NASA Archives

May 14, 2019May 14, 2019 by Matt Williams

NASA Senior Engineer Kobie Boykins talks About Exploring Mars. And I was There to See it!

Kobie Boykins and myself, holding replicas of the wheels used on the Sojourner and Opportunity rover. Credit: Carla Jack

As part of National Geographic Live, Chief Engineer Kobie Boykins of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has been touring the world of late. As part of the program’s goal of having featured speakers share their behind-the-scenes stories, Boykins has been showcasing the accomplishments of NASA’s Mars robotic exploration programs – of which he played a major role.

This week, his tour brought him to my hometown, where he delivered a presentation to a packed house at the Royal Theatre here in of Victoria, BC. Titled “Exploring Mars”, Boykins shared personal stories of what it was like to be an integral part of the team that created the Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity and Mars 2020 rovers. I had the honor of attending the event, and being able to do a little Q&A with him after the show.

May 9, 2019May 9, 2019 by Matt Williams

Prototype of a Future Interstellar Probe was Just Tested on a Balloon

At the University of California, Santa Barbara, researchers with the UCSB Experimental Cosmology Group (ECG) are currently working on ways to achieve the dream of interstellar flight. Under the leadership of Professor Philip Lubin, the group has dedicated a considerable amount of effort towards the creation of an interstellar mission consisting of directed-energy light sail and a wafer-scale spacecraft (WSS) “wafercraft“.

If all goes well, this spacecraft will be able to reach relativistic speeds (a portion of the speed of light) and make it to the nearest star system (Proxima Centauri) within our lifetimes. Recently, the ECG achieved a major milestone by successfully testing a prototype version of their wafercraft (aka. the “StarChip“). This consisted of sending the prototype via balloon into the stratosphere to test its functionality and performance.

May 3, 2019May 3, 2019 by Matt Williams

16 Years of Hubble Images Come Together in this one Picture Containing 265,000 Galaxies

This Hubble Space Telescope image represents the largest, most comprehensive "history book" of galaxies in the universe.The image, a combination of nearly 7,500 separate Hubble exposures, represents 16 years' worth of observations.The ambitious endeavor, called the Hubble Legacy Field, includes several Hubble deep-field surveys, including the eXtreme Deep Field (XDF), the deepest view of the universe. The wavelength range stretches from ultraviolet to near-infrared light, capturing all the features of galaxy assembly over time.The image mosaic presents a wide portrait of the distant universe and contains roughly 265,000 galaxies. They stretch back through 13.3 billion years of time to just 500 million years after the universe's birth in the big bang. The tiny, faint, most distant galaxies in the image are similar to the seedling villages from which today's great galaxy star-cities grew. The faintest and farthest galaxies are just one ten-billionth the brightness of what the human eye can see.The wider view contains 100 times as many galaxies as in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, taken in 2004. The new portrait, a mosaic of multiple snapshots, covers almost the width of the full Moon. Lying in this region is the XDF, which penetrated deeper into space than this legacy field view. However, the XDF field covers less than one-tenth of the full Moon's diameter. Credits: NASA, ESA, G. Illingworth and D. Magee (University of California, Santa Cruz), K. Whitaker (University of Connecticut), R. Bouwens (Leiden University), P. Oesch (University of Geneva) and the Hubble Legacy Field team

Even after almost three decades of faithful service, the Hubble Space Telescope continues to operate and provide breathtaking images of the cosmos. As one of NASA’s Great Observatories, its observations of distant galaxies, exoplanets, and the expansion of the Universe have had a revolutionary impact on astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology.

Hubble’s latest contribution comes in the form of a deep-sky mosaic image that was constructed using 16 years’ worth of observations. Known as the “Hubble Legacy Field“, this mosaic is being described as the largest and most comprehensive “history book” of galaxies. All told, it contains roughly 265,000 galaxies that date back to just 500 million years after the Big Bang.

May 3, 2019May 3, 2019 by Evan Gough

The Global Dust Storm that Ended Opportunity Helped Teach us how Mars Lost its Water

Mars in 2001. On the left, no global dust storm. On the right, global dust storm. Image Credit: By Jim Secosky picked out this NASA image NASA/JPL/MSSS - https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/figures/PIA03170_fig1.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=65809875

The enduring, and maybe endearing, mystery around Mars is what happened to its water? We can say with near-certainty now, thanks to the squad of Mars rovers and orbiters, that Mars was once much wetter. In fact that planet may have had an ocean that covered a third of the surface. But what happened to it all?

As it turns out, the global dust storms that envelop Mars, and in particular the most recent one that felled the Opportunity rover, may offer an explanation.

April 26, 2019April 27, 2019 by Matt Williams

InSight Just Detected its First “Marsquake”

This artist's illustration of InSight on a photo background of Mars shows the lander fully deployed. The solar array is open, and in the foreground two of its instruments are shown. On the left is the SEIS instrument, and on the right is the HP3 probe. Image: NASA/Lockheed Martin

In November of 2018, the NASA Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander set down on Mars. Shortly thereafter, it began preparing for its science operations, which would consist of studying Mars’ seismology and its heat flow for the sake of learning how this planet – and all the other terrestrial planets in the Solar System (like Earth) – formed and evolved over time.

With science operations well-underway, InSight has been “listening” to Mars to see what it can learn about its interior structure and composition. A few weeks ago, mission controllers discovered that the lander’s Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument detected its strongest seismic signal (aka. a “marsquake”) to date. This faint quake could reveal much about the Red Planet and how it came to be.

April 16, 2019April 16, 2019 by Evan Gough

Curiosity has Finally Sampled a Clay-Rich Region on Mars

A mast-cam mosaic image of the so-called "clay-bearing unit". After almost seven years on Mars, MSL Curiosity has finally been able to drill into the clay-rich region. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

It’s hard to believe that MSL Curiosity has been on Mars for almost seven years. But it has, and during that time, the rover has explored Gale Crater and Mt. Sharp, the central peak inside the crater. And while it has used its drill multiple times to take rock samples, this is the first sample it’s gathered from the so-called ‘clay unit.’

April 9, 2019June 17, 2022 by Evan Gough

Metal Asteroid Psyche Might Have Had Volcanoes of Molten Iron

An artist's illustration of a metallic asteroid like Psyche. Image Credit: Elena Hartley/USC — An artist's illustration of a metallic asteroid like Psyche. Credit: Elena Hartley/USC

Imagine a time in the Solar System’s past, when the asteroids were not solid rock, but blobs of molten iron. It sounds strange, but that may have been the case. And in the right conditions, some of those asteroids would have sprouted volcanoes. One of those asteroids, Psyche, is the destination for a NASA mission.

April 3, 2019April 3, 2019 by Evan Gough

Mars Helicopter Completes More Test Flights. It’s Almost Ready to go to Mars

Members of the NASA Mars Helicopter team inspect the flight model (the actual vehicle going to the Red Planet), inside the Space Simulator, a 25-foot-wide (7.62-meter-wide) vacuum chamber at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, on Feb. 1, 2019. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

We’ve known for some time that NASA is sending a helicopter to Mars. The vehicle, called the Mars Helicopter, is undergoing flight testing at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. The little helicopter will make its eventual way to Mars as part of the Mars 2020 Rover mission.

The Mars Helicopter is pretty small, less than 1.8 kg (4 lb). It’s made of lightweight carbon fiber, and other materials like aluminum, silicon, and foil. The version being tested is the actual vehicle that will make the trip to Mars.

March 27, 2019March 28, 2019 by Susie Murph

Weekly Space Hangout: March 27, 2019 – Dr. Amanda Hendrix, Director of NASA’s TREX

Hosts:
Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain)
Dr. Pamela Gay (astronomycast.com / cosmoquest.org / @starstryder)
Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier )
Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org)

Dr. Amanda R. Hendrix is a Senior Scientist with the Planetary Science Institute, based in Boulder.

Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: March 27, 2019 – Dr. Amanda Hendrix, Director of NASA’s TREX”

March 15, 2019March 15, 2019 by Scott Manley

SLS Rocket Promises To Do Better

Artist rendering of SLS Block 1 Rocket. Credit: NASA

A dramatic week in space launcher politics has left NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) with a vastly reduced launch manifesto and casts doubt on the prospects of future upgrades to the massive launch vehicle.

On Monday the White House’s budget request laid out the administration’s plans for NASA’s coming years. For SLS there were three significant changes.