Max Goes to Mars: A Science Adventure with Max the Dog

by Jeffrey Bennett, Alan Okamoto (Illustrator)

Overview

Winner:
2016 ILA CBC Children's Choice List

This is the updated edition of the first children’s book ever launched into space and read aloud by astronauts from the International Space Station

Come with Max as he takes off on his next exciting science adventure, this time joining astronauts on the first human mission to Mars. Equipped with a specially designed spacesuit, Max sniffs for signs of microscopic life. Will he find any? Read the exciting story to find out, and to learn how his trip to Mars helps his young friend Tori reflect on the beauty and fragility of our own planet Earth. Max Goes to Mars is more than just a fun story. Educationally designed “Big Kid Boxes” along the sides of the pages help children and parents learn about Mars as the adventure unfolds. This second edition is fully updated to incorporate the latest scientific discoveries about Mars.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781937548445
Publisher:	Big Kid Science
Publication date:	04/01/2015
Series:	Science Adventures with Max the Dog Series
Edition description:	Second edition
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	183,374
Product dimensions:	11.00(w) x 10.90(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	7 - 9 Years

About the Author

Jeffrey Bennett, winner of the 2013 American Institute of Physics Science Communication Award, is an astrophysicist and educator who proposed the idea for and helped develop the Voyage Scale Model Solar System—the first science-oriented exhibit approved for permanent installation on the National Mall in Washington, DC. He is also the author of children's books, including those in the Science Adventures with Max the Dog series and The Wizard Who Saved the World. He lives in Boulder, Colorado. Alan Okamoto was a children's book illustrator and a space artist who completed commissioned work for the Air Force, numerous aerospace corporations, and college textbooks.

Read an Excerpt

Max Goes to Mars

A Science Adventure with Max the Dog

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By Jeffrey Bennett, Alan Okamoto, Joan Marsh, Mary Douglas

Big Kid Science

Copyright © 2006 Jeffrey Bennett
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-937548-02-5

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CHAPTER 1

This is the story of how Max the Dog helped humanity take the next giant leap — far beyond the Moon, to the wondrous planet Mars.

It had been only a few years since Max and his friend Tori helped start the Moon colony. Thousands of people had already visited the Moon, but no one had yet traveled beyond.

Tori and Max stayed busy at home on Earth. Tori was in school, and Max would play all day.

They loved to go for evening walks, especially when the sky was clear and dark. Tori could always spot the planets among the stars. Sometimes, when Mars was bright, she imagined that it was calling out to them, inviting a girl and her dog to visit.

Stars and Planets

Tori could spot planets among the stars. Can you?

Sometimes it's easy: Venus and Jupiter often shine more brightly than any star in the night sky, and you may recognize Mars by its reddish color. But the real trick to spotting planets was discovered thousands of years ago: Stars create the same patterns, or constellations, night after night, while planets slowly wander among the constellations. In fact, the word planet comes from an ancient Greek word meaning "wanderer." You won't see a planet like Mars wandering in a single night, but as weeks and months go by you'll see that it moves from one constellation to another.

Ancient people didn't know why planets wander. Their strange motion made planets seem powerful, which is why they were named for ancient gods. Today we know that planets wander because they orbit the Sun, while stars stay in fixed patterns because they are so much farther away. You can see how this works by trying the activity on page 30.

In fact, there's an even more basic difference between stars and planets. Stars are gigantic balls of hot, glowing gas, like our own Sun. Planets are worlds that orbit stars just as Earth and Mars orbit the Sun. Many stars have planets, so the planets we see in the night sky are only a few of the countless planets in the universe.

Tori got the phone call when Max was out doing his famous merry-go-round trick. As a puppy, he'd learned to spin the merry-go-round on his own, jumping on and off and sometimes just riding around. He still loved the trick, and kids usually came to ride with him.

"It's Commander Grant," said Tori." They want a dog to go along on the first trip to Mars." Max just kept on playing.

Dogs in Space

The real dog Max has never been to space, but other dogs have. A Russian dog named Laika was the first. In fact, she was the first living creature sent into space.

Laika was launched into Earth orbit aboard a ship called Sputnik 2 on November 3, 1957. Her trip provided valuable data that later helped people and other animals survive in space. Sadly, her own ship was not designed for a return trip home, and she died in space.

Twelve other Russian dogs made space launches and eight of them returned safely. The first dogs to survive a space flight were Belka and Strelka, who orbited Earth for a day on August 19, 1960. Strelka later had puppies. In an early example of space exploration helping to foster peace, Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev gave one of Strelka's puppies to the family of U.S. President John F. Kennedy. The last dogs in space — at least so far — were Verterok and Ugolyok. In 1966, they spent 22 days in space before returning home.

The United States never sent dogs into space but did send monkeys and chimpanzees. The first chimp, named Ham, made a short flight into space on January 31, 1961. He survived the flight and lived in zoos for the rest of his life.

Tori was both happy and sad. Happy that Max would get to go on such a great adventure. Sad because she knew that this time he'd have to go without her.

Tori remembered visiting a scale model of the solar system in Washington, DC. She learned that even when it's closest to Earth, Mars is about 150 times as far away as the Moon. The trip to Mars would take too long for a girl still in school.

How Far Is Mars?

The vast distances between the planets are easier to think about if we use a scale model of the solar system. The painting on this page shows part of a model, called Voyage, located outside the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC. Voyage shows the solar system at one ten–billionth of its actual size. The Sun is the gold ball on the pedestal at the right. The other pedestals show the locations of the four inner planets.

The models of the planets are inside the glass disks on each pedestal. Earth is about the size of a pinhead and shares its glass disk with the even smaller Moon. The Earth–Moon distance is only about an inch and a half (4 cm) in the Voyage model. Now, notice that the pedestal for Mars is several big steps beyond Earth. That's how Tori learned that Mars is so much farther away than the Moon.

If you want some real numbers, here they are: The Moon is about 235,000 miles

(380,000 km) from Earth. The distance from Earth to Mars ranges between about 35 and 250 million miles (56 and 400 million km), depending on where the two planets are located in their orbits.

To learn more about Voyage and the scale of space, visit www.voyageonline.org or take the virtual tour of Voyage at www.BigKidScience.com.

Tori thought Max should know a little about his destination. "Listen carefully, Max. We call Mars the Red Planet because it looks like a reddish dot in the night sky. Long ago, people of many cultures gave Mars different names and made up stories about it. The name Mars comes from the ancient Roman god of war."

Max stood very still, staring right past Tori. "Good, I can see that you're listening," she said.

The Names of Mars

Mars was named for the mythological god of war more than 3,000 years ago, perhaps because its color reminded people of blood. Different people of the ancient Middle East had different names for the god of war, and each gave this name to the planet. The Babylonians called it Nergal, the Greeks called it Ares, and the Romans gave it the name Mars.

People in other parts of the world had different ideas about Mars. In India, Mars was known as Mangala and associated with a six-headed, warlike god. It was the "great star" to the Pawnee people of North America. The Chinese called Mars the "fire planet" or Ying huo, which translates roughly as "sparkling deluder." Even today Mars has many names in different languages.

Did you know that Mars has a day, a month, and a city named for it? Tuesday is "Mars day," as you can tell if you know how to say Tuesday in Spanish (Martes), French (Mardi), or Italian (Marte). We get the English Tuesday from the ancient Norse god of war, who was named Tiw. The month named for Mars is probably obvious: March. The city is Cairo, capital of Egypt, whose name comes from an ancient Arabic name for Mars.

"Well, Max, it gets even more interesting," she continued. "A hundred years ago, a few scientists thought there were great cities on Mars. Some people even worried about Martians invading Earth."

"Can you imagine that?" Tori laughed. Max was definitely imagining something.

Martian Fantasies

Have you ever wondered why people often talk about Martians but rarely talk about, say, Venusians or Jupiterians? It started with blurry images of Mars seen through telescopes more than 100 years ago.

In 1877, an Italian astronomer named Giovanni Schiaparelli thought he saw straight lines on Mars. He called them canali, meaning "channels." However, the word was translated into English as canals, which made people think of artificial waterways. In 1894, an American astronomer named Percival Lowell opened his own observatory to study the canals of Mars. The Lowell Observatory is still used for astronomical research. You can visit it in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Lowell made detailed maps of Martian canals, imagining that they were built by an old civilization to transport precious water on a dying planet. H.G. Wells used this idea when he wrote about Martians invading Earth in his novel The War of the Worlds.

Of course, we now know that Lowell's idea had a major problem: The canals don't really exist. So what was he seeing? Remember that Lowell was looking by eye at blurry telescopic images of Mars. Perhaps he allowed his mind to fill in straight lines along blurry boundaries of light and dark geographical regions.

Tori took Max to a science museum, where they walked through an exhibit of Mars. "We know a lot about Mars now," she explained, "because many nations have sent spacecraft to Mars. But none of these spacecraft have carried any people or animals. That's why your trip is going to be so exciting."

Tori suddenly became more serious. "Max, there aren't any cities or Martians on Mars, but you could still could help us make one of the greatest discoveries in history."

Missions to Mars

How can we know so much about Mars when no one has ever been there? The answer is that we've sent "robotic" spacecraft that use onboard computers to control their engines, cameras, and scientific instruments. We use radio waves to send them computer instructions and to receive back the pictures and data they collect. It works just like sending pictures or data with a cell phone, except over a much greater distance.

The first spacecraft to visit Mars was Mariner 4, which made a single flyby in 1965. Six years later, Mariner 9 became the first spacecraft to orbit Mars. The first successful Mars landings came in 1976 with the spacecraft Viking 1 and Viking 2.

Many more spacecraft have been sent to Mars in recent years. Mars Pathfinder, which landed in 1997, carried a little rover named Sojourner, the first vehicle to drive on Mars. Two larger rovers, named Spirit and Opportunity, landed in 2004. New orbiters are also teaching us more about Mars by studying it from high above the ground. More than 20 nations are currently involved in missions to Mars.

The paintings of Mars in this book are based on real data from Mars missions. The painting on this page is based on a diorama at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, and the big TV on the right-hand page shows a view from the Spirit rover.

"Mars is a cold, dry planet today," continued Tori, "but scientists think that Mars had lakes and rivers a long, long time ago. There might still be water underground. And if there's water, well, maybe there's life!"

"Martian life would probably be too small to see without a microscope. Still, if you found even the tiniest living creature on Mars, we'd finally know for sure that we are not alone in the universe."

Max sniffed excitedly at the floor, proving that he was well-equipped for the search for microscopic life.

Water on Mars

Tori says Mars is dry today but had water in the past. How does she know?

Mars has to be dry today because its air is too thin for liquid water to last on its surface. If you took a cup of water outside on Mars, all the water would quickly either freeze or evaporate. But photographs from Martian orbit show dried up riverbeds, vast flood plains, and perhaps even dry lake beds and oceans. Studies of rocks by Mars rovers confirm that Mars once had lots of liquid water.

The era of abundant water is long gone. By studying craters on Mars, scientists can tell that most of the lakes and rivers dried up at least 2 billion years ago. However, Mars still has frozen water ice: A lot is underground, some forms clouds in the Martian sky, and some is mixed in with the carbon dioxide ice that makes up Mars's polar caps.

It's possible that liquid water still exists on Mars, but only underground. Some may be responsible for mysterious gullies on crater walls, like those shown in the painting on page 19. More may be located near ancient volcanoes (see page 22) that still generate enough heat to melt underground ice.

This photo, taken from Martian orbit, shows dried up riverbeds on Mars.

As launch day approached, Tori and Max left Earth and returned to the Moon colony, where the Mars ship was waiting.

Tori could not hide her tears as she gave Max a big good-bye hug. She knew that Mars lines up with Earth in it orbit only about every two years. Max and the crew would have to stay on Mars almost that long before they could return home.

Commander Grant saw the concern on Tori's face. "Don't you worry," he said, "we tested everything over and over again. It will be a long trip, but we'll all be fine."

To Mars and Back

Are you wondering why the Mars trip takes so long? It's because of the way Earth and Mars orbit the Sun. Earth takes one year to orbit the Sun. Mars takes longer because it orbits more slowly and at a greater distance from the Sun. Like two people racing in different lanes around a track at different speeds, Earth passes Mars about every two years (more precisely, about every 26 months).

Earth and Mars line up in their orbits about every two years.

It's much easier to send a spacecraft to Mars if we time the trip to these orbital alignments. Otherwise, the trip would require far more fuel and expense. Even so, current spacecraft take 6 to 7 months to reach Mars. The 4-month trip in this story assumes the use of a more advanced, nuclear-powered spacecraft. By the time the crew reaches Mars, Earth will have raced ahead in its orbit, forcing them to stay on Mars until the next line-up about two years later.

The Mars ship quickly left the Moon and Earth far behind. Max and the astronauts were traveling faster than anyone in history, but the trip would still take more than four months. It was disorienting to be so far from any place, and they had no sense of up or down as they floated weightlessly in the spaceship.

The astronauts didn't have much to do on the long trip, which was one reason they brought Max along. His weightless antics provided endless entertainment, and he was very helpful when someone felt homesick. There's nothing quite as comforting as petting a dog.

The Long Trip

The 4-month trip to Mars won't be easy for the crew. For one thing, they have to worry about boredom. After all, they're stuck in a small cabin with only the star-speckled blackness of space to see out the window. Weightlessness may also be a problem. Real astronauts who have spent months being weightless in Earth orbit (on a space station) have suffered bone loss and other health problems, and have had difficulty walking when they first return to Earth. The Mars crew will need special exercise equipment and perhaps new medicines to stay healthy and to be able to walk when they reach Mars.

It's possible to avoid weightlessness by using a rotating spacecraft, because rotation can create "artificial gravity." However, a rotating spacecraft will probably be too expensive for the first human missions to Mars, and we have not used one in this story. Weightless or not, the crew will face danger from the harmful radiation that fills space. On Earth, our planet's atmosphere and magnetic field shield us from this radiation. The Mars ship will need special shielding to keep the crew safe.

Back on Earth, Tori had a special privilege: Each day before school, she received a private video phone call from the crew.

During a call one day, about halfway through the voyage to Mars, Commander Grant pointed his camera out the window to show Tori the tiny Earth and Moon in the distance. "That's where you are," he said.

"Not just me," she thought. "Every person who has ever lived grew up on that tiny blue dot."

Light-Travel Time

Tori's phone calls keep her in touch with the crew, but conversations aren't easy. The problem is the time that it takes for light to travel between Earth and the Mars ship.

The radio waves we use to communicate with spaceships are actually a form of light, even though we can't see them. Like all other forms of light, radio waves travel through space at the speed of light, which is 186,000 miles per second (300,000 km/s).

That's really fast. If radio waves went in circles, they could circle Earth almost eight times in just one second! But distances in space are so vast that even light takes a long time to cross them. For example, radio waves would take about 6 minutes in each direction when the Mars ship is halfway to Mars. So if Tori asks "How are you?," she'll have to wait about 12 minutes for an answer: 6 minutes for her message to reach the crew and 6 more minutes for their response to get to Earth.

The astronauts were very happy when Mars finally began to loom large ahead of them. They had all spent time on the Moon, but this was different. Mars is much bigger than the Moon, though still much smaller than Earth. It even has two moons of its own, named Phobos and Deimos, but they are so small that they look more like rocks than worlds.

Mars and Its Moons

Do you want to know exactly how big Mars is? Its diameter is about 4,200 miles (6,800 km), or about half that of Earth. The picture below shows the two planets to scale. Interestingly, because most of Earth's surface is covered by oceans, Earth's dry land area is about the same as the land area of Mars. That means exploring all of Mars would be like exploring all of Earth's continents combined.

The two moons of Mars, which are named for two children of the mythical god of war, are very different from our own Moon. Our Moon is round and almost as big as some planets. Mars's moons are shaped more like potatoes and they are very small. Phobos is only about 8 miles (13 km) across. Deimos is even smaller — about 5 miles (8 km) across. These tiny moons have such weak gravity that if you stood on them, a big jump would almost allow you to escape into space. They also orbit Mars quite closely and quite fast. Phobos takes only about 8 hours to orbit Mars, and Deimos takes just over a day. You can see both moons in the painting on this page: Phobos is clearly visible and Deimos is the bright dot near the lower right.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Max Goes to Mars by Jeffrey Bennett, Alan Okamoto, Joan Marsh, Mary Douglas. Copyright © 2006 Jeffrey Bennett. Excerpted by permission of Big Kid Science.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Editorial Reviews

“A rousing success . . . Its brisk plot is enhanced both by Alan Okamoto’s colorful illustrations and by clearly explained scientific information.”  —National Science Teachers Association “Recommends”

“A great book for elementary school-age kids that  might be even better suited to adults [with its] answers to the most commonly asked questions about Mars.”   —Sky and Telescope

“A book that can easily grow with the child . . . [It] conveys the excitement associated with scientific discovery.” —Astronomy Education Review

“Fuels young readers’ interest in space travel, while explaining difficult scientific concepts in an easy-to-understand manner.”   —Mercury magazine

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