Posted on by Jenny Winder

Sir Bernard Lovell, 1913 to 2012

Caption: Sir Bernard Lovell. Credit: Jodrell Bank, University of Manchester

Sir Bernard Lovell OBE FRS, Emeritus Professor of Radio Astronomy, died yesterday, 6th August 2012 at the age of 98. He was the founder and first Director of The University of Manchester’s Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire from 1945 to 1980.

Bernard Lovell was born in Gloucestershire on 31 August, 1913 and studied Physics at The University of Bristol, gaining his PhD in 1936. He then went to work at The University of Manchester researching cosmic rays. This work was interrupted during World War II when he worked in Telecommunications, leading the team that developed H2S radar for which he was awarded the OBE in 1946. He then returned to The University of Manchester. During his research he showed that radar echoes could be obtained from daytime meteor showers as they entered the Earth’s atmosphere and ionised the surrounding air.

He moved his research out to the university’s botany site at Jodrell Bank in late 1945 to avoid background interference from the Electric trams in Manchester. Here he worked with engineer Sir Charles Husband to construct the 76-metre Lovell Telescope, the largest steerable radio telescope in the world at the time, and still the third largest. The iconic telescope was completed in 1957 and within days it tracked the rocket that carried Sputnik 1 into orbit. Today the telescope is part of the e-MERLIN array of seven radio telescopes spread across the UK and European VLBI Network interferometric arrays of radio telescopes. Later this year the international headquarters of The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) the world’s largest telescope will move to Jodrell Bank.

Sir Bernard wrote many books about Jodrell Bank and astronomy, including ‘The Story of Jodrell Bank’ published in 1968. He was knighted for his contribution to the development of radio astronomy in 1961 and in 1981 was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society.

In 2009 Lovell claimed that during the cold war, when Jodrell Bank was being used as part of an early warning system for nuclear attacks, the Soviets allegedly tried to kill him with a lethal radiation dose. Lovell wrote a full account of the incident with instructions that it be published after his death.

Away from science he was also an accomplished musician, playing the church organ, a keen cricketer and a renowned arboriculturist. He is survived by four of his five children, fourteen grandchildren and fourteen great-grandchildren.

The University of Manchester paid tribute to him saying “Sir Bernard’s legacy is immense, extending from his wartime work to his pioneering contributions to radio astronomy and including his dedication to education and public engagement with scientific research. A great man, he will be sorely missed.”

A book of condolence has been opened at the observatory’s Discovery Centre and online.

Read more here

Posted on by Ken Kremer

Curiosity’s Dramatic MARDI Descent Movie

Image Caption: Curiosity Heat shield falls away from the bottom of Curiosity and the Sky Crane descent stage in this image from the MARDI camera.
Watch the video below. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS

As NASA’s Curiosity Mars Science Lab (MSL) was in the final stages of her flawless but harrowing decent to Gale Crater on Mars overnight (Aug. 5/6) employing the never-before-used rocket powered sky crane descent stage, dramatic movie-like imagery of the plunge was being recorded by MARDI, the Mars Descent Imager camera positioned on the belly of the rover and pointed downwards.

The first low resolution MARDI images and video (above and below) were beamed back to Earth just hours after landing and clearly show the jettisoning of the heat shield moments after it sprung loose to expose Curiosity and MARDI for landing.

“We see the heat shield falling away about 2 minutes and 30 seconds from touchdown,” said Mike Malin, MARDI Principal Investigator from Malin Space Systems at a post-landing news briefing today (Aug. 6). “The heat shield is about 16 meters (50 ft) away in the image and 4.5 m (15 ft) across.”

“I’m very excited to be at Gale Crater”.

“So far we have received about 297 thumbnail images (192 x 144 pixels) so far and created a stop motion video. MADRI was collecting images at 4 frames per second. In the final frames you can see dust being kicked up the rocket engines.”
Curiosity landed at 1:32 on Aug. 6, EDT (11:32 p.m. Aug. 5, PDT), near the foot of a mountain three miles(5 km) tall inside Gale Crater, 96 miles (154 km) in diameter.

