysis ecosystem were present in enough quantities in the meteorites they studied to support a bacterial colony similar to those found on the Earth.

This isnt the first time the Brown team took a look at this question. Back in 2018 they instead analyzed gamma ray spectroscopy data from Odyssey and came to a similar conclusion about the potential for life to spring up in Mars subsurface. Nor is the team at Brown the only one to search out this process off of Earth. Other teams have explored the potential for the process on ocean worlds.

Simply because the environmental conditions are right does not mean that a bacterial colony actually exists. So far there has been no conclusive evidence for the existence of life on Mars. But that doesnt stop scientists from looking. With the addition of this new research, there is now a stronger case for a mission specifically to look for life underground on the red planet. If a mission is launched, and life is eventually found there, then Mr. Goldblums famous quote will take on a whole new meaning.

Learn More:Brown Mars has right ingredients for present-day microbial life beneath its surface, study findsAstrobiology Earth-like Habitable Environments in the Subsurface of MarsMining.com Meteorites give clues of possible existence of present-day microbial life on MarsUT Youre Going to Need a Bigger Drill. The Best Place for Life on Mars is Deep, Deep Underground

Lead Image:Jesse Tarnas, the lead author on the paper, collecting samples in a mine shaft that could prove similar in environment to the subsurface of Mars.Credit: Jesse Tarnas

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Mars has the Right Conditions for Life Just Under the Surface - Universe Today

China has named its first-ever Mars rover "Zhurong" after an ancient fire god ahead of a landing attempt on the Red Planet in May.

The China National Space Administration (CNSA) revealed the name at the sixth China Space Day held in Nanjing on Saturday (April 24).

Zhurong was the most popular of 10 shortlisted names for a public vote that opened in January, and that choice was backed by an expert panel and the CNSA itself.

Related: The latest news about China's space program

Going with the fire god is apt, for the Chinese name for Mars, "Huoxing," literally means "fire star."

The roughly 530-lb. (240 kilograms) solar-powered Zhurong rover is part of the Tianwen-1 mission, which launched in July 2020 and arrived in orbit around Mars in February.

The Tianwen-1 orbiter has been collecting high-resolution images of Zhurongs target landing site in Utopia Planitia. The landing attempt is expected in mid-May, according to a senior Chinese space scientist.

The rover carries panoramic and multispectral cameras and instruments to analyze the composition of rocks. Zhurong will also investigate subsurface characteristics with ground-penetrating radar, if all goes according to plan.

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Meet 'Zhurong': China names Tianwen-1 Mars rover ahead of mid-May landing attempt - Space.com

While NASAs Perseverance rover has been making news since reaching Mars in February, a 2016 study by Canadian geologists is also eliciting significant interest, for the clues it offers in the search for alien life, especially on the Red Planet.

The research, published in Nature Communications, is based on a discovery made by Dr Barbara Sherwood Lollar of the University of Toronto, who in 2009 extracted from a Canadian mine water that is 1.6 billion years old the oldest to be found on our planet.

The discovery of the water 2.4 km below the Earths surface has since been heralded as one of great importance, given its ramifications on what we know about the origin and evolution of our planet, the nature of water and life, as well as the possibility of finding life on Mars.

The worlds oldest water

Since 1992, Sherwood Lollar had been carrying out research at the Kidd Creek mine, located on the 2.7 billion-year-old Canadian Shield, one of the worlds largest continental shields meaning the oldest and least tectonically active parts of the Earths crust.

It was on an expedition in 2009 that a musty smell led Sherwood Lollar to make the crucial discovery. It literally is following your nose right up to the rock, to find the crack or the fractures where the water is discharging, she told the magazine Macleans. The water was highly saline ten times saltier than sea water.

According to the report, the researcher, who at the time was unaware of how old the water exactly was, sent a sample to UKs Oxford University, who informed her that it caused their mass spectrometer to break. Researchers then conducted studies for four years on the sample, finally settling at the 1.6 billion years figure.

