Uwingu's latest fund-raising project is 'Beam Me to Mars.' Image courtesy Uwingu.
A new project from Uwingu to help address funding shortages for researchers, scientists, educators and students allows people from Earth to give a global “shout?out” to planet Mars. The project is called “Beam Me to Mars,” and it celebrates the 50th anniversary of the launch of f NASA’s Mariner 4 mission, the first successful mission to Mars.
“Nothing like this has ever been done,” Uwingu CEO Alan Stern told Universe Today. “It’s going to be a lot of fun, and, I think, historic.”
The messages will be beamed to Mars on November 28 using high-powered commercial transmitters owned by Universal Space Network (USN), a company that communicates daily with spacecraft in Earth orbit. They will transmit the Beam Me messages from antennas in Hawaii, Alaska, and Australia.
Since this is a fund-raiser, messages cost between $5 and $100, depending on how elaborate you’d like your message to be (and how much you’d like to give to support Uwingu’s goal to help fund research and space exploration.) Half of the money will go towards The Uwingu Fund that creates space research and education grants. The rest pays for transmission costs to Mars, and things like internet services, Uwingu product development and Uwingu business operations.
The messages can be as simple as just sending your name, or even include a longer message or images. These aren’t private messages, however. The entire message database will be searchable (no charge for that), and will be socially sharable, by anyone on the internet.
Who will get the messages? Well, since there are just robots there (as far as we know), no Martians will receive the messages. But Uwingu will also share messages with those who make decisions on space-related topics back here on Earth. “All of the messages will be hand delivered to Congress, to NASA, and to the United Nations,” says the Uwingu website.
Already, numerous space leaders and personalities like astronaut Chris Hadfield, authors Homer Hickam and Dava Sobel, Mars rover PI Steve Squyres, NASA GRAIL PI Maria Zuber, and Planetary Society President Jim Bell have penned messages to Mars as part of the project.
Uwingu says the radio beam from Earth will spread out to encompass all of Mars — just in case…
“We expect “Beam Me to Mars” to generate a lot of interest — as well as new funds for Uwingu space research and education grants we will make from a portion of the proceeds,” said Stern.
NASA’s Curiosity rover looks back to ramp with 4th drill site target at ‘Bonanza King’ rock outcrop in ‘Hidden Valley’ at site marking her 2nd anniversary on Mars, as shown in this photo mosaic view captured on Aug. 6, 2014, Sol 711. Note the rover’s partial selfie, valley walls, deep wheel tracks in the sand dunes and distant rim of Gale crater beyond the ramp. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
NASA’s Curiosity rover looks back to ramp with 4th drill site target at ‘Bonanza King’ rock outcrop in ‘Hidden Valley’ at site marking her 2nd anniversary on Mars, as shown in this photo mosaic view captured on Aug. 6, 2014, Sol 711. Note the rover’s partial selfie, valley walls, deep wheel tracks in the sand dunes and distant rim of Gale crater beyond the ramp. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo[/caption]
Not wanting to get stuck in a rut, Curiosity’s handlers have commanded NASA’s SUV-sized rover to reverse course and drive out of a potentially hazardous Martian valley of slippery sand with poor wheel traction and instead backtrack towards an enticing nearby spot that the team feels could be the fourth candidate for rock drilling – and thereby widen the scope of the story of habitable environments on the Red Planet.
The new drilling target under up close evaluation right now is named ‘Bonanza King’ – shown in our photo mosaic above.
Bonanza King was chosen after the six wheeled rover unexpectedly experienced significant wheel slippage in the past week while driving over an extended dune field of sandy ripples that basically stopped forward movement inside the Martian valley.
The team was thus in a quandary over whether to push forward on a route through the loose sands of “Hidden Valley” and possibly risk getting mired in a hidden sand trap or drive backwards over a field of sharp rocks on the “Zabriskie plateau” and beyond that are certain to tear further holes in the wheels.
Drilling Candidate Site ‘Bonanza King’ on Mars. This image from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover shows a portion of the pale rock outcrop that includes the “Bonanza King” target chosen for evaluation as the mission’s fourth rock-drilling site. Raised ridges on the flat rocks — possible mineral veins — are visible at upper and middle right. Tread marks from one of Curiosity’s wheels are visible in the lower half of the image from Sol 707, Aug. 12, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
As reported here last week on the occasion of her 2nd anniversary on Mars since the dramatic touchdown inside Gale Crater on Aug. 6, 2012, Curiosity had been driving merrily through the supposed safe valley of sandy ripples of “Hidden Valley.” She was approaching a bedrock unit named “Pahrump Hills” that for the first time is actually part of the humongous mountain named Mount Sharp she will soon scale and which is the primary science destination of the mission.
