Universe Today

January 23, 2013December 23, 2015 by Fraser Cain

In Orion, There Really is a Hole in the Sky

Clouds of cosmic dust in the region of Orion. Credit: ESO

A new image from ESO’s APEX instrument shows a cloud of gas and dust in the Orion region. Image credit: ESO

When astronomers see dark regions in nebula in visible light, they know there’s something going on. There’s got to be some kind of star forming activity pumping out material that obscures the view to the newly forming starts. Switch to infrared and you can peer through that intervening dust to see the young stars at work.

Astronomers using the European Southern Observatory’s Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope in Chile were surprised to see a dark region in the nebula NGC 1999, even in infrared, when the cause of the dark region should have been apparent.

Ooo, mystery.

These dark regions in nebulae have been observed for hundreds of years. Even William Herschel found one in the constellation Scorpius back in 1774.”Truly there is a hole in the sky here!” he noted. But it wasn’t a hole. It was a region where star formation is actively happening.

Under construction, nothing to see here, come back in a million years when the newly formed stars have generated powerful solar winds and are clearing out their stellar neighborhoods.

Here, I’ve attached an image of bok globules (dark nebulae in IC 2944), which can contain 2 to 50 solar masses of material contained within a volume of about a light-year. Often these dark regions can result in double or even multiple star systems.

But in the case of NGC 1999, astronomers used the APEX instrument to peer at this region in infrared; the perfect wavelength to see through all that dust.

And the hole, this dark region, was still there.

This is a widefield view of the region around NGC 1999. The nebula itself is right at the middle of this image, with the more famous Orion Nebula up at the top of the picture. Image credit: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin

Thanks to multiple observations from different instruments, astronomers think they’ve puzzled out the nature of this dark hole. It’s actually a cavity carved out by the star V380 Orionis. It really is a dark hole in the nebula, and not a secret star forming region at all.

V380 Orionis is the brightest star in the region of NGC 1999 – it’s actually the brightest member of a triple star system. It’s got a surface temperature of about 10,000 Kelvin and contains about 3.5 times the mass of the Sun. Back in 2010, researchers uncovered that a powerful jet from V380 Ori is probably responsible for carving out this gap in the nebula.

Original Source: ESO News Release

P.S. Pixies running through my head as I’m writing this.

January 23, 2013April 26, 2016 by Elizabeth Howell

The Ocean is a lot Like Outer Space

A view of the Bathyscaphe Trieste in 1959. (U.S. NHHC)

Just about any space mission these days requires water training. Think of the countless hours astronauts spend in the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory at the Johnson Space Center, practicing the steps to do spacewalks. Then there are the crews that actually live in the ocean for days at a time on NASA’s NEEMO missions.

Long before these “aquanauts” added flippers to their list of equipment, however, the U.S. Navy was busy exploring the depths of the ocean. Today – Jan. 23 – marks the anniversary of the Bathyscaphe Trieste’s descent to the bottom of the ocean in 1960. This was the first time a vessel, manned or unmanned, had reached the deepest known point of the Earth’s oceans, the Mariana Trench.

Trieste was at first operated by the French Navy, which operated it for several years in the Mediterranean Sea, but the US Navy purchased the Trieste in 1958.

Although two men took the ride down, all accounts say that it was an isolating experience. Jacques Piccard – well-known today for his exploration of the oceans – and US Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh descended about 11 kilometers (7 miles) to the bottom.

Lt. Don Walsh, USN (left) and Jacques Piccard (centre)
in the bathyscaphe Trieste. Via Wikipedia. — Lt. Don Walsh, USN (left) and Jacques Piccard (centre) in the bathyscaphe Trieste. Via Wikipedia.

Fighting with poor communications and high pressure – which cracked a window at 30,000 feet below the surface – the crew made their way to ocean floor. They worked in a tiny sphere only 2 meters (6.5 feet) wide, and according to the University of Delaware, the interior reached frigid temperatures of 7 degrees Celsius (45 degrees Fahrenheit) during their successful descent and return.