What scientists found in the water

Investigations into the highly saline water led to a pathbreaking discovery: scientists found that chemolithotrophic microbes bacteria that can thrive in the most extreme surroundings had been able to survive in the subterranean liquid.

Researchers found that the microbes had been feeding on nitrogen and sulphate, and that the chemistry that supported them bore resemblance to ocean beds that are known to support similar such extreme life forms.

As it happens, the Canadian Shield, on which the Kidd mine is located, in the past used to form an ocean floor, as per the report. Over millions of years of flux, however, its horizontal seabed became vertical, now preserved in the mines rock walls from which the water sample was extracted.

Why this matters in the search for life on Mars

Being a continental shield, which suffers the least from plate tectonic activity, the Canadian Shield is the closest analogue on Earth to the subsurface of Mars, researchers believe.

Scientists argue that if life-supporting water can be found 2.4 km below the Earth, it may be possible that the same could be true in the case of the Red Planet. This hypothesis provides an impetus for missions like Perseverance, which are looking for signs of present or past life on Mars.

For her discovery, Sherwood Lollar was awarded the Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal for Science and Engineering worth 1 million Canadian dollars in 2019, as well as the John C Polanyi Award by the countrys Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council in 2016, as per a Sciences Times report.

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Explained: Why finding the oldest water on Earth matters in the quest for life on Mars - The Indian Express

What sort of outer space movies are you a fan of? The action-packed, big-budgeters that have the word "Star" in the title, as well as either "Trek" or "Wars?" The message-heavy ones such as "2001: A Space Odyssey?" (yes, some of those messages were perplexing), or the cerebral ones like Andrei Tarkovsky's "Solaris" and Steven Soderbergh's remake of that film? (and in both of those cases, by "cerebral," I mean "boring").

"Stowaway" doesn't fit neatly into any of those categories. There are some good visual effects, but they're limited in number. There isn't a dull moment in it. Its main message is more on the order of "what would YOU do" if you were in this situation.

The plot starts out as a simple one. A three-person crew is being sent to Mars on a two-year mission that has to do with maintaining and sustaining long-term life there. The commander is Marina (Toni Collette), the doctor is Zoe (Anna Kendrick), the scientist is David (Daniel Dae Kim).

There's the loud and shaky lift-off, the docking with the space station where they'll live and work, the settling in, and the scraps of personal information (this is Marina's third and final mission, Zoe and David have brought their good-humored Harvard-Yale rivalry into space).

But about 15 minutes in I started wondering about the title. Where could someone be hiding out? How could anyone survive the takeoff if they weren't strapped in and had a personal oxygen supply?

Three minutes later, Marina sees a splotch of blood on the floor, unbolts a ceiling panel, and is fallen on by an injured and unconscious man. The scene is shocking and nicely done. The first line of dialogue is apt: "Who the hell is this?"

We soon find out he's Michael (Shamier Anderson), a launch support engineer who somehow got stuck on the ship (sorry, no explanation of how it happened is forthcoming). Since it's only 12 hours after launch, he pleads with the crew to turn it around and bring him back home.

Nope, that's not going to happen, says the practically inaudible radio voice of mission control - not NASA, but some corporation called Hyperion - to the commander. Keep going to Mars. Make do with the situation.

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And so the difficulties begin to pile up. The commander's left arm is broken due to Michael falling on her. The craft's Life Support Assembly was damaged. David's main science experiments - one of the major components of the expedition - are likely compromised. There's plenty of food onboard for an extra person, but that might not be the case as far as oxygen. And there's one other detail. This voyage to Mars was initially intended for two people, but the bean-counters at Hyperion figured out a method of retooling things to make room for three, at very little additional cost. It may not show, but some of the work is, shall we say, on the shoddy side. So, a ship that was made for two is now carrying four. And the sudden oxygen shortage is not helping matters.

The second half of the film deals with Hyperion simply not giving a damn about the crew, and ordering them to continue on with the mission, while the astronauts try to devise a method of survival. They know that if they can make it to Mars, where there is already a colony, they'll be OK. But the odds are against that happening, and there's quiet talk among the three actual crew members of continuing on without Michael.

So, there's that "what would you do in this situation" component.

"Stowaway"

Written by Joe Penna and Ryan Morrison; directed by Joe Penna

With Anna Kendrick, Toni Collette, Daniel Dae Kim, Shamier Anderson

Not Rated

It's a tough emotional grind for Marina, Zoe, and David, and that's amplified when Michael catches wind of what's going on. The situation seems impossible, but since this is science fiction, there's also a possible solution, one filled with risks and with no guarantee of succeeding. But it adds some good drama - and those visual effects - to the film.

A dangerous space walk includes a "ticking clock," tense music, spirit, bravery, and selflessness, all leading to an eerie, haunting, really moving ending.

"Stowaway" is now available on Netflix.

U.S. News and World Report's 2021 list of the BEST GEORGIA HIGH SCHOOLSincludes 22 Gwinnett County public high schools in the top 205 in the state. Click for more.

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Movie review: 'Stowaway' heads to Mars slowly and dramatically - Gwinnettdailypost.com

FLORENCE Joey Barriers introduction to Mars Hill soccer came in 1995, when he was a senior playing the sport for the first time and falling in love with it.

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Challenge participants presented solutions aimed at improving patient outcomes and reducing time between diagnosis and treatment for lung cancer patients

Challenge winners includethe Kingston Health Sciences Centre and the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, with solutions to help improve timely access to specialized care in rural South Eastern Ontario and accelerate lung cancer diagnosis and treatment through liquid biopsy

KIRKLAND, QC, April 28, 2021 /CNW/ -Merck Canada and MaRS Discovery District (MaRS) are proud to announce the winners of the Lung Cancer Innovation Challenge: the Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC), competition winner and the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, runner up winner. The competition, which launched in January 2021, challenged Ontario-based innovators to identify, implement and scale solutions that could help enhance the lung cancer patient journey by seeking to reduce the length of time between diagnosis and treatment, and enable improved treatment outcomes, especially for priority patient groups such as rural and lower socioeconomic populations.

In 2020, approximately 30,000 new cases of lung cancer were diagnosed in Canada and more than 21,000 people died of the disease.1Alarmingly, the survival rate for lung cancer is among the lowest of all types of cancer and approximately half of all cases are diagnosed at stage 4, further worsening chances of survival.1,2

"From diagnosis to treatment, lung cancer patients face a huge number of access barriers, which may ultimately impact their health outcomes. Today this has been even further exacerbated due to the COVID-19 pandemic," said AnnA Van Acker, President and Managing Director at Merck Canada. "As a patient-centric biotech company with a passion for and a focus on saving and improving lives, we know we need to play our part in finding solutions for patients, and that is why we partnered with MaRS on the Lung Cancer Innovation Challenge. We are very grateful and feel inspired by all participants who brought forth unique and innovative solutions. Together, we have the power to transform lung cancer care for the better!"

"We have been incredibly inspired by all of the solutions presented during the challenge,"said Alex Ryan, SVP, Partner Solutions at MaRS. "As North America's largest innovation hub, our focus at MaRS is on empowering new ideas that drive change, and this challenge has really showcased the best of local talent and of ingenuity. We hope that these winning solutions will grow and act as a blueprint to help improve outcomes for Ontario lung cancer patients."

Lung cancer's impact is particularly acute in Ontario, where an estimated 35 per cent of Canada's new lung cancer cases in 2020 were diagnosed.3However, on a positive note, Ontario is also a hub for best-in-class life sciences talent, with incubators, research organizations, private enterprises and academic institutions. More than half of Canada's Research and Development spending in the life sciences sector happens in Ontario and the province has been a driver for major breakthroughs in healthcare.4

"Ontario is a world-class centre for talent and innovative ideas," said Vic Fedeli, Ontario Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade. "The challenge has been a great opportunity for Ontario-based innovators to showcase their skills and demonstrate the power of collaboration across different perspectives with the common goal of supporting lung cancer patients."

"Now more than ever, we need innovation and new ideas to better our healthcare system," said Nina Tangri, Parliamentary Assistant to the Ontario Minister of Economic Development, Job Creation, and Trade. "On behalf of the Ontario Government, I would like to thank Merck Canada, MaRS and all of the participants for joining forces to launch this competition and to help improve outcomes for lung cancer patients."

Competition winner The Kingston Health Sciences Centre

$100,000 prize

KHSC runs the Lung Diagnostic Assessment Program, a rapid assessment clinic for patients with suspected lung cancer in South Eastern Ontario. The team won the competition with their solution to launch an outreach clinic in the Lennox and Addington County General Hospital, a community hospital located in a rural region of South Eastern Ontario.

Through the outreach clinic, patients referred to the program for evaluation of a suspected diagnosis of lung cancer and who live in Napanee or further west in Ontario will have the opportunity to select the community hospital as the site at which their first consultation with a respirologist can take place, versus needing to travel to the KHSC. Patients will undergo initial diagnostic and staging investigations locally where possible with more complex and sophisticated procedures being coordinated centrally through KHSC where required.

"Our team is composed of a multidisciplinary group of individuals with expertise in quality improvement and epidemiology, and we're constantly looking for opportunities to collaborate and improve through innovation," said Dr. Genevive C. Digby, Respirologist, Clinical Lead for the Diagnostic Assessment Programs at KHSC and team representative. "Together, we've launched several innovative system solutions to address local delays in lung cancer care during the diagnostic phase. We would like to thank this challenge for giving us a platform to present our proposal for this new outreach program, which will help more Ontarians diagnosed with lung cancer get timely access to specialized care."

Competition runner-up - The Lung Cancer Site Group at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre

$50,000 prize

The Lung Cancer Site Group at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre - one of the top five cancer research centres in the world - came in second place with their proposal to help significantly reduce the time between diagnosis and treatment for patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer. Their solution proposes the use of a liquid biopsy versus the conventional diagnostic pathway of molecular testing of tumour tissue after imaging and biopsy.

The team proposes that this "blood-first" approach could enable faster turnaround time for molecular results, as blood samples can be processed while patients await their diagnostic tissue biopsy. Molecular information from liquid biopsies can help diagnose and discover molecular targets faster than with standard tissue biopsy and tissue testing, which could allow patients to start treatment faster than through the conventional diagnostic pathway.

"Our team at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre is passionate about getting the right treatment to the right person as soon as possible," said Dr. Natasha B. Leighl, Thoracic Medical Oncology Site Lead, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre and team representative. "We are testing whether our solution to incorporate liquid biopsy into our Lung Cancer Rapid Assessment and Management Program will help get patients to treatment faster, with fewer delays and avoiding extra tests. This could change the way we diagnose lung cancer in Ontario, and have a positive impact for patients."

Please go here for more information and to learn more about the winning solutions.

About MerckFor more than 125 years, Merck, known as MSD outside ofthe United StatesandCanada, has been inventing for life, bringing forward medicines and vaccines for many of the world's most challenging diseases in pursuit of our mission to save and improve lives. We demonstrate our commitment to patients and population health by increasing access to health care through far-reaching policies, programs and partnerships. Today, Merck continues to be at the forefront of research to prevent and treat diseases that threaten people and animals including cancer, infectious diseases such as HIV and Ebola, and emerging animal diseases as we aspire to be the premier research-intensive biopharmaceutical company in the world.

About MaRSMaRS is North America's largest urban innovation hub. A registered non-profit, MaRS supports high-growth startups and scale-ups tackling key issues in health, cleantech, fintech and other sectors. In addition, MaRS convenes all members of the tech ecosystem to drive breakthrough discoveries, grow the economy and make an impact by solving real problems for real people in Canada and around the world.

References

SOURCE Merck Canada

For further information: Merck Canada Media Relations, 1-833-906-3725 or [emailprotected], MaRS Media Relations, [emailprotected]

Read more from the original source:

Merck Canada and MaRS Announce Winners of the Lung Cancer Innovation Challenge - Canada NewsWire