But rather soon after driving over a low hump from Zabriskie plateau (see our mosaic below) into Hidden Valley, the robot experienced wheel slippage in the ripples of sand filling the crater floor which was much higher than anticipated. And even worse than comparable test drives in a practice sand lot at JPL.
Curiosity rover looks back to the rocky plains of the Zabriskie plateau from sandy ramp into ‘Hidden Valley’ with 4th drill site target at ‘Bonanza King’ rock outcrop as shown in this photo mosaic view captured on Aug. 14, 2014, Sol 719. Sharp edged rocks at Zabriskie tore new holes into rover wheels. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com
The sandy ripples extend out to the sloping valley walls with no end in sight.
“We need to gain a better understanding of the interaction between the wheels and Martian sand ripples, and Hidden Valley is not a good location for experimenting,” said Curiosity Project Manager Jim Erickson of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, in a statement.
And since Hidden Valley is as long as a football field and has only two navigable exits at the northeastern and southwestern ends (see map below), the team was forced to drive back to the entrance way at the northern end to consider an alternative route forward to the base of Mount Sharp.
In the meantime while they evaluate the way forward, the team decided that Bonanza King offers similar science to what scientists anticipate at the outcrops at “Pahrump Hills”- a preview of a geological unit that is part of the base of Mount Sharp for the first time since landing rather than still belonging to the floor of Gale Crater.
“Geologically speaking, we can tie the Bonanza King rocks to those at Pahrump Hills. Studying them here will give us a head start in understanding how they fit into the bigger picture of Gale Crater and Mount Sharp,” said Curiosity Deputy Project Scientist Ashwin Vasavada of JPL, in a statement.
Bonanza King sits in an bright outcrop on the low ramp leading in and out of Hidden Valley.
Curiosity rover up close view of ‘Bonanza King’ rock outcrop and 4th drill target looking down from ramp and back into ‘Hidden Valley’ and hazardous dune field of sandy ripples on Aug. 14, 2014, Sol 719. Wheel tracks show where Curiosity drove into the valley, and back out again, earlier in August 2014. The largest of the individual flat rocks in the foreground are a few inches (several centimeters) across. Hazcam camera raw image flattened and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
It looks like a pale paving stone. Since its location within the geological layers visible on the ramp is similar to what was expected at the Pahrump Hills outcrop, it’s very appealing to the science team.
Furthermore when one of the rovers wheel’s drove over the outcrop, it cracked open one of the rocks and exposed bright interior material, possibly from mineral veins – which is super exciting from a science perspective as a potential marker for flowing liquid water.
Right now the team is collecting spectral data with the science instruments to assess its science utility and is planning a super fast drilling campaign, far shorter than the prior three.
The plan would be to core a sample from the interior of the dinner plate sized rock slab for delivery to Curiosity’s pair of the onboard chemistry labs, SAM and CheMin to analyze for the chemical ingredients to support miartin microbes, if they ever existed.
“This outcrop on the ramp is too appealing to pass up,” Vasavada said.
The main map here shows the assortment of landforms near the location of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover as the rover’s second anniversary of landing on Mars nears. The gold traverse line entering from upper right ends at Curiosity’s position as of Sol 705 on Mars (July 31, 2014). The inset map shows the mission’s entire traverse from the landing on Aug. 5, 2012, PDT (Aug. 6, EDT) to Sol 705, and the remaining distance to long-term science destinations near Murray Buttes, at the base of Mount Sharp. The label “Aug. 5, 2013” indicates where Curiosity was one year after landing. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
To date, Curiosity’s odometer totals over 5.5 miles (9.0 kilometers) since landing inside Gale Crater on Mars in August 2012. She has taken over 178,000 images.
Curiosity still has about another 2 miles (3 kilometers) to go to reach the entry way at a gap in the treacherous sand dunes at the foothills of Mount Sharp sometime later this year.
Mount Sharp is a layered mountain that dominates most of Gale Crater and towers 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the Martian sky and is taller than Mount Rainier.
“Getting to Mount Sharp is the next big step for Curiosity and we expect that in the Fall of this year,” Dr. Jim Green, NASA’s Director of Planetary Sciences at NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC, told me in an interview making the 2nd anniversary on Aug. 6.
Up close view of hole in one of rover Curiosity’s six wheels caused by driving over rough Martian rocks. Mosaic assembled from Mastcam raw images taken on Dec. 22, 2013 (Sol 490). Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Rosetta, Curiosity, Opportunity, Orion, SpaceX, Boeing, Orbital Sciences, Dream Chaser, commercial space, MAVEN, MOM, Mars and more planetary and human spaceflight news.
1 Martian Year on Mars!
Curiosity treks to Mount Sharp in this photo mosaic view captured on Sol 669, June 24, 2014. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com2 Earth Years on Mars! NASA’s Curiosity rover celebrated the 2nd anniversary on Mars at ‘Hidden Valley’ as shown in this photo mosaic view captured on Aug. 6, 2014, Sol 711. Note the valley walls, rover tracks and distant crater rim. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
The shadow of the Opportunity rover lies on the Martian surface in this picture taken on Sol 3752, on Aug. 13. The rover is on the west rim of Endeavour Crater, near the Martian equator. Its landing site was Meridani Planum. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/Arizona State Univ.
Many of us in the northern hemisphere are on summer vacation right now, and others are dreaming of it. While taking off somewhere exotic requires time and money, looking at pictures around the solar system provides cheaper thrills — in stranger places!
Several spacecraft roaming our planetary neighborhood regularly send back raw images of what they’re seeing. Here are some views from them taken in the past week.
Mars: After setting an off-word driving record, the Opportunity rover is still trundling on Mars after more than 10 years of operations. One of its latest raw images, above, shows its shadow and tracks on the surface of the Red Planet. Its heading to a destination called “Marathon Valley”, which is a likely spot for clay materials, and recently observed a transit of the moon Phobos. The rover’s computer had a brief reset, but is in good health besides that.
Tracks of the Curiosity rover crisscross Mars in this picture taken on Sol 719 (Aug. 14, 2014). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Mars: The Curiosity rover — which recently celebrated its two-year Earth birthday on Mars — has been on the move itself. Scientists are carefully moving the rover to its next science destination, about 1/3 of a mile (500 meters) away. The challenge is the extremely rocky terrain is damaging the rover’s wheels, but NASA said a recent drive through a rocky stretch produced less wear than feared.
A lava surface in southern Elysium Planitia taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE). Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
Mars: These strange features spotted by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter are puzzling scientists. Usually the cones you see are indicative of lava features, but these are smaller than usual. “What’s really odd here is that the cones are associated with lighter areas with polygonal patterns,” stated the University of Arizona on its blog for the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE). “Such polygons are commonly visible on the denser portions of lava flows, while the rougher areas have more broken-up low-density crust.”
A raw image of the Sun taken by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) on Aug. 15, 2014. Credit: ESA/NASA/SOHO
Sun: The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) is one of a few sentinels keeping watch over the Sun for sunspots and other signs of solar activity. This allows scientists to make better predictions about when solar storms sweep over our planet, which is important for protecting satellites and infrastructure from the worst of these storms.
A raw image of Saturn taken by the Cassini spacecraft. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Saturn: The Cassini spacecraft has been busily gazing at Saturn and its moons in the past week, including looking at temperatures in the atmosphere (specifically, in the upper troposphere and tropopause) in the gas giant. Just visible in this image is a huge hexagonal storm that scientists previously said acts somewhat like the Earth’s ozone hole.
A raw view of Titan taken by the Cassini spacecraft Aug. 13, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Titan: Saturn’s largest moon — which contains organic compounds that could be precursors to life’s chemistry — is undergoing some changes as summer approaches. A few days ago, scientists noted that clouds are starting to form in Titan’s northern hemisphere. While they’re not sure yet if it will herald summer, scientists added that the lack of clouds before that defied models.
A close-up view of Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko taken by the Rosetta spacecraft on Aug. 7, 2014. Credit: ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA
Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko: The Rosetta spacecraft just arrived at this comet on Aug. 6, and has been sending back a few images of this small body that is speeding towards the Sun. You may recognize this particular image as part of the basis for a 3-D image that was released yesterday. Meanwhile, team members are examining dust production of the comet, which has already started as it heads to its closest Sun approach (between Earth and Mars) in about a year.
NASA's Curiosity rover looks across a rock field in this raw picture from Mars taken Aug. 8, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
This picture alone illustrates the challenge NASA has as it slowly moves the Curiosity rover across Mars to its mountainous destination. You can see rocks surrounding the rover on Sol 713 (on Aug. 8), which is a challenge because of the ongoing wear and tear on Curiosity’s aluminum wheels.
In mid-July, Curiosity crossed one of the most difficult stretches of terrain yet since NASA spotted the damage and took measures to mitigate further problems, which includes picking out the smoothest terrain possible for its rover — which just celebrated two years on the Red Planet.
“For about half of July, the rover team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, drove Curiosity across an area of hazardous sharp rocks on Mars called ‘Zabriskie Plateau’,” NASA wrote in a recent press release.
A closeup of Curiosity’s wheels on Mars on Aug. 9, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“Damage to Curiosity‘s aluminum wheels from driving across similar terrain last year prompted a change in route, with the plan of skirting such rock-studded terrain wherever feasible. The one-eighth mile (200 meters) across Zabriskie Plateau was one of the longest stretches without a suitable detour on the redesigned route toward the long-term science destination.”
The rover is planning to make its way up the slope of science destinations on Mount Sharp, which is about two miles (3 kilometers) away. NASA pointed out that an interim stop for the rover will take place less than a third of a mile away (500 meters).
“The wheels took some damage getting across Zabriskie Plateau, but it’s less than I expected from the amount of hard, sharp rocks embedded there,” added Jim Erickson, project manager for Curiosity at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in a statement.
A low view of the terrain taken by the Mars Curiosity rover in August 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“The rover drivers showed that they’re up to the task of getting around the really bad rocks. There will still be rough patches ahead. We didn’t imagine prior to landing that we would see this kind of challenge to the vehicle, but we’re handling it.”
Curiosity has driven out of its landing ellipse and will continue the trek to the mountain, stopping to perform science along the way.
NASA plans to heavily borrow from Curiosity’s design for its next rover, called Mars 2020. The science instruments for that rover were selected last week. While Curiosity was made to seek potentially habitable environments in the past or present, Mars 2020 will have the capability to search for organic materials that could indicate precursors to life.
The Mars Curiosity rover leaves tracks in the sand in this picture taken Aug. 9, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-CaltechA shadow of Mars Curiosity lies across the surface in this picture taken Aug. 9, 2014. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
1 Martian Year on Mars! Curiosity treks to Mount Sharp in this photo mosaic view captured on Sol 669, June 24, 2014. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
2 Years on Mars!
Curiosity treks to Mount Sharp, her primary science destination, in this photo mosaic view captured on Sol 669, June 24, 2014. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com
Story and mosaics updated[/caption]
NASA’s most scientifically powerful rover ever dispatched to the Red Planet, Curiosity, is celebrating her 2nd anniversary on Mars since the dramatic touchdown inside Gale Crater on Aug. 6, 2012, EDT (Aug. 5, 2012, PDT) while simultaneously approaching a bedrock unit that for the first time is actually part of the humongous mountain she will soon scale and is the primary science destination of the mission.
Mount Sharp is a layered mountain that dominates most of Gale Crater and towers 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the Martian sky and is taller than Mount Rainier.
Aug. 6, 2014 marks ‘2 Years on Mars’ and Sol 711 for Curiosity in an area called “Hidden Valley.”
“Getting to Mount Sharp is the next big step for Curiosity and we expect that in the Fall of this year,” Dr. Jim Green, NASA’s Director of Planetary Sciences at NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC, told me in an interview making the 2nd anniversary.
The 1 ton rover is equipped with 10 state-of-the-art science instruments and searching for signs of life.
The mysterious mountain is so huge that outcrops of bedrock extend several miles out from its base and Curiosity is now within striking distance of reaching the area the rover team calls “Pahrump Hills.”
2 Earth Years on Mars!
NASA’s Curiosity rover celebrated the 2nd anniversary on Mars at ‘Hidden Valley’ as shown in this photo mosaic view captured on Aug. 6, 2014, Sol 711. Note the valley walls, rover tracks and distant crater rim. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
Scientists anticipate that the outcrops at “Pahrump Hills” offer a preview of a geological unit that is part of the base of Mount Sharp for the first time since landing rather than still belonging to the floor of Gale Crater.
“We’re coming to our first taste of a geological unit that’s part of the base of the mountain rather than the floor of the crater,” said Curiosity Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, in a statement.
“We will cross a major terrain boundary.”
Since “Pahrump Hills” is less than one-third of a mile (500 meters) from Curiosity she should arrive soon.
In late July 2014, the rover arrived in an area of sandy terrain called “Hidden Valley” which is on the planned route ahead leading to “Pahrump Hills” and easily traversable with few of the sharp edged rocks that have caused significant damage to the rovers six aluminum wheels.
This full-circle panorama of the landscape surrounding NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover on July 31, 2014, Sol 705, offers a view into sandy lower terrain called “Hidden Valley,” which is on the planned route ahead. It combines several images from Curiosity’s Navigation Camera. South is at the center. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The sedimentary layers in the lower slopes of Mount Sharp have been Curiosity’s long-term science destination.
They are the principal reason why the science team specifically chose Gale Crater as the primary landing site based on high resolution spectral observations collected by NASA’s powerful Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) indicating the presence of deposits of clay-bearing sedimentary rocks.
Curiosity’s goal all along has been to determine whether Mars ever offered environmental conditions favorable for microbial life. Finding clay bearing minerals. or phyllosilicates, in Martian rocks is the key to fulfilling its major objective.
The team expected to find the clay bearing minerals only in the sedimentary layers at the lower reaches of Mount Sharp.
Curiosity rover panorama of Mount Sharp captured on June 6, 2014 (Sol 651) during traverse inside Gale Crater. Note rover wheel tracks at left. She will eventually ascend the mountain at the ‘Murray Buttes’ at right later this year. Assembled from Mastcam color camera raw images and stitched by Marco Di Lorenzo and Ken Kremer. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com
Soon after landing, the team spotted some rather interesting looking outcrops barely a half mile away from the touchdown zone at a spot dubbed ‘Yellowknife Bay” and decided to take a detour towards it to investigate.
Well the scientists won the bet and struck scientific gold barely six months after landing when they drilled into a rock outcrop named “John Klein” at “Yellowknife Bay” and unexpectedly discovered the clay bearing minerals on the crater floor.
Yellowknife Bay was found to be an ancient lakebed where liquid water flowed on Mars surface billions of years ago.
The discovery of phyllosilicates in the 1st drill sample during the spring of 2013 meant that Curiosity had rather remarkably already fulfilled its primary goal of finding a habitable zone during its first year of operations!
The rock analysis “yielded evidence of a lakebed environment billions of years ago that offered fresh water, all of the key elemental ingredients for life, and a chemical source of energy for microbes, if any existed there,” according to NASA.
Curiosity accomplished Historic 1st drilling into Martian rock at John Klein outcrop on Feb 8, 2013 (Sol 182) and discovered a habitable zone, shown in this context mosaic view of the Yellowknife Bay basin taken on Jan. 26 (Sol 169). The robotic arm is pressing down on the surface at John Klein outcrop of veined hydrated minerals – dramatically back dropped with her ultimate destination; Mount Sharp. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
“Before landing, we expected that we would need to drive much farther before answering that habitability question,” said Curiosity Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena. “We were able to take advantage of landing very close to an ancient streambed and lake. Now we want to learn more about how environmental conditions on Mars evolved, and we know where to go to do that.”
During the rovers second Earth year on the Red Planet, Curiosity has been driving as fast as possible towards a safe entry point to the slopes of Mount Sharp. The desired destination for the car sized rover is now about 2 miles (3 kilometers) southwest of its current location.
‘Driving, Driving, Driving’ is indeed the rover teams mantra.
The main map here shows the assortment of landforms near the location of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover as the rover’s second anniversary of landing on Mars nears. The gold traverse line entering from upper right ends at Curiosity’s position as of Sol 705 on Mars (July 31, 2014). The inset map shows the mission’s entire traverse from the landing on Aug. 5, 2012, PDT (Aug. 6, EDT) to Sol 705, and the remaining distance to long-term science destinations near Murray Buttes, at the base of Mount Sharp. The label “Aug. 5, 2013” indicates where Curiosity was one year after landing. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
To date, Curiosity’s odometer totals over 5.5 miles (9.0 kilometers) since landing inside Gale Crater on Mars in August 2012. She has taken over 174,000 images.
Curiosity still has about another 2 miles (3 kilometers) to go to reach the entry way at a gap in the treacherous sand dunes at the foothills of Mount Sharp sometime later this year.
And NASA is moving forward with future Red Planet missions when it recently announced the selection of 7 instruments chosen to fly aboard the Mars 2020 rover, the agency’s next rover going to Mars that will search for signs of ancient life as well as carry a technology demonstration that will help pave the way for ‘Humans to Mars’ in the 2030s. Read my story – here.
Coincidentally, ESA’s Rosetta comet hunting spacecraft arrived in orbit at its destination Comet 67P after a 10 year voyage on the same day as Curiosity’s 2 Earth year anniversary.
Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Rosetta, Curiosity, Opportunity, Orion, SpaceX, Boeing, Orbital Sciences, commercial space, MAVEN, MOM, Mars and more planetary and human spaceflight news.
Up close view of hole in one of rover Curiosity’s six wheels caused by recent driving over rough Martian rocks. Mosaic assembled from Mastcam raw images taken on Dec. 22, 2013 (Sol 490). Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
NASA's Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD) during a June 2014 test flight. Credit: NASA/YouTube (screenshot)
Feeling dizzy? This is what the view looked like from NASA’s next-generation Mars spacecraft as the flying saucer-shaped vehicle did a test in June.
According to the agency, the Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD) met all of its test objectives even though the parachute didn’t deploy as planned. And in a briefing today (Aug. 8), agency officials said they have a plan to deal with the issue for the next flight, which will be in summer 2015.
“We are going to change the shape. We are going to have some structural reinforcements to make it stronger in areas that it is particularly sensitive, to
improve deployment of parachute,” said Ian Clark, the principal investigator of LDSD at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
With every robotic Mars mission, it appears, NASA is trying to land bigger and bigger payloads on the surface of the planet. That’s because the rovers have become more powerful over time. The latest vehicle, the Mars Science Laboratory (better known as Curiosity) included a unique crane system that was so innovative that NASA dubbed the final landing sequence “seven minutes of terror.”
“We’re really happy. We have tons and tons of data,” said Mark Adler, the project manager for LDSD at JPL. “Nothing makes us happier than data.”
Besides the busted parachute, officials said the test showed the vehicle was performing to expectations — and sometimes, even better than expected. The shape held within 1/8 of an inch (0.32 cm), which they said was very good for a 20-foot (6-meter) vehicle. Drag and stability happened as they thought. The balloon that deployed the parachute also did well, they said.
A timeline of events for a test of NASA’s Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The parachute, however, developed tears very close to the beginning of its deployment, which officials said was due to a lack of understanding about how parachutes perform at supersonic velocities.
While the LDSD has not been assigned to a particular mission yet, officials said it would be useful to land missions more accurately on the Red Planet in spots that would be more difficult to reach. It also would be useful for a future human mission, whenever that happens, because the equivalent of “two-storey condominiums”would be needed, said Adler.
The project has been in the works since September 2010, and this summer’s test occurred a year ahead of schedule.
A HiRISE image called "steep north polar peripheral scarp." Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
Don’t you love it when close-up pictures come beaming to your computer from another planet? Below are some of the latest images from Mars taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
And by the way, there’s a way for you to request where HiRISE will be pointing next.
All you need to go to this page (called HiWish) and leave a suggestion for where you’d like the spacecraft to look. For some tips on what to do:
The general consensus seems to be picking a spot that is not over-popular, and trying to find a spot that HiRISE has not looked at before or very frequently. Best of luck!
A HiRISE image called “Nili Patera.” Credit: NASA/JPL/University of ArizonaA HiRISE image called “scalloped surface in Utopia region.” Credit: NASA/JPL/University of ArizonaA HiRISE image called “gullied crater wall.” Credit: NASA/JPL/University of ArizonaA HiRISE image called “active dune gullies in Kaiser crater.” Credit: NASA/JPL/University of ArizonaA HiRISE image called “dark-capped plain and hills in western Arabia region intercrater terrain.” Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
Artist's concept of the proposed "ExoLance" instrument that Explore Mars would have burrow beneath the Red Planet's surface for life. Credit: ExoLance/Indiegogo/YouTube (screenshot)
Not-for-profit group Explore Mars has a new IndieGoGo campaign that could see an instrument, ExoLance, head to the Red Planet to burrow for subsurface life. The first stage will be to raise money to build the prototype and then test it, within 12-14 months of finishing the fundraising.
No launch date for this mission has been announced, but the group says that will be determined after testing is finished and a launch provider can be found.
“Explore Mars has devised a simple system capable of being delivered to the Martian surface to detect microorganisms living on or under the surface,” the campaign page states.
“ExoLance leverages a delivery system that was originally designed for military purposes. As each small, lightweight penetrator probe (“arrow”) impacts the surface, it leaves behind a radio transmitter at the surface to communicate with an orbiter, and then kinetically burrows to emplace a life-detection experiment one to two meters below the surface. ExoLance combines the experiments of the 1970s Viking landers and the Curiosity rover with bunker-busting weapons technology.”
The project aims to raise $250,000, but there will be milestone goals available all the way up to $1 million.
An artist concept image of where seven carefully-selected instruments will be located on NASA’s Mars 2020 rover. The instruments will conduct unprecedented science and exploration technology investigations on the Red Planet as never before. Image Credit: NASA
NASA announced the winners of the high stakes science instrument competition to fly aboard the Mars 2020 rover at a briefing held today, Thursday, July 31, at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The 2020 rover’s instruments goals are to search for signs of organic molecules and past life and help pave the way for future human explorers.
Seven carefully-selected payloads were chosen from a total of 58 proposals received in January 2014 from science teams worldwide, which is twice the usual number for instrument competitions and demonstrates the extraordinary interest in Mars by the science community.
The 2020 rover architecture is based on NASA’s hugely successful Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Curiosity rover which safely touched down a one ton mass on Mars on Aug. 5, 2012 using the nail-biting and never before used skycrane rocket assisted descent system.
The seven instruments will conduct unprecedented science and technology investigations on the Red Planet that’s aimed for the first time at simultaneously advancing both NASA’s unmanned robotic exploration searching for extraterrestrial life and plans for human missions to Mars in the 2030’s.
Planning for NASA’s 2020 Mars rover envisions a basic structure that capitalizes on the design and engineering work done for the NASA rover Curiosity, which landed on Mars in 2012, but with new science instruments selected through competition for accomplishing different science objectives. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The instruments will have the capability to detect low levels of organic molecules that are essential precursors to life.
A technology demonstration experiment will use Mars natural resources to generate oxygen from atmospheric carbon dioxide that can be used as rocket fuel or for human explorers. This will save enormous costs by enabling astronauts to ‘live off the land’ rather than having to bring everything needed for survival from Earth.
NASA said that the development cost for the chosen instruments is approximately $130 million out of a total cost of $1.9 Billion.
This overall cost is less than Curiosity’s approximate $2.4 Billion cost since the team is rebuilding the rover and landing architecture – sort of an MSL 2 so to speak – developed for Curiosity and also using several left over MSL flight spares.
Mars 2020 builds on the architecture developed for Curiosity.
Curiosity’s panoramic view departing Mount Remarkable and ‘The Kimberley Waypoint’ where rover conducted 3rd drilling campaign inside Gale Crater on Mars. The navcam raw images were taken on Sol 630, May 15, 2014, stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
The Mars 2020 rover will also have a sample cacher with the ability to store core samples collected by the rover’s drill for later retrieval and return to Earth at an as yet unspecified time.
“The Mars 2020 rover, with these new advanced scientific instruments, including those from our international partners, holds the promise to unlock more mysteries of Mars’ past as revealed in the geological record,” said John Grunsfeld, astronaut and associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
“This mission will further our search for life in the universe and also offer opportunities to advance new capabilities in exploration technology.”
NASA’s Mars 2020 rover will explore the Red Planet like never before. Credit: NASAHere’s a list of the 7 selected science payload proposals. They are in some ways more advanced versions form Curiosity and in other ways completely new:
Mastcam-Z, an advanced camera system with panoramic and stereoscopic imaging capability with the ability to zoom. The instrument also will determine mineralogy of the Martian surface and assist with rover operations. The principal investigator is James Bell, Arizona State University in Phoenix.
SuperCam, an instrument that can provide imaging, chemical composition analysis, and mineralogy. The instrument will also be able to detect the presence of organic compounds in rocks and regolith from a distance. The principal investigator is Roger Wiens, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico. This instrument also has a significant contribution from the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales,Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planetologie (CNES/IRAP) France.
Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry (PIXL), an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer that will also contain an imager with high resolution to determine the fine scale elemental composition of Martian surface materials. PIXL will provide capabilities that permit more detailed detection and analysis of chemical elements than ever before. The principal investigator is Abigail Allwood, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.
Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC), a spectrometer that will provide fine-scale imaging and uses an ultraviolet (UV) laser to determine fine-scale mineralogy and detect organic compounds. SHERLOC will be the first UV Raman spectrometer to fly to the surface of Mars and will provide complementary measurements with other instruments in the payload. The principal investigator is Luther Beegle, JPL.
The Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment (MOXIE), an exploration technology investigation that will produce oxygen from Martian atmospheric carbon dioxide. The principal investigator is Michael Hecht, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA), a set of sensors that will provide measurements of temperature, wind speed and direction, pressure, relative humidity and dust size and shape. The principal investigator is Jose Rodriguez-Manfredi, Centro de Astrobiologia, Instituto Nacional de Tecnica Aeroespacial, Spain.
The Radar Imager for Mars’ Subsurface Exploration (RIMFAX), a ground-penetrating radar that will provide centimeter-scale resolution of the geologic structure of the subsurface. The principal investigator is Svein-Erik Hamran, Forsvarets Forskning Institute, Norway.
So the instruments are more sophisticated, upgraded hardware versions as well as new instruments to conduct geological assessments of the rover’s landing site, determine the potential habitability of the environment, and directly search for signs of ancient Martian life, according to NASA.
Creating a Returnable Cache of Martian Samples is a major objective for NASA’s Mars 2020 rover. This prototype show hardware to cache samples of cores drilled from Martian rocks for possible future return to Earth. The 2020 rover would be to collect and package a carefully selected set of up to 31 samples in a cache that could be returned to Earth by a later mission. The capabilities of laboratories on Earth for detailed examination of cores drilled from Martian rocks would far exceed the capabilities of any set of instruments that could feasibly be flown to Mars. For scale, the diameter of the core sample shown in the image is 0.4 inch (1 centimeter). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“Today we take another important step on our journey to Mars,” said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden.
“While getting to and landing on Mars is hard, Curiosity was an iconic example of how our robotic scientific explorers are paving the way for humans to pioneer Mars and beyond. Mars exploration will be this generation’s legacy, and the Mars 2020 rover will be another critical step on humans’ journey to the Red Planet.”
Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Curiosity, Opportunity, Orion, SpaceX, Boeing, Orbital Sciences, commercial space, MAVEN, MOM, Mars and more Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news.
This scene from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows "Lunokhod 2 Crater." Image Credit: NASA
NASA’s Opportunity mars rover now holds the off-Earth roving distance record after accruing 25 miles of driving. Given that the rover has been roaming the Red Planet for over a decade, that’s a travel speed of roughly 2.5 miles per year, and it’s one to be proud of.
“Opportunity has driven farther than any other wheeled vehicle on another world,” said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager John Callas, from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in a NASA press release. “This is so remarkable considering Opportunity was intended to drive about one kilometer and was never designed for distance. But what is really important is not how many miles the rover has racked up, but how much exploration and discovery we have accomplished over that distance.”
The previous record was held by the Soviet Union’s Lunokhod 2 rover, which landed on the moon in 1973. It drove about 24.2 miles in less than five months, according to calculations recently made using images from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.
“The Lunokhod missions still stand as two signature accomplishments of what I think of as the first golden age of planetary exploration, the 1960s and ’70s,” said Steve Squyres from Cornell University, and principal investigator for NASA’s twin Mars rovers. “We’re in a second golden age now, and what we’ve tried to do on Mars with Spirit and Opportunity has been very much inspired by the accomplishments of the Lunokhod team on the moon so many years ago. It has been a real honor to follow in their historical wheel tracks.”
The gold line on this image shows Opportunity’s route from the landing site inside Eagle Crater (upper left) to its current location. Image Credit: NASA
A drive of 157 feet on July 27 put Opportunity’s odometer at 25.01 miles. The rover is currently headed southward along the western rim of Endeavour crater: a site that is continuing to yield evidence of ancient environments with less acidic water than those examined at Opportunity’s landing site.
If the rover can continue to operate for another 25.2 miles — the distance of a marathon — it will approach the next major investigation site: a valley, which scientists have dubbed “Marathon Valley.” Observations from spacecraft in orbit suggest that the valley is composed of a stack of layered sediments, offering a glimpse at the Red Planet’s changing geologic history.
Opportunity has continued to rove, gather scientific observations, and report back to Earth for over 40 times its designed lifespan. Now every additional mile reached will set the record for the longest off-Earth roving distance.
