@edgarblythe,
Waiting with bated breath.....
The Mars Exploration Rover “Opportunity” has finally left Greeley Haven, an outcrop titled towards the sun. The rover has been working in that area since December 26th 2011, using spectrometers and a microscopic imager to inspect over a dozen targets within reach while on the outcrop. The rover conducted the tests during the winter months of Mars in order to gain more precise information regarding the planet’s rotation. Iit has moved 12 feet away from the outcrop to the sand just below it.
Now the rover will turn its panoramic camera back to the outcrop in order to take multiple images of the targets that it scanned while on the outcrop. The team controlling the rover will then make sure there’s enough energy now that it rests at a different angle. During the winter months, the rover was angled favourably to catch as much sun as possible.
Matt Golombek, Opportunity team member, details the next steps for the rover: “Our next goal is a few meters farther north on Cape York, at a bright-looking patch of what may be dust. We haven’t been able to see much dust in Meridiani. This could be a chance to learn more about it.” Aside from the dust, the team is hoping to study bedrock in the northern regions of Cape York.
I want to tell you about a special place on the surface of Mars. Back in the solar system's early days, a large object slammed into the red planet, leaving behind a hundred-mile crater -- a dent large enough to withstand three billion years of erosion. The Gale Crater, as the site is known, is almost as wide as Earth's Chicxulub crater, the impact zone of the asteroid that is thought to have killed the dinosaurs. Because Mars orbits close to the solar system's main asteroid belt, it's not unusual to find impact craters there; just recently, a group of geophysicists counted more than 600,000.
But Gale is no ordinary crater. Over eons, thin layers of sediment have accumulated at its center, forming a lumpy, striated mountain that towers three miles high, so high that its peak crests above the lip of the crater. The mountain's rocky layers make up a geologic time capsule, a fine-grained record of Martian history that stretches back more than a billion years. If we could examine those layers up close, we could look deep into the Martian past, perhaps deep enough to see what the planet was like when it had an atmosphere and liquid water.
And we recently sent a super-futuristic robot there to do just that.
On its way to the Gale Crater, right now, is NASA's Curiosity rover, the most sophisticated robot in the history of space science: a dune buggy equipped with a set of tools and instruments to shame Inspector Gadget. Curiosity can vaporize rock, analyze soil samples, gauge the weather, and film in HD. It's due to touch down in the Gale Crater on August 5, completing an eight-month journey through the local solar system. Once it lands, the rover will begin a slow ascent up Aeolis Mons, the mountain in the crater's center, probing its layers for signs that Mars once supported life. It will also collect new data about the surface of Mars, which NASA will use to determine the feasibility of future manned missions there.
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/07/the-robot-of-the-future-thats-about-to-explore-the-deep-past-of-mars/258976/
rest of article
NASA says the countdown for Curiosity's August landing on Mars has begun and that everything is on track for the space agency's rover.
A dust storm on Mars and a minor wobble in the spacecraft's trajectory have given scientists something to think about, but leaders of NASA's Curiosity mission said Thursday that they are on track for a Sunday landing — the delivery of the largest and most ambitious machine ever sent to another planet.
"Things are almost too quiet," Pete Theisinger, the mission's project manager, said Thursday at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge as Curiosity barreled toward Mars at 7,987 mph. "I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop."
Curiosity, a roving lab that will scour Mars for the ingredients of life, is scheduled to land at 10:31 PDT Sunday in an ancient geological feature known as the Gale Crater. It is a complex operation. At 1,982 pounds, Curiosity is five times heavier than previous Mars rovers. Its landing requires a dizzying sequence of pyrotechnics and on-the-fly adjustment, all done automatically because Mars is 154 million miles distant, too far for the swift communication needed to guide the landing from Earth.
At a briefing Thursday, scientists said satellites had discovered a dust storm swirling south of Gale Crater. Earlier this week, the storm was more than 600 miles from Curiosity's landing site but large enough that it could kick up a pesky cloud of dust.
In theory, that could affect the accuracy of Curiosity's landing mechanism, but scientists said the craft had been engineered to guard against nasty weather and that storms like this are common and typically dissipate in a day or two. To pose a real threat, Theisinger said, "it would have to be the great-grandmother of all dust storms."
Scientists also determined in recent weeks that Curiosity was on course to hit the Martian atmosphere about 13 miles east of the optimal "entry point." Last weekend, they conducted a routine trajectory correction — a "burn," in pop-science parlance. The operation was a success, but imperfect. The spacecraft's new trajectory will send it into the Martian atmosphere at a point roughly 3,000 feet from where scientists had planned after the correction.
However, Curiosity's landing target is an ellipse of land 12 miles wide, allowing for considerable wiggle room. What's more, the craft has been equipped with a self-correcting navigation system called "guided entry" — thrusters that can correct miles' worth of error in trajectory.
Adam Steltzner, a leader of the JPL team overseeing the spacecraft's landing, said an error of just 3,000 feet could easily be "flown out" — absorbed by the sophisticated navigation system. Scientists have two other opportunities for corrective "burns," but said it was unlikely they would use them.
"We are doing everything we can to make sure that we are going to the right place," said Tomas Martin-Mur, the mission's navigation team chief. "I am confident that we will get there and get there safely."
Also Thursday, scientists revealed that Curiosity has already delivered results, even before it lands.
Curiosity's instruments are expected to yield a new understanding of Mars' history and environment. The mission's impact doesn't end there, however. Curiosity is also expected to pave the way for future Mars missions, including the first human exploration. President Obama has set a goal of sending an astronaut to Mars by the 2030s.
That would be no small matter. Rather than the three days it took to reach the moon, an astronaut would endure a nine-month trip there and then another one to get home. Scientists are still trying to understand how they might guard against radiation astronauts would encounter. It's a critical issue. Carrying a proper radiation shield would be both vital and burdensome.
Curiosity was equipped with a device, known as RAD, to measure radiation once the craft arrives. Mars, because of its thin atmosphere and weak magnetic field, lacks the ability to repel or absorb radiation, a trait that could have affected the planet's ability to foster life.
About a year ago, scientists realized they could turn RAD on early, that they didn't need to wait for Curiosity to get to Mars. The instrument was turned on 10 days after launch and was active for most of the spacecraft's 81/2-month journey to Mars. It has already sent home a significant amount of data.
RAD measured radiation encountered by Curiosity along the way, both outside the craft and inside, where an astronaut would be housed during a human-exploration "cruise."
Though scientists are still digesting the data, early indications are that radiation outside the spacecraft carrying Curiosity was perhaps 100 times higher than inside the craft. Still, levels inside might have been a full fifth of the amount of radiation that NASA allows its astronauts to face over the course of their career — "not a full, lifetime dose, but not insignificant," said Don Hassler, RAD's principal investigator. A better understanding of deep-space radiation could help determine everything from spacecraft construction to when a human-exploration mission might launch to limit an astronaut's exposure.
@edgarblythe,
That thing looks suspiciously like "JOHNY FIVE"
@edgarblythe,
Without knowing if and what kind of atmosphere Mars has, it's almost impossible to plan ahead for its landing of any craft.
How much propulsion pressure is needed is the 64 thousand dollar q.
@cicerone imposter,
Hear about the restaurnt on the moon?
The food is great but its got zero atmosphere
@farmerman,
A little wine should cure that!
They say it is on course, with no known problems. I am cautiously optimistic.
@edgarblythe,
"No known problems" is good news. This had better work, because "we" spent some 2.5 billion on this project.
@edgarblythe,
"No known problems" is good news. This had better work, because "we" spent some 2.5 billion on this project.
2 billion here, two billion there. It all adds up.
I have to get my sleep, since tomorrow is a work day. I hope to wake up to good news.
Touchdown confirmed via NASA-TV.
