Rovers on Mars

The one Rover is still finding the minerals that are water deposited. Im amazed at how the damn things are still alive. I heard that the other Rover is in an earth directed "coma" to preserve the electrical system after the winter is over and the solar panels can charge the batteries. Ill bet the next rovers will have little soft kolinsky sable wiper brushes to clean the solar panels like a windshield wiper.

I had windshield wipers on my mind watching that last youtube video.

windshield brushes. Brushes made out of the softest baby ass sable hair. Its the same hair they use on finest watercolor brushes. We have them make up little wipers that look more like eyelashes than wipers. I think that a rubby type wiper would just scratxh the solar panels.

I knew they would not put Ford wipers on there. I even envisioned some sort of fan instead of a wiper. But I knew they would figure it out. I don't see how the extra expended energy would be too much for the system when it helps keep the batteries strong.

I posted this on another thread, but I think I'll repeat it here...

Despite the success of the Mars Rovers, I think it's important to remember that it would have taken a geologist in a space suit mere moments to gather the same info that it took the rovers months to gather. In addition, a human on the surface can actively select more interesting things to investigate. The rovers can't do that even with humans a million miles away looking through their robotic eyes.

The rovers have been on Mars for several years now, but the distances they have covered and the things they've discovered could have been done by a human in a mars-buggy in less than a week. Robots will get better over time, and they are definitely cheaper to send, but there is no comparison between them and humans when it comes to how much can be discovered in a smaller amount of time.

A human being can actively, creatively, interactively, and experientially *explore* an area. But a remotely operated vehicle can only report data. There is a world of difference. A Whole World in this case.

Despite anything else I have said, I would volunteer for a mission to Mars, were it even a remote possibility I would be chosen.

You're a brave man Edgar, I don't think I would do that. But I've got a 1yr old that I want to see grow up

My kids are as grown as they are going to get. My wife tolerates my idiosyncrasies. I know it's unrealistic, but I really would take the chance.

I believe you. I would be tempted for sure, but I would have to decline. I think you would make a very fine two-legged Mars Rover

What I lack is the scientific background to be any real help.

While I'm sure they would be extremely selective in who they send to Mars and none of us would quality, the basic point I was making a few posts back is that despite the success of the rovers, human beings, even average every-day human beings, are still phenomenally more effective as "explorers" than robots are (assuming you can keep the human alive long enough to explore and report).

There are also esoteric qualities of exploration and experience that robots can't provide no matter how much time you give them. How many of us have stood on the ground and SEEN the Grand Canyon, or the full Moon on the horizon, or a Total Solar Eclipse, versus seeing those things in pictures. There are some things that pictures simply don't capture.

Exploratory robots are a good thing and an interesting mechanism to assist in human exploration, but they can't (and probably never will) replace human exploration. At least I hope they won't.

I know you are right. After seeing magazine reproductions of Turner's paintings, I actually got to see one one for real. I was not ready for such beautiful work. I am ready for the robots, primarily because I am growing old. I don't expect to see the day humans land there.

Who's Turner? What paintings?

JMW Turner
It was not this same painting I'm posting. I don't recall the name of it. I wasted a lifetime of opportunities to visit art museums and the like and that is why the experience is so exceptional for me.

Turner's waves are always mesmerizing. They're like glass.

The Mars rover known as Opportunity has caught a glimpse of the Endeavour crater and is now less than a football field's distance away from the rim.

Reaching the rim of Endeavour has been a long-term goal of the Mars rover team since August 2008, when Opportunity left the Victoria crater, which it had been exploring for two years. Endeavour, however, is more than 25 times wider than Victoria at 14 miles in diameter. Opportunity is scheduled to arrive at a section of the crater's rim known as "Spirit Point" on the western side of Endeavour in the coming days.

"Observations by orbiting spacecraft indicate that the ridges along Endeavour's western rim expose rock outcrops older than any Opportunity has seen so far," NASA said.

Opportunity and its now defunct sibling, Spirit, completed a scheduled, three-month tour of Mars in August 2004 but have remained on the Red Planet for years in a series of bonus missions. Both vehicles have made important discoveries about wet environments on ancient Mars that might have supported microbial life. Spirit, however, did not survive its last Martian winter; it last communicated with the rover team on March 22, 2010 after driving 4.8 miles, more than 12 times its original goal.


Now, after a 13.45-mile journey, Opportunity is approaching its latest target. Why did it take so long? NASA said the drive included an autonomous hazard detection portion during which the rover paused at intervals to check for obstacles before proceeding.

"Autonomous hazard detection has added a significant portion of the driving distance over the past few months. It lets us squeeze 10 to 15 percent more distance into each drive," Alfonso Herrera, a rover mission manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement.

Another technique to extend the life of Opportunity is driving backwards, which preserves the life of a motor in a right-front wheel that sometimes draws more current than the other five wheels' drive motors.

"Opportunity has an arthritic shoulder joint on her robotic arm and is a little lame in the right front wheel, but she is otherwise doing remarkably well after seven years on Mars, more like 70 in 'rover years,'" Bill Nelson, chief of the mission's engineering team, said last month. "The elevated right front wheel current is a concern, but a combination of heating and backwards driving has kept it in check over the past 2,000-plus sols," or Martian days.

Earlier this month, data gathered from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) suggested the possibility of flowing water on the Red Planet during the warmest months of the year. Also this month, Elon Musk, CEO of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) discussed his dream of colonies on Mars and other planets. "Ultimately, the thing that is super important in the grand scale of history is—are we on a path to becoming a multi-planet species or not? If we’re not, that’s not a very bright future. We’ll just be hanging out on Earth until some eventual calamity claims

With a diameter of 14 miles, Endeavour is expected to hold rocks and terrain that are distinct from anything the rovers have seen as of yet. Scientists have been eager to study the crater, which seems to hold clay minerals that NASA says "may have formed in an early warmer and wetter period."

Explaining why Endeavour's rocks are different, Mars Exploration Rover science team member Matthew Golombek says, "Clay minerals form in wet conditions, so we may learn about a potentially habitable environment that appears to have been very different from those responsible for the rocks comprising the plains."

You've already gotten the news out! here's a link

http://roadtoendeavour.wordpress.com/2011/08/10/landfall/

Thanks for the update Edgar.

Oh what I wouldn't give to have it find unambiguous fossils of some kind of ancient life... the world would seem new again.

I'm as excited as the day they landed. Hope it finds something special out there.