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Mars Rock Touched by NASA Curiosity Has Surprises
ScienceDaily (Oct. 12, 2012) — The first Martian rock NASA’s Curiosity rover has reached out to touch presents a more varied composition than expected from previous missions. The rock also resembles some unusual rocks from Earth’s interior.
The rover team used two instruments on Curiosity to study the chemical makeup of the football-size rock called “Jake Matijevic” (matt-EE-oh-vick). The results support some surprising recent measurements and provide an example of why identifying rocks’ composition is such a major emphasis of the mission. Rock compositions tell stories about unseen environments and planetary processes.
“This rock is a close match in chemical composition to an unusual but well-known type of igneous rock found in many volcanic provinces on Earth,” said Edward Stolper of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, who is a Curiosity co-investigator. “With only one Martian rock of this type, it is difficult to know whether the same processes were involved, but it is a reasonable place to start thinking about its origin.”
Mars rover Curiosity scoops, detects bright object
Mars rover Curiosity finds evidence of ancient fast-moving streams on surface of red planet
The Nasa rover Curiosity has beamed pictures back from the red planet that appear to show the remnants of an ancient stream which once ‘ran vigorously’ on the surface of Mars.
The discovery of bedrock and pebbles, which appear to indicate there was once fast moving water on the planet, was described by the mission’s chief scientist as ‘exciting’.
Pebbles, that appear to have been rounded off by water, have offered the most convincing evidence yet that there was water on the surface of Mars.
NASA Mars Rover Opportunity Reveals Geological Mystery: Spherical Objects Unlike Previously Found ‘Blueberries’
ScienceDaily (Sep. 14, 2012) — NASA’s long-lived rover Opportunity has returned an image of the Martian surface that is puzzling researchers.
Spherical objects concentrated at an outcrop Opportunity reached last week differ in several ways from iron-rich spherules nicknamed “blueberries” the rover found at its landing site in early 2004 and at many other locations to date.
Opportunity is investigating an outcrop called Kirkwood in the Cape York segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater. The spheres measure as much as one-eighth of an inch (3 millimeters) in diameter. The analysis is still preliminary, but it indicates that these spheres do not have the high iron content of Martian blueberries.
“This is one of the most extraordinary pictures from the whole mission,” said Opportunity’s principal investigator, Steve Squyres of Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. “Kirkwood is chock full of a dense accumulation of these small spherical objects. Of course, we immediately thought of the blueberries, but this is something different. We never have seen such a dense accumulation of spherules in a rock outcrop on Mars.”
Read more: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/09/120914154003.htm
Stunning Mars Photo Shows Curiosity Rover’s Tracks from Space
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| Tracks from the first drives of NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity are visible in this image captured by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The rover is seen where the tracks end. The image’s color has been enhanced to show the surface details better. Image released Sept. 6, 2012. CREDIT: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona NASA’s newest Mars rover Curiosity is taking its first tentative drives across the Martian surface and leaving tracks that have been spotted all the way from space in a spectacular photo snapped by an orbiting spacecraft. The newview of Curiosity’s tracks from space was captured by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and released today (Sept. 6). It shows the rover as a bright, boxy vehicle at the end of two tracks that create a single zig-zag pattern in the Martian surface. Read more: http://www.space.com/17485-amazing-mars-photos-curiosity-rover-space.html |
NASA Rover Returns Voice, Telephoto Views From Mars
August 28, 2012
A chapter of the layered geological history of Mars is laid bare in this postcard from NASA’s Curiosity rover. The image shows the base of Mount Sharp, the rover’s eventual science destination. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
PASADENA, Calif. — NASA’s Mars Curiosity has debuted the first recorded human voice that traveled from Earth to another planet and back.
In spoken words radioed to the rover on Mars and back to NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN) on Earth, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden noted the difficulty of landing a rover on Mars, congratulated NASA employees and the agency’s commercial and government partners on the successful landing of Curiosity earlier this month, and said curiosity is what drives humans to explore.
“The knowledge we hope to gain from our observation and analysis of Gale Crater will tell us much about the possibility of life on Mars as well as the past and future possibilities for our own planet. Curiosity will bring benefits to Earth and inspire a new generation of scientists and explorers, as it prepares the way for a human mission in the not too distant future,” Bolden said in the recorded message.
The voice playback was released along with new telephoto camera views of the varied Martian landscape during a news conference today at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Read more: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/news/msl20120827.html
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Curiosity landing video assembled from high-res images (video)
Nasa’s Curiosity Mars rover seen in new satellite image
By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent
The MRO image shows the terrain around the rover (double blue/white dot) at its landing site within Gale Crater on Mars. The blue fans either side are rocket blast marks in the ground
Nasa has used its high-resolution imaging satellite at the Red Planet to look down on the Curiosity rover and acquire a new picture of the recently landed six-wheeled robot.
The vehicle appears as a double dot.
The view from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has been colour enhanced to emphasise certain ground features.
These include the disturbance in the soil made either side of the vehicle by the rocket powered crane that lowered Curiosity into Gale Crater a week ago.
“We can clearly see Curiosity – it’s like two bright spots that we see, and their shadows. And then it’s surrounded by the blast pattern from the descent stage – those little blue fans right next to it (false colour blue),” explained Alfred McEwen, the principal investigator on MRO’s High Resolution Image Science Experiment (HiRise) camera.
Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19262486
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