Spaceflight and deep-ocean diving share many similarities, as this mission demonstrated. The early days of the space program had communications blackouts as spaceships flew between stations; this proved to be a near-disaster for the Gemini 8 crew in 1966 when their spacecraft spun out of control during a period with no voice connection to the ground.

Also, sustaining life is no less challenging in the water as it is in space. Humans require oxygen, pressure and a comfortable environment where they work. Crews in space have faced serious problems with all of these matters before – Mir suffered a partial depressurization in 1997, and the early days of the Skylab space station were rather hot until the astronauts could deploy a sunshade.

Walsh was not available for an interview with Universe Today due to travel, but in a 2012 BBC interview he noted that he had reserved confidence that they would make it to the bottom.

“I knew the machine well enough, at that point, to know that theoretically, it could be done,” Walsh recalled.

The mens’ feat would go unrepeated for decades, until in 2012 Hollywood director James Cameron made the descent again – alone, although certainly equipped with more modern technology. For comparison, only one American has flown solo in space since the 1960s; in 2004, Mike Melvill piloted SpaceShipOne into suborbital space twice as part of the Ansari X-Prize win.

January 23, 2013December 23, 2015 by Fraser Cain

Detailed View of Betelgeuse, on a Collision Course with a Nearby Wall of Dust

A photograph of the red supergiant Betelgeuse interacting with a mysterious dusty wall. Image credit: Herschel/ESA

Betelgeuse is one of my favorite objects to look at, partly because of its pure red color, and mostly because my imagination fills in the rest. That bright red star, the shoulder of Orion is a supergiant, with dozens of times the mass of the Sun, and ready to detonate as a supernova any day now (any day within the next few million years).

But look at Betelgeuse with a really powerful telescope, like the European Space Agency’s Herschel telescope, and you’ll see something like this: the red supergiant Betelgeuse in all its glory, smashing its ferocious solar winds into its environment.

In this photograph, just released from the European Space Agency, you can see the powerful solar winds creating a bow shock around the star as it ploughs through the interstellar medium at a speed of 30 km/s. Closer into the star there are asymmetric structures, where the star shed material in fits and starts into its surroundings, like convective bubbles randomly popping to the top of a pot of boiling water.

It’s the interaction of this supergiant star and its surroundings that astronomers were attempting to unravel with their research, in a paper titled: The enigmatic nature of the circumstellar envelope and bow shock surrounding Betelgeuse as revealed by Herschel. Researchers from several European universities combined data from Herschel, the GALEX space observatory, WISE, and even radio wavelengths to study Betelgeuse and its environment. They studied the star, the bow shock, and the asymmetric clumps of material around it.

Over on the left-hand side of the photograph is a mysterious dusty wall structure that Betelgeuse is heading straight for. Because this dusty wall doesn’t curve, like the bow shock around Betelgeuse, astronomers don’t think it was caused by the star itself. According to the researchers:

The linear bar might be the edge of an interstellar cloud illuminated by Betelgeuse or a linear filament whose a possible origin is linked to the Galactic magnetic field. Since no curvature is present in the bar, we believe that the bar is not directly linked to a previous blue supergiant wind

Betelgeuse is, however, responsible for illuminating this structure, like a flashlight illuminating a nearby fog bank. And according the astronomer’s calculations, the star’s bow shock will collide with that wall in a mere 5,000 years, with the star itself following suit 12,500 years later.

Original Source: ESA News Release

January 22, 2013December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

NASA Stars at 2013 Presidential Inaugural Parade with Orion and Curiosity – Photos and Video

Image caption: Orion deep space crew capsule float passes in front of the White House at the Presidential Inaugural parade on Jan 21, 2013 in Washington, DC. Credit: NASA

NASA’s new Orion deep space crew capsule and sensational Curiosity Mars rover had starring roles at the 2013 Presidential Inaugural Parade held on Monday, Jan 21, 2013 in Washington D.C.

NASA photographers captured stunning photos and video (above and below) as Orion and Curiosity passed in front of the White House and the official reviewing stand – with President Obama & VP Joe Biden and their families and numerous dignitaries smiling and waving.