Video Caption: The Curiosity Mars Descent Imager (MARDI) captured the rover’s descent to the surface of the Red Planet. The instrument shot 4 fps video from heatshield separation to the ground. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS

“The image sequence received so far indicates Curiosity had, as expected, a very exciting ride to the surface,” said Mike Malin, imaging scientist for the Mars Science Lab mission from Malin Space Systems in San Diego. “But as dramatic as they are, there is real other-world importance to obtaining them. These images will help the mission scientists interpret the rover’s surroundings, the rover drivers in planning for future drives across the surface, as well as assist engineers in their design of forthcoming landing systems for Mars or other worlds.”

“A good comparison is to that grainy onboard film from Apollo 11 when they were about to land on the moon,” said Malin.

Over 1500 hundred more low and high resolution MARDI images (1600 x 1200 pixels) will be sent back over the next few weeks to make a full frame animation and will provide the most complete and dramatic imagery of a planetary landing in the history of exploration.

The team has been able to determine Curiosity’s location to “within” about 1 meter says Malin, by matching the MARDI and MRO HiRISE images as well as the Hazcam images.

“So far the rover is healthy and we are ecstatic with its performance,” said Jennifer Trospher, MSL mission manager

The next steps are to deploy the high gain antenna (HGA), raise the mast with the higher resolution cameras and continue to check out the mechanical and electrical systems as well the science instruments as the rover is transitioned to surface operations mode.

Ken Kremer

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Huge Solar Filament Stretches Across the Sun

Caption: High resolution full disc hydrogen alpha composite of the Sun on August 5, 2012, comprising of 6 images for the disc and 5 images for the prominences.Credit: Paul Andrew on Flickr.

The Sun wanted to let us know there was action going on in other places in the Solar System besides Mars. A huge, dark-colored filament stretched across nearly half the solar face on August 5th. Estimates are this filament was about 800,000 km in length! Wow! Paul Andrew took six images to create a composite, full image of the Sun, and below is an 11-panel mosaic by Leonard Mercer from Malta to show the surrounding region with the main sunspots 1535, 1538, 1540 present.


Caption: Credit: 11 images combined to create this view of a large filament on the Sun. Credit: Leonard Mercer.

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Curiosity’s Awesome Landing “Trailer”

MSL Curiosity is busy investigating the surface of Mars, to see if that planet could have harbored life. Image: NASA/JPL/Cal-Tech
MSL Curiosity is busy investigating the surface of Mars, to see if that planet could have harbored life. Image: NASA/JPL/Cal-Tech

This short compilation video is a great overview of all the action on landing night for the Curiosity rover: Suspense, intrigue and definitely a happy ending. Only this “made for movie theater”-like trailer really happened.

UPDATE: We’ve gotten comments and questions that some people can’t see the video above, so we’ve added the You Tube version, below.
Continue reading “Curiosity’s Awesome Landing “Trailer””

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

“Nailed It!” HiRISE Captures Incredible Image of Curiosity’s Descent to Mars

The HiRISE team has outdone themselves this time. Using their incredible instrument, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, they have captured an absolutely amazing image of the Curiosity rover, descending on a parachute through Mars’ atmosphere.

“Nailed it!” Tweeted Christian Schaller of the HiRISE team. “My goodness, @MarsCuriosity you look pretty.”

Wow!

Full image below.

Link to original image (2.7 MB)

Schaller told Universe Today that the MSL Navigation team, the MRO Navigation team and the MRO FET (flight engineering team) “seriously rock. Seriously.”

The planning by those teams made this image possible.

Schaller is the software developer responsible for the primary planning tools the MRO and HiRISE targeting specialists and science team members use to plan their images.

“The Mars background looks a little blurry or smeared because we set up the timing to capture Curiosity, not the Martian surface,” Schaller said via email after the image was released at the press conference from JPL on Monday morning.

The image was set up so that as MSL was descending, MRO “slewed” the HiRISE field of view across the expected descent path. But obviously, MRO didn’t have to slew too much. “We were almost directly overhead, and had a very, very small angle to take the image,” said HiRISE team member Sarah Malkovich at the press conference. “MRO was essentially overhead.”

HiRISE Principal Investigator Alfred McEwen said before the landing that they expected only a 60% chance of success.

