The robot can produce nearly 60 grams of oxygen per hour from every square meter of Martian material, potentially eliminating the need for astronauts to carry oxygen from Earth for future missions. However, Michael Hecht at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Haystack Observatory points out that there is an easier way to produce oxygen on Mars through the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE) on board NASA’s Perseverance rover. Despite this, Jiang suggests that the robotic chemist could also be used to produce other useful catalysts on Mars, such as fertilizers for plants.
Key takeaways:
- Researchers in China have developed an AI-powered robot chemist that can extract oxygen from water on Mars using Martian materials to produce catalysts.
- The study, led by Jun Jiang at the University of Science and Technology of China, used a mobile machine to analyse meteorites and search for a chemical that could break down water, a process that would have taken a human researcher 2,000 years.
- If a catalyst that can produce oxygen from water can be made on Mars, this would remove the need for missions to carry such a catalyst from Earth. Jiang's system could make nearly 60 grams of oxygen per hour from every square metre of Martian material.
- Michael Hecht at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Haystack Observatory points out that there is a much easier way to produce oxygen on Mars, through the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE) on board NASA’s Perseverance rover, which has successfully demonstrated the production of oxygen from the Martian air.