Beautiful weather shined though out the entire day’s festivities and into the early evening as full size models of Orion and Curiosity made their way thought the capitol streets to participate in the 2013 Inaugural parade.

NASA’s floats prominently placed near the front of the parade and seen on Live TV about 530 PM EDT as well as by about a million spectators on hand.

Image caption: Curiosity Mars rover float passes in front of the White House and reviewing stand at the Presidential Inaugural parade on Jan 21, 2013 in Washington, DC. Credit: NASA

The fantastically successful Curiosity rover is discovering widespread evidence for the ancient flow of liquid water on Mars.

The Orion multi-purpose capsule will take our astronauts back to the Moon and farther into deep space than ever before.

NASA is the ONLY federal agency asked to be in the inaugural parade. Curiosity led the way followed by Orion.

Video of full-size models of the Curiosity Mars rover and Orion, the multi-purpose capsule that will take our astronauts farther into space than ever, as they appeared in the Washington, D.C. parade on Jan. 21.

Accompanying the NASA vehicles were members of the Curiosity team from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and current and former astronauts Alvin Drew, Serena Aunon, Kate Rubins, Mike Massimino, Lee Morin and Kjell Lindgren, as well as Leland Melvin, NASA’s associate administrator for Education, and John Grunsfeld, NASA’s associate administrator for Science.

Be sure to check out NASA’s Flickr stream for many photos from the 2013 Inaugural Day festivities and parade – here and here

See my preview story – here

Ken Kremer

January 22, 2013December 23, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Astrophotos: Jupiter and the Moon Conjunction

The Galilean Satellites of Jupiter are clearly visible just above a halo around the Moon, seen over central Italy on January 21, 2013. Credit: Giuseppe Petricca

Last night, the Moon and Jupiter snuggled up in the sky, coming within 29 arcminutes of each other. This will be the closest conjunction of these two bodies in the sky until 2026. The waxing gibbous Moon and the gas giant planet made for a great pair in the western night sky, and some astrophotographers, like Giuseppe Petricca in the image above, were also able to capture some of the Moons of Jupiter as well.

See more images from around the world, below.

Jupiter and the Moon 1-21-13. The Moon is intentionally overexposed so you can see three moons. Ganymede on the left and Io and Callisto on the right (Europa was transiting at the time). Credit and copyright: Robert Sparks.

Moon & Jupiter Conjunction, January 21, 2013. Quick 2-frame collage of this remarkable conjunction between our Moon and the giant planet. This was taken with a Canon EOS Rebel T2i DSLR and a Celestron C90 Maksutov-Cassegrain telescope. Credit an copyright: Gustavo Sanchez/Observatorio Guajataca.

Reflections over Lavender Bay, Sydney Australia, Jupiter and Moon conjunction. ‘By this point I had to leave the bay area but one last look back and I saw this frame, so I tried my best to capture it whilst the timer on my parking ticket was quickly running out.’ Credit and copyright: Carlos Orue (ourkind on Flickr.)

Moon-Jupiter January conjunction. Taken with Nikon 55-300 + kenko 2X, 3 different shots for each body. Credit: Alejandro García (bokepacha on Flickr). — Moon-Jupiter January conjunction. Taken with Nikon 55-300 + kenko 2X, 3 different shots for each body. Credit and copyright: Alejandro García (bokepacha on Flickr).

Planet Jupiter vs. the Moon. The small orb on the lower left is the planet Jupiter visible near the moon in the night sky of January 21, 2013. Credit and copyright: Daniel Lowe/danieldragonfilms.com./IStockTimelapse.com

In some areas of South America, the conjunction actually became an occultation. This picture captures the moment when about half of Jupiter was behind the (dark part of) the disk of the Moon. Credit and copyright: Sergio Gorbach, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Sergio Gorbach, from Buenos Aires, Argentina sent us this image, showing how he was in a region where the conjunction turned into an occulation. “This captures the moment when about half of Jupiter was behind the dark part of the disk of the moon,” Sergio wrote via email. “On the scope three of the Galilean moons where visible, but not on this picture, unfortunately. The picture quality is not great since they were taken by a smartphone held by hand in front of the eyepiece of my (cheap) telescope, but the resulting image is not that bad.”

Not bad indeed!

Jupiter and the Moon over London, England on January 21, 2013. Credit and copyright: Sculptor Lil on Flickr.

Jupiter and the Moon. Hooligan handhelded shot series with EF-S 60 mm f/2.8 macro lens. Credit and copyright: Sergei Golyshev.

Luna con Jupiter -- as seen from Spain. Credit and copyright: Jordi Villanueva Alberich.

Moon and Jupiter conjunction Jan. 21, 2013. Two exposures back to back to compensate for the exposure differences. Credit and copyright: jimnista on Flickr.

This is a collage of three photos, all taken on January 21, 2013: one of the Moon and Jupiter, another focusing on Jupiter’s Moons (both with a Canon Rebel T2i), and another through an 8 inch Dobsonian telescope of Jupiter, which was scaled to size and overlayed on Jupiter to provide some detail. ‘The moons are obviously not to scale because they are out of focus, I think it makes the photo a bit more dramatic,’ said photographer Chris Gorman.

Who says you can't enjoy the night sky even in Urban areas! This photo of Jupiter and the Moon in close proximity was taken in the light polluted suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. This photo is one shot - not a collage! Credit and copyright: Dave Hudson.

Dave Hudson took this great shot on Tuesday, January 21, 2013 @ 10:32pm EST.
Camera and Telescope: Celestron C8 on a Celestron CG5 EQ mount
Canon 60D using Eyepiece projection with MAXIM adapter and Celestron .63 Focal Reducer
17mp picture, ISO 100, 1/60 second exposure, no filters
Telescope: 203.2 mm aperture, 2000mm focal length, F10 – reduced to F6.3 using Celestron Focal Reducer

Jupiter-Moon Conjunction, Jan 21, 2013 from San Diego, California. Shot with a Fuji Finepix 2000hd. Credit and copyright: Bob Gould.

Jupiter-Moon conjunction on January 21, 2013. Credit and copyright: Paul Latham.

Jupiter-Moon conjunction 1/21/13 from Houston Texas. Credit and copyright: Chris Grabo.

Want to get your astrophoto featured on Universe Today? Join our Flickr group or send us your images by email (this means you’re giving us permission to post them). Please explain what’s in the picture, when you took it, the equipment you used, etc.

January 21, 2013December 23, 2015 by Fraser Cain

Virtual Star Party: January 20, 2013: The Welcome Rookie Edition

Another wonderful Virtual Star Party, this time with 5 astronomers broadcasting their view of the night sky live. We had amazing views of Jupiter, the Moon, and several deep sky objects, including the Orion Nebula, the Pleiades, M33, the Rosette Nebula, Andromeda, the Cave Nebula, and several others. Check out the really cool “37 star cluster”, where the stars in the cluster actually write out the number 37.

This was also the first time were joined by Louis Mamakos, who delighted us with his dark sky views from Pennsylvania.

Astronomers: Roy Salisbury, Stuart Forman, Mike Phillips, Bill McLaughlin and Louis Mamakos.

Commentary: Nicole Gugliucci, Dr. Pamela Gay, Dr. Thad Szabo, Scott Lewis

Host: Fraser Cain

We run the Virtual Star Party every Sunday night as a live Google+ Hangout. Want to find when it’s happening next? Just circle the Virtual Star Party page on Google+. Visit the Universe Today YouTube channel to see an archive of all our past events.

Here are some amazing pictures that were captured during the event:

January 21, 2013December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

NASA’s Curiosity and Orion Shine at Presidential Inaugural Parade

Video caption: Preview of Mars Curiosity Parade Float. Jim Green, Director of the Science Mission Directorate Planetary Systems Division at NASA Headquarters, describes the replica of the Mars Curiosity Rover on the second NASA float in Monday’s (Jan 21, 2013) presidential inaugural parade. Parade photos below

Full scale models of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover and the Orion crew capsule are participating in the 2013 Presidential Inaugural Parade on Monday, Jan 21, 2013, in Washington, DC – representing NASA’s robotic and human spaceflight endeavors.

The fantastically successful Curiosity rover is discovering widespread evidence for the ancient flow of liquid water on Mars.

The Orion multi-purpose capsule will take our astronauts back to the Moon and farther into space than ever.

NASA is the ONLY federal agency asked to be in the inaugural parade and now Curiosity is leading the NASA group with Orion after Curiosity.

Update 530 PM EDT – NASA’s 2 floats just passed by a cheering and waving President Obama & VP Biden at the reviewing stand in front of the White House – prominently near the front of the parade. See float photos from the parade below

Walking alongside both floats are members of the Curiosity team from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory – including ‘Mohawk Guy’ – and several current and former astronauts.

The participating astronauts are Alvin Drew, Serena Aunon, Kate Rubins, Mike Massimino, Lee Morin and Kjell Lindgren, as well as Leland Melvin, NASA’s associate administrator for Education, and John Grunsfeld, NASA’s associate administrator for Science.

The marching team for Curiosity includes Richard Cook-project manager (from JPL), Bobak Ferdowsi (otherwise known as ‘Mohawk Guy’)-flight director (from JPL), Dave Lavery – program executive (from NASA Headquarters) , Michael Meyer – program Scientist (from NASA Headquarters), Jennifer Trosper-mission manager (from JPL) and Ashwin Vasavada, Deputy Project Scientist (from JPL)

Image caption: Orion crew capsule float with NASA astronauts at the Presidential Inaugural parade on Jan 21, 2013 in Washington, DC. Credit: NASA

Image caption: Curiosity float with team members at the Presidential Inaugural parade on Jan 21, 2013 in Washington, DC. Credit: NASA

Be sure to check out NASA’s Flickr stream for many photos from the 2013 Inaugural Day festivities and parade – here and here

Here’s another video about the Curiosity float:

Ken Kremer

Image caption: Orion crew capsule arrives in Washington, DC, for Presidential Inaugural parade on Jan 21, 2013. Credit: NASA

January 21, 2013December 23, 2015 by Jason Major

Take a Rollercoaster Ride Around Venus

If you’ve ever wanted to see what it’s like to buzz Venus like only a spacecraft can, here’s your chance: this is a video animation of images taken by ESA’s Venus Express as it makes a pole-to-pole orbit of our neighboring world.

Captured in ultraviolet wavelengths, the images were acquired by the spacecraft’s Venus Monitoring Camera last January over a period of 18 hours. It’s truly a “day in the life” of Venus Express!

From ESA’s description of the video:

We join the spacecraft from a staggering 66,000 km above the south pole, staring down into the swirling south polar vortex. From this bird’s-eye view, half of the planet is in darkness, the ‘terminator’ marking the dividing line between the day and night sides of the planet.

Intricate features on smaller and smaller scales are revealed as Venus Express dives to just 250 km above the north pole and clouds flood the field of view, before regaining a global perspective as it climbs away from the north pole.

The observed pattern of bright and dark markings is caused by variations in an unknown absorbing chemical at the Venus cloud tops.

False-color image of cloud features on Venus. Captured by Venus Express from a distance of 30,000 km (18,640 miles) on December 8, 2011. (ESA/MPS/DLR/IDA)

Source: European Space Agency

January 21, 2013December 23, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Stunning Death Valley ‘Dreamlapse’

Meteor still shot from 'Death Valley Dreamlapse.' Credit: Gavin Heffernan/Sunchaser Pictures.

Here’s yet another gorgeous timelapse from Gavin Heffernan and his team. As we previewed in our Geminid Meteor Shower post, the Sunchaser Pictures team trekked to the world-famous Eureka Dunes in Death Valley National Park to search for some of the darkest skies on Earth during the meteor shower peak on the night of December 13th, 2012. They braved a long journey, a tough climb cold temperatures.

“But it was all worth it when the skies cleared and showed us an incredible galactic palette!” Gavin writes on Vimeo.