McEwen wrote the HiRISE website of the image:

The parachute appears fully inflated and performing perfectly. Details in the parachute such as the band gap at the edges and the central hole are clearly visible. The cords connecting the parachute to the backshell cannot be seen, although they were seen in the image of Phoenix descending, perhaps due to the difference in lighting angles.

The bright spot on the backshell containing MSL might be a specular reflection off of a shiny area. MSL was released from the backshell sometime after this image was acquired.

This view is one product from an observation made by HiRISE targeted to the expected location of MSL about 1 minute prior to landing. It was captured in HiRISE CCD RED1, near the eastern edge of the swath width (there is a RED0 at the very edge). This means that MSL was a bit further east or downrange than predicted.

The image scale is 33.6 cm/pixel.

MRO was 340 km away from Curiosity when the image was taken, and that is line of sight distance, said Malkovich. “HiRISE has taken over 120 pictures of Gale Crater in preparation for MSL’s mission, but I think this is the coolest one,” she said.

McEwen said more details and image products will be available and we will post them as soon as they are available.

This animation shows how HiRISE planned to capture MSL’s descent:

Malkovich said that the HiRISE team already has plans to take images of Curiosity sitting on the surface of Mars later this week that will be of higher resolution than the descent image.

Posted on by Ken Kremer

President Obama Hails NASA Curiosity rover landing on Mars

Image Caption: Landing ellipse for Curiosity rover inside Gale Crater at the foot of Mount Sharp on Mars and will attempt to climb the mountain later in the mission. Credit: NASA

US President Barack Obama hailed the spectacular landing success of NASA’s Curiosity rover on Aug. 6 inside Gale Crater and eagerly awaits the discoveries to come. More accolades for Curiosity and the rover team are pouring in from all across the globe.

The White House issued the following statement:

Statement by the President on Curiosity Landing on Mars

“Tonight, on the planet Mars, the United States of America made history.

The successful landing of Curiosity – the most sophisticated roving laboratory ever to land on another planet – marks an unprecedented feat of technology that will stand as a point of national pride far into the future. It proves that even the longest of odds are no match for our unique blend of ingenuity and determination.

Tonight’s success, delivered by NASA, parallels our major steps forward towards a vision for a new partnership with American companies to send American astronauts into space on American spacecraft. That partnership will save taxpayer dollars while allowing NASA to do what it has always done best – push the very boundaries of human knowledge. And tonight’s success reminds us that our preeminence – not just in space, but here on Earth – depends on continuing to invest wisely in the innovation, technology, and basic research that has always made our economy the envy of the world.

I congratulate and thank all the men and women of NASA who made this remarkable accomplishment a reality – and I eagerly await what Curiosity has yet to discover.”

The 1 ton Mini Cooper sized robot geologist and roving chemistry lab is seeking the signs of life on Mars and is loaded with 165 pounds of the most sophisticated science instruments ever delivered to the surface of the Red Planet.

During a two-year prime mission, Curiosity the rover will investigate whether the region has ever offered conditions favorable for microbial life, and search for organic molecules – the chemical ingredients for life.

Ken Kremer

Posted on by Ken Kremer

Long Live American Curiosity – Now We Start Exploring Mars

Image Caption: This image shows one of the first views from NASA’s Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of Aug. 5 PDT (early morning hours Aug. 6 EDT). It was taken through a “fisheye” wide-angle lens on one of the rover’s Hazard-Avoidance cameras. These engineering cameras are located at the rover’s base. As planned, the early images are lower resolution. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

“Welcome to Mars,” said Charles Elachi, Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., following the dramatic and successful touchdown of Curiosity on the Red Planet at 1:32 AM EDT Aug. 6 (10:32 PM Aug 5). “Tonight was a great drama. We did the landing. Tomorrow we start exploring Mars and make new discoveries every day. Our Curiosity has no limits and we will explore the solar system.”

Tumultuous and long lasting jubilation erupted at Mission Control at JPL when the spectacular pinpoint landing success was announced and continued during the post landing news briefing at JPL.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars Science Lab (MSL) safely survived the harrowing plunge and nail biting descent through the Martian atmosphere known as the “7 minutes of Terror”. After hitting the thin atmosphere at 13,200 MPH (5,900 m/s), the robot perfectly executed the unprecedented entry, descent and landing (EDL) sequence utilizing a rocket powered guided descent, supersonic parachutes and then culminating in the never before tried “sky crane maneuver” and helicopter-like touch down at 0 MPH barely 7 minutes later.

Curiosity landed near the foot of a layered mountain three miles (5 km) tall and 96 miles(154 km) in diameter inside Gale Crater which may once have contained a lake. She relayed a few initial thumbnail pictures within minutes after touchdown via NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter.

Larger images showing the Gale crater rim were sent back during the 2nd Odyssey over flight about 2 hours later. Many higher resolution images will be transmitted back to Earth in the coming days including the first 360 degree panorama.

“Curiosity’s landing site is beginning to come into focus,” said John Grotzinger, project manager of NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory mission, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. “In the image (above), we are looking to the northwest. What you see on the horizon is the rim of Gale Crater. In the foreground, you can see a gravel field. The question is, where does this gravel come from? It is the first of what will be many scientific questions to come from our new home on Mars.”


Image Caption: Cheers for Curiosity – Engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., celebrate the landing of NASA’s Curiosity rover on the Red Planet. The rover touched down on Mars the evening of Aug. 5 PDT (morning of Aug. 6 EDT). Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

“Long live American Curiosity”, said John Holdren, science advisor to President Obama. “Today on Mars, history was made on Earth. It will stand as an American point of pride far in the future. I want to congratulate the team on behalf of President Obama. Landing Curiosity was the most challenging mission ever attempted in robotic planetary exploration. This 1 ton automobile sized piece of American ingenuity on Mars should put to rest any doubts about American space leadership. Even the longest odds are no match for our gutsy determination.”

Curiosity traveled for over 8 months and more than 352-million-mile (567-million-kilometer) to arrive at Mars since launching from Earth in Nov. 2011.

“Today, the wheels of Curiosity have begun to blaze the trail for human footprints on Mars. Curiosity, the most sophisticated rover ever built, is now on the surface of the Red Planet, where it will seek to answer age-old questions about whether life ever existed on Mars — or if the planet can sustain life in the future,” said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden.

“This is an amazing achievement, made possible by a team of scientists and engineers from around the world and led by the extraordinary men and women of NASA and our Jet Propulsion Laboratory. President Obama has laid out a bold vision for sending humans to Mars in the mid-2030’s, and today’s landing marks a significant step toward achieving this goal.”

“What a fantastic demonstration of what our nation can accomplish. Thank you team. I am so proud of you. And what an inspiration to our young people. Nothing is harder than landing on Mars. Our leadership will make this world better.”

Curiosity is a 10 foot long (3 m) car-sized robotic geologist. The 1 ton behemoth is a roving chemistry lab with 10 state-of-the-art science instruments that will collect and analyze soil and rock samples and zap rocks from a distance with a laser to search for carbon in the form of organic molecules – the building blocks of life.

Image Caption: Gale Crater landing site for Curiosity beside layered Martian mountain with landing ellipse. Credit: NASA

“On behalf of the 400 members of the science team we thank everybody involved in this enterprise the landing team,” said John Grotzinger, the MSL Project Scientist of the California Institute of Technology. “There is no greater inspiration to school kids than going to Mars. The cost of MSL for each American is the cost of a movie. That’s a movie I want to see.”

During a 2 year prime mission, she will search for evidence of habitats that could preserve signs of Martian microbial life. She will rove the crater floor seeking evidence of water related phyllosilicates and sulfates and eventually climb up the nearby mountain, nicknamed Mount Sharp.

Ken Kremer

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Watch the Nail-biting 7 Minutes of Terror in JPL’s Mission Control

Live through the tense moments of waiting to find out if the Curiosity rover made it safely to Mars’ surface and the joy and elation of six more wheels on Mars.

UPDATE: Shortly after we posted this NASA video late last night/early this morning of the events that took place in JPL’s mission Control, it was taken down in due to a copyright claim by Scripps Local News. As you can see in the comments below, everyone was wondering how public domain footage from NASA could be copyrighted. Motherboard and Gizmodo uncovered what actually happened in Scripps’ “zealous takedown spree,” wrote Gizmodo. “They have a history of this sort of thing. The video has since gone back up, but it stands a particular egregious example of the way YouTube’s Content ID system allows third parties to shoot first and ask questions later when it comes to takedowns.” Read more about it at those two links.

And thanks to Raam Dev who supplied a back-up version of the events that we could post in the interim. His video is below.

Continue reading “Watch the Nail-biting 7 Minutes of Terror in JPL’s Mission Control”

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Welcome to Mars! Curiosity Rover Lands Successfully!

“Touchdown confirmed. We’re safe on Mars!” announced mission control from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory after the Mars Science Laboratory’s Curiosity rover landed safely on the Red Planet. After blazing through Mars’ atmosphere at over 21,000 km/h, Curiosity’s unique landing system worked perfectly through the challenging entry, descent, and landing, allowing the rover to touch down and take pictures shortly after. Above are the first two images from Curiosity’s view of Mars’ Gale Crater. The image on the left shows Curiosity’s shadow on Mars.

Pandemonium erupted in JPL’s mission control, across Twitter and other social media outlets as the touchdown was confirmed. With the landing, the Curiosity rover successfully made its eight-month voyage across 560 million-kilometer (352 million miles) to reach Mars, landing on Mars’ surface using a supersonic parachute and a jet-powered sky-crane. Curiosity now begins an ambitious two-year mission to search for signs of past or even present habitability on Mars.


NASA will be posting more of the first images taken by Curiosity at: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/ (Currently the website is being over-run with visitors and may load very slowly).

After years of planning, setbacks, and ups and downs for the Mars Science Laboratory, the teams of scientists and engineers were able to celebrate with shouts, tears, and lots of hugs following the confirmation of the landing. At about 05:32 UTC on Aug. 6 (10:32 p.m. PDT Aug. 5) Curiosity became the largest robotic rover ever to touch down on another planet.

“It’s just absolutely incredible, and it’s a huge day for the American people,” said NASA administrator Charles Bolden on NASA TV. “Everybody in the morning should be sticking their chest out and saying that’s my rover on Mars because it belongs to everyone.”

During its planned two-year prime mission, Curiosity will explore Gale Crater by roving, drilling, collecting samples, taking oodles of pictures and shooting its laser at rocks to determine the chemical make-up of this enticing region on Mars. In particular, the probe will search for organic carbon that might indicate fossilized life forms. It will also be “sniffing” the air on Mars, trying to smell if gasses like methane — which could be a sign of life — are present.

“Congratulations and long live American Curiosity!” said John Holdren, the senior advisor to President Barack Obama on science and technology, speaking at a post-landing press conference. “The Seven Minutes of Terror has turned into the Seven Minutes of Triumph. My immense joy in the success of this mission is matched only by overwhelming pride I feel for the women and men of the mission’s team.”

JPL Director Charles Elachi quoted Teddy Roosevelt: “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat,” he said, “and tonight, we have experienced victory.”

Curiosity carries 10 science instruments with a total mass 15 times as large as the science payloads on the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity. Some of the tools are the first of their kind on Mars, such as a laser-firing instrument for checking elemental composition of rocks from a distance. The rover will use a drill and scoop at the end of its robotic arm to gather soil and powdered samples of rock interiors, then sieve and parcel out these samples into analytical laboratory instruments inside the rover.

To handle this science toolkit, Curiosity is twice as long and five times as heavy as Spirit or Opportunity. The Gale Crater landing site places the rover within driving distance of layers of the crater’s interior mountain. Observations from orbit have identified clay and sulfate minerals in the lower layers, indicating a wet history.

“That great things take many people working together to make them happen is one of the fantastic things of human existence,” said Adam Steltzner, who led the Entry Descent and Landing team. “There is a new picture of a new place on Mars. That is, for me, the big payoff.”

“There are many who say that NASA has lost its way,” said John Grunsfeld, the head of NASA’s Science Directorate. “I think its fair to say that NASA knows how to explore, we’ve been exploring, and tonight we can say, again, we are on Mars. The Curiosity story is just beginning.”

If you missed the excitement or want to relive it again, here’s our Virtual Landing Party, a 3+ hour Google+ Hangout on Air: