/sci/ - Science & Math

There is still one region on Earth that remains almost completely unexplored. A region larger than every land mass put together. New species are discovered there all the time. New plants, new animals, some beautiful and some terrifying.

It is a place of adventure and mystery. Of advanced exploratory vessels, pressurized habitats and life support exoskeletons. Cutting edge technology forging a path into a realm more alien to our every day experience than the surface of Mars.

It's happening now. You weren't born too late. Any of you can take part in the conquest of this new frontier, make new discoveries, even stake your claim as a pioneer. A taste of this costs only as much as a scuba rental. Nonprofits exist that will take *anyone* down in a submersible for free, provided they have a legitimate experiment to perform there. This new land is open to you, and you were born at precisely the right time to explore it.

>>3670170

No, not for millionaires. The NWE habitat modules comprising the Leviathan will be produced as a diver's hobby product for $35,000 each, or $50,000 fully loaded. 'Rent' aboard the permanent colony will be somewhere around $1100 per month, what you could expect to pay for a decent apartment in the city.

The blue frontier is for everyone.

http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Explorers+scramble+build+vessel+that+will+reach+Earth+deep
est+point/5294164/story.html

>It’s been more than 50 years since humanity ventured to the deepest place on Earth, but four crews now are racing to make a return trip.

>One of the futuristic crafts in the works comes courtesy of Graham Hawkes. For years his minisubmarine, which resembles an underwater fighter jet, has sat in a bare concrete room in Point Richmond, Calif.

>This fall, it is destined for a muddy gorge in the Mariana Trench, the world’s deepest known point, 36,000 feet below the surface of the Pacific Ocean near Guam.

>Hawkes is in good company in the pursuit of what many think will be the next big thing in human exploration: manned submersibles that can maneuver through the crushing pressure at the bottom of the world.

>"Avatar" director James Cameron is closing in with a team in Australia, and Florida-based Triton Submarines also is in the hunt. Another hopeful, scientist Sylvia Earle, is rounding out the pack with a kind of hovering deep sea space station, which her Alameda-based company promises will become a "world asset."

>a kind of hovering deep sea space station
>a kind of hovering deep sea space station
>a kind of hovering deep sea space station

ALLOFMYMONEY.PNG

I like these threads.

How about this feel, OP?

>>3361371

>>Unfortunately we live in a time where discoveries aren't possible for the average man. Which is why I love the idea of deep space exploration in the future, and I envy our descendants that will get to do it.

The ocean is the everyman's frontier. Anyone can scuba dive, and nonprofits exist that will take anyone with a legit experiment down in a submersible free of charge.

It doesn't face the same technical challenges space exploration does, we've just neglected it until now. But with 100 billion in rare earths discovered in the pacific, deep sea power grids under construction and undersea nuclear plants on the way, mankind is about to move into the ocean in a big way. And it will yield an influx of wealth and resources that will pave the way to space.

>>3308775

On the upside, courtesy of Virgin Oceanic, if you're got a couple grand to spend on it you'll soon be able to ride in an acrobatic 'flying sub' careening down the Challenger Deep, floodlights illuminating the walls as you bank and loop like it's fucking Star Wars.

How do you feel about this?

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-10/officials-claim-chinese-rare-earths-embargo-expands
-include-us-and-europe

http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/08/29/135221/China-Plans-To-Mine-the-Yellow-Sea-Floor

http://coto2.wordpress.com/2010/11/24/china-and-russia-have-officially-called-it-quits-on-the-dollar
/

Our near future relies on rare earth metals. We need them for electric vehicles, for robots, basically anything that uses motors and batteries. We need them for solar panels, for wind turbines, for maglev based highspeed rail, basically every advanced technology we want in the next century.

But China has a stranglehold on rare earth metals. And they're looking to mine the sea floor to further secure that monopoly, as it's the last source of easily accessible (if not for the pressure) rare earth metals. We have untapped reserves in the US, but nothing approaching the richness of seafloor sites like Solwara 1.

We have the technology, as well as the political and economic incentive. It's time for a new race, not into space, but into the depths, where the next chapter of human history will unfold!