In addition to Geminids, there are star trails, planets and a weird spiraling object at about 1:30-1:35. It makes three broad circular sweeps over the desert – although in timelapse it appears to be moving fast, but the 5 seconds of time in timelapse equals about 50 minutes, so it’s actually not moving all that fast. It can also be seen cutting through the circular star trails picture below. There’s another 25-second exposure that of the object moving that makes it look almost like a colored rope.

“I don’t think that ‘rope’ look is unusual for a normal plane etc.,” Gavin told Universe Today via email. “The circular motion, and very slow movement are what really make it interesting/unusual. It’s definitely worth noting that the site is definitely near some kind of military installation or air force base, because we saw the spectacular sight of F-16 fighter planes zooming over the dunes, not too far off the ground. I know for sure it wasn’t a helicopter, because we would have heard it.”

Shots from the timelapse:

Star trails from 'Death Valley Dreamlapse." Credit: Gavin Heffernan/Sunchaser Pictures. — Star trails from 'Death Valley Dreamlapse.

A close-up, 25 second exposure of an object flying through the field of view. Credit: Gavin Heffernan/Sunchaser Pictures. — A 25 second exposure of an object flying through the field of view. Credit: Gavin Heffernan/Sunchaser Pictures.

DEATH VALLEY DREAMLAPSE from Sunchaser Pictures on Vimeo.

January 19, 2013June 5, 2022 by Ken Kremer

Watery Science ‘Jackpot’ Discovered by Curiosity

Curiosity found widespread evidence for flowing water in the highly diverse, rocky scenery shown in this photo mosaic from the edge of Yellowknife Bay on Sol 157 (Jan 14, 2013). The rover will soon conduct 1st Martian rock drilling operation at flat, light toned rocks at the outcrop called “John Klein”, at center. ‘John Klein’ drill site and ‘Sheep Bed’ outcrop ledges to right of rover arm are filled with numerous mineral veins and spherical concretions which strongly suggest precipitation of minerals from liquid water. ‘Snake River’ rock formation is the linear chain of rocks protruding up from the Martian sand near rover wheel. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo

The Curiosity rover hit the science “jackpot” and has discovered widespread further evidence of multiple episodes of liquid water flowing over ancient Mars billions of years ago when the planet was warmer and wetter, scientists announced. The watery evidence comes in the form of water bearing mineral veins, cross-bedded layering, nodules and spherical sedimentary concretions.

Any day now NASA’s mega robot will be instructed to drill directly into veined rocks where water once flowed, the team announced at a media briefing this week.

Delighted researchers said Curiosity surprisingly found lots of evidence for light-toned chains of linear mineral veins inside fractured rocks littering the highly diverse Martian terrain – using her array of ten state-of-the-art science instruments. Veins form when liquid water circulates through fractures and deposit minerals, gradually filling the insides of the fractured rocks over time.

Sometime in the next two weeks or so, NASA’s car sized rover will carry out history’s first ever drilling inside a Martian rock that was “percolated” by liquid water – an essential prerequisite for life as we know. A powdered sample will then be delivered to the robots duo of analytical chemistry labs (CheMin & SAM) to determine its elemental composition and ascertain whether organic molecules are present.

The drill target area is named “John Klein” outcrop, in tribute to a team member who was the deputy project manager for Curiosity at JPL for several years and who passed away in 2011.

“We identified a potential drill target and are preparing to do drill activities in the next two weeks. We are ready to go,” said Richard Cook, the project manager of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.

“Drilling [into a rock] is the most significant engineering activity since landing. It is the most difficult aspect of the surface mission, interacting with an unknown surface terrain, and has never been done on Mars. We will go slowly. It will take some time to deliver samples to CheMin and SAM and will be a great set of scientific measurements.”

Image caption: Mineral veins of calcium sulfate discovered by Curiosity at ‘Sheepbed’ Outcrop. These veins form when water circulates through fractures, depositing minerals along the sides of the fracture, to form a vein. These vein fills are characteristic of the stratigraphically lowest unit in the “Yellowknife Bay” area where Curiosity is currently exploring and were imaged on Sol 126 (Dec. 13, 2012) by the telephoto Mastcam camera. Image has been white-balanced. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

“The scientists have been let into the candy store,” said Cook referring to the unexpected wealth of science targets surrounding the rover at this moment.

“There is a high diversity of rocks types here to characterize,” added Mike Malin, Mastcam principal investigator of Malin Space Science Systems (MSSS). “We see layering, veins and concretions. The area is still undergoing some changes.”

Curiosity is just a few meters away from ‘John Klein’ and will drive to the site shortly from her location inside ‘Yellowknife Bay’ beside the ‘Snake River’ rock formation. To see where Curiosity is in context with ‘John Klein’ and “Snake River’, see our annotated context mosaic (by Ken Kremer & Marco Di Lorenzo) as the rover collects data at a rock ledge.

The white colored veins were discovered over the past few weeks- using the high resolution mast- mounted imaging cameras and ChemCam laser firing spectrometer -at exactly the vicinity where Curiosity is currently investigating ; around a shallow basin called Yellowknife Bay and roughly a half mile away from the landing site inside Gale Crater.

“This lowest unit that we are at in Yellowknife Bay, the very farthest thing we drove to, turns out to be kind of the ‘jackpot’ unit here,” said John Grotzinger, the mission’s chief scientist of the California Institute of Technology. “It is literally shot through with these fractures and vein fills.”

Image caption: ‘John Klein’ Site Selected for Curiosity’s Drill Debut. This view shows the patch of veined, flat-lying rock selected as the first drilling site. The rover’s right Mast Camera equipped with a telephoto lens, was about 16 feet (5 meters) away from the site when it recorded this mosaic on sol 153 (Jan. 10, 2013). The area is shot full of fractures and veins, with the intervening rock also containing concretions, which are small spherical concentrations of minerals. Enlargement A shows a high concentration of ridge-like veins protruding above the surface. Some of the veins have two walls and an eroded interior. Enlargement B shows that in some portions of this feature, there is a horizontal discontinuity a few centimeters or inches beneath the surface. The discontinuity may be a bed, a fracture, or potentially a horizontal vein. Enlargement C shows a hole developed in the sand that overlies a fracture, implying infiltration of sand down into the fracture system. Image has been white-balanced. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Shortly after landing the team took a calculated gamble and decided to take a several months long detour away from the main destination of the towering, sedimentary mountain named Mount Sharp, and instead drive to an area dubbed ‘Glenelg’ and home to ‘Yellowknife Bay’, because it sits at the junction of a trio of different geologic terrains. Glenelg exhibits high thermal inertia and helps put the entire region in better scientific context. The gamble has clearly payed off.

“We chose to go there because we saw something anomalous, but wouldn’t have predicted any of this from orbit,” said Grotzinger.

The Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument found elevated levels of calcium, sulfur and hydrogen. Hydrogen is indicative of water.

The mineral veins are probably comprised of calcium sulfate – which exists in several hydrated (water bearing) forms.

“The ChemCam spectra point to a composition very high in calcium. These veins are likely composed of hydrated calcium sulfate, such as bassinite or gypsum, depending on the hydration state,” said ChemCam team member Nicolas Mangold of the Laboratoire de Planétologie et Géodynamique de Nantes in France. “On Earth, forming veins like these requires water circulating in fractures and occur at low to moderate temperatures.”

The newly found veins appear quite similar to analogous veins discovered in late 2011 by NASA’s Opportunity rover – Curiosity’s older sister – inside Endeavour crater and nearly on the opposite side of Mars. See our Opportunity vein mosaic featured at APOD on Dec. 11, 2011 to learn more about veined rocks.

“What these vein fills tell us is water moved and percolated through these rocks, through these fracture networks and then minerals precipitated to form the white material which ChemCam has concluded is very likely a calcium sulfate, probably hydrated in origin,” Grotzinger explained.

“So this is the first time in this mission that we have seen something that is not just an aqueous environment, but one that also results in precipitation of minerals, which is very attractive to us.”

Yellowknife Bay and the ‘John Klein’ drilling area outcrop are chock full of mineral veins and sedimentary concretions.

“When you put all this together it says that basically these rocks were saturated with water. There may be several phases to this history of water, but that’s still to be worked out.”

“This has been really exciting and we can’t wait to start drilling,” Grotzinger emphasized.

Curiosity can drill about 2 inches (5 cm) into rocks. Ultimately a powdered sample about half an aspirin tablet in size will be delivered to SAM and CheMin after a few weeks. All rover systems and instruments are healthy, said Cook.

Grotzinger said that Curiosity will be instructed to drive over the veins to try and break them up and expose fresh surfaces for analysis. Then she will drill directly into a vein and hopefully catch some of the surrounding material as well.

“This will reveal the mineralogy of the vein filling material and how many hydrated mineral phases are present. The main goal is this will give us an assessment of the habitability of this environment.”

As the rover has driven down the shallow depression to deeper stratigraphic layers, the units are older in time.

After the first drill sample is fully analyzed, Grotzinger told me that the team will reevaluate whether to drill into a second rock.

The team doesn’t yet know whether the flowing water from which the veins precipitated was a more neutral pH or more acidic. “It’s too early to tell. We need to drill into the rock to tell and determine the mineralogy,” Grotzinger told me. Neutral water is more hospitable to life.

How long the episodes of water flowed is not yet known and it’s a complex history. But the water was at least hip to ankle deep at times and able to transport and round the gravel.

“There are a broad variety of sedimentary rocks here, transported from elsewhere. Mars was geologically active in this location, which is totally cool !,” said Aileen Yingst, MAHLI deputy principal investigator. ”There are a number of different transport mechanisms in play.”

Image caption: Curiosity’s Traverse into Different Terrain. This image maps the traverse of NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity from “Bradbury Landing” to “Yellowknife Bay,” with an inset documenting a change in the ground’s thermal properties with arrival at a different type of terrain. credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona/CAB(CSIC-INTA)/FMI

Drilling goes to the heart of the mission and will mark a historic feat in planetary exploration – as the first time that an indigenous sample has been cored from the interior of a rock on another planet and subsequently analyzed by chemical spectrometers to determine its elemental composition and determine if organic molecules are present .

The high powered hammering drill is located on the tool turret at the end of the car-sized robots 7 foot (2.1 meter) long mechanical arm . It is the last of Curiosity’s ten instruments that remains to be checked out and put into action.

Curiosity landed on the Red Planet five months ago inside Gale Crater to investigate whether Mars ever offered an environment favorable for microbial life, past or present and is now nearly a quarter of the way through her two year prime mission.

Curiosity might reach the base of Mount Sharp by the end of 2013, which is about 6 miles (10 km) away as the Martian crow flies.

Ken Kremer

Image Caption: Calcium-Rich Veins in Martian Rocks. This graphic shows close-ups of light-toned veins in rocks in the “Yellowknife Bay” area of Mars together with analyses of their composition. The top part of the image shows a close-up of the rock named “Crest,” taken by the remote micro-imager (RMI) on Curiosity’s Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument above the analysis of the elements detected by using ChemCam’s laser to zap the target. The spectral profile of Crest’s light-colored vein is shown in red, while that of a basaltic calibration target of known composition is shown in black. The bottom part of the image shows ChemCam’s close-up of the rock named “Rapitan” with the analysis of its elemental composition. The spectral profile of Rapitan’s light-colored vein is shown in blue, while that of a basaltic calibration target of known composition is shown in black. These results suggest the veins are unlike typical basaltic material. They are depleted in silica and composed of a calcium-bearing mineral. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/IRAP/LPGNantes/CNRS

Image caption: Curiosity will carry out 1st rock drilling at ‘John Klein’ outcrop visible in this time lapse mosaic showing movements of Curiosity rover’s arm on Sol 149 (Jan. 5, 2013) at Yellowknife Bay basin where the rover has found widespread evidence for flowing water. Curiosity discovered hydrated mineral veins and concretions around the rock ledge ahead . She next drove there for contact science near the slithery chain of narrow protruding rocks known as ‘Snake River. Photomosaic stitched from Navcam raw images and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo