Mar's Curiosity Mission Gale Crater Landing Site Named in Honor of Ray Bradbury

Mar's Curiosity Mission Gale Crater Landing Site Named in Honor of Ray Bradbury
Mar's Curiosity Mission Gale Crater Landing Site Named in Honor of Ray BradburyThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « Black-Hole Incubators Discovered --In Huge Star Clusters at Center of Milky Way |Main| The 'Daily Galaxy' Twitter Followers Top 200,000 »

August 23, 2012 Mar's Curiosity Mission Gale Crater Landing Site Named in Honor of Ray Bradbury

 

         

 

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced yesterday that it has dubbed the landing site of the Mars rover Curiosity “Bradbury Landing” in honor of sci-fi author Ray Bradbury, who's most popular work was The Martian Chronicles, which portrayed a human invasion of Mars.. It was the Curiosity science team that chose to honor Bradbury, who passed away back in June, and the announcement coincided with what would have been Bradbury’s 92nd birthday.

“This was not a difficult choice for the science team,” said Michael Meyer, NASA program scientist for Curiosity. Bradbury "inspired our curiosity and opened our minds to the possibility of life on Mars."*Bradbury attended Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Caltech events throughout his life, and this week’s announcement was commemorated by the agency with a video of Bradbury reading his poem “If Only We Had Taller Been” at a symposium just before the Mariner 9 orbiter reached Mars in 1971.

 

           

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RIP. <3 About Ray, guess these may explain a lot:

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2012/06/ray-bradbury.html

and

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jun/06/ray-bradbury-neil-gaiman-appreciation.

Posted by:Trantorian |August 23, 2012 at 02:31 PM

and no one deserves it more. I'll bet that at least half of the scientists who made that Mars mission possible were inspired as children (maybe later) by Bradbury's 'The Martian Chronicles'. And I would suggest that we they search for evidence of life there, they might take another look at the Chronicles to remind them that we may not see what is there.

Posted by:Tosca Z |August 24, 2012 at 06:19 AM

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Image of the Day: Mars Curiosity Rover Captures Its Own Shadow at Gale Crater Landing

Image of the Day: Mars Curiosity Rover Captures Its Own Shadow at Gale Crater Landing
Image of the Day: Mars Curiosity Rover Captures Its Own Shadow at Gale Crater LandingThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « The Science of Curiosity Rover --Seeking Signs of Ancient Habitable Environments |Main| First Ever Methane-Exhaling Microbes Discovered on Earth (Will Mars be Next?) »

August 06, 2012 Image of the Day: Mars Curiosity Rover Captures Its Own Shadow at Gale Crater Landing

 

          

 

This is the first image taken by NASA's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of Aug. 5 PDT (morning of Aug. 6 EDT). It was taken through a "fisheye" wide-angle lens on one of the rover's front left Hazard-Avoidance cameras at one-quarter of full resolution. The clear dust cover on the camera is still on in this view, and dust can be seen around its edge, along with three cover fasteners. The rover's shadow is visible in the foreground.

As planned, the rover's early engineering images are lower resolution. Larger color images are expected later in the week when the rover's mast, carrying high-resolution cameras, is deployed. 

This computer-generated view below is based on multiple orbital observations shows Mars' Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft north of the crater. Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater landing site, with its strangely sculpted mountain --three times higher than the Grand Canyon is deep--is the ideal place for Curiosity to conduct its mission of exploration into the Red Planet's past. Researchers plan to use Curiosity to study layers in the mountain that hold evidence about wet environments of early Mars.

"This may be one of the thickest exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks in the solar system," said Joy Crisp, MSL Deputy Project Scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old -- stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable."

Gale crater is 96 miles (154 kilometers) in diameter and holds a layered mountain rising about 3 miles (5 kilometers) above the crater floor. The ellipse superimposed on this image indicates the candidate landing area, 12.4 miles (20 kilometers) by 15.5 miles (25 kilometers). The portion of the crater within the landing area has an alluvial fan likely formed by water-carried sediments. The lower layers of the nearby mountain -- within driving distance for Curiosity -- contain minerals indicating a wet history. The candidate landing site is at 4.5 degrees south latitude, 137.4 degrees east longitude.

This view was created using visible-light imaging by the Thermal Emission Imaging System camera on NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter and three-dimensional information from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter, which flew on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter. Color information is generalized from color imaging of portions of the scene by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The vertical dimension is not exaggerated.

In a prime mission lasting one Martian year -- nearly two Earth years -- after landing, researchers will use the rover's tools to study whether the landing region has had environmental conditions favorable for supporting microbial life and for preserving clues about whether life existed.

New NASA research that lays out the optimal depths and locations to probe for organic molecules like those that compose living organisms as we know them, could help the newest Mars rover scout for evidence of life beneath the surface and within rocks. The results suggest that, should Mars harbor simple organic molecules, NASA's prospects for discovering them during Curiosity's explorations are better than previously thought, said Alexander Pavlov of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, lead author of the study.

An instrument on Curiosity can check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover's path. Today the Red Planet is a radiation-drenched, bitterly cold, bleak world. Enormous dust storms explode across the barren landscape and darken Martian skies for months at a time. But data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest that Mars once hosted vast lakes and flowing rivers.

While simple molecules could provide evidence of ancient Martian life, they could also stem from other sources like meteorites and volcanoes. Complex organic molecules could hint more strongly at the possibility of past life on the planet. These molecules, made up of 10 or more carbon atoms, could resemble known building blocks of life such as the amino acids that make up proteins.

Although complex carbon structures are trickier to find because they're more vulnerable to cosmic radiation that continuously bombards and penetrates the surface of the Red Planet, the new research by Pavlov and his colleagues provides suggestions for where to start looking. The amounts of radiation that rock and soil is exposed to over time, and how deep that radiation penetrates – an indicator of how deep a rover would have to sample to find intact organic molecules – is a subject of ongoing research.

The scientists report that chances of finding these molecules in the first 2 centimeters (0.8 inches) of Martian soil is close to zero. That top layer, they calculate, will absorb a total of 500 million grays of cosmic radiation over the course of one billion years – capable of destroying all organic material. A mere 50 grays, absorbed immediately or over time, would cause almost certain death to a human.

However, within 5 to 10 centimeters (2 to 4 inches) beneath the surface, the amount of radiation reduces tenfold, to 50 million grays. Although that's still extreme, the team reports that simple organic molecules, such as a single formaldehyde molecule, could exist at this depth – and in some places, specifically young craters, the complex building blocks of life could remain as well.

"Right now the challenge is that past Martian landers haven't seen any organic material whatsoever," Pavlov said. "We know that organic molecules have to be there but we can't find any of them in the soil."

As Mars revolves around the Sun, it is constantly bombarded by very small meteors and interplanetary dust particles, which have plenty of organic compounds in them, Pavlov said. Therefore, over time they would have accumulated at the Martian surface.

The Mars Science Laboratory is the newest and largest of NASA's Martian landers. Curiosity doesn't have a shovel but, equipped with drilling technology, it will collect, store, and analyze samples of Martian material down to 5 centimeters below the surface of rock and soil. Past Martian rovers have only collected loose soil atop the surface that has been directly exposed to cosmic radiation, making the possibility for detecting organic molecules exceedingly slim.

When evaluating how deep organic molecules might persist beneath the surface, previous studies have mainly focused on the maximum depth, approximately 1.5 meters (5 feet), that cosmic radiation reaches because beyond that point organic molecules could survive, unharmed, for billions of years, Pavlov said. However, drilling to 1.5 meters or deeper is currently too expensive to engineer for a Martian rover.

So the team focused on more attainable depths – the first 20 cm (8 in) below the surface. They modeled the complex scenario of cosmic ray accumulation and its effects on organic molecules using a collection of important variables, including Martian rock and soil composition, changes in the planet's atmospheric density over time, and cosmic rays' various energy levels.

In addition to the finding that some simple carbon-containing molecules could exist within 10 cm (4 in) depth, the scientists emphasize that certain regions on Mars may have radiation levels far lower than 50 million grays near the surface – and so more complex molecules like amino acids could remain intact.

In order to find these molecules within the rover's drilling range (1 to 5 cm), the scientists found the best bet is to look at "fresh" craters that are no more than 10 million years old, unlike past expeditionary sites that mainly sampled from landscapes undisturbed for billions of years.

Compared to Martian landscapes undisturbed for one billion years or more, relatively young craters exhibit freshly exposed rock and soil that was once deeper beneath the surface. The new research indicates that this material will have been near the surface for a short enough period of time that it's overall exposure to harmful radiation would not have been enough to wipe out organic molecules.

"When you have a chance to drill, don't waste it on perfectly preserved (landscapes)," Pavlov said. "You want to go to fresh craters because there's probably a better chance to detect complex organic molecules. Let Nature work for you."

"The next logical step," said Lewis Dartnell, a postdoctoral researcher at the University College London in the U.K, "is to actually experiment and have a radiation source hit amino acids with radiation of similar energies as cosmic rays and determine how quickly those amino acids are destroyed because models can only do so much."

Curiosity is set to land in the same crater where the Spirit rover landed in 2004. Whether this 3.5-billion-year-old crater has fresher craters within it is uncertain. However, Pavlov hopes that his team's findings will at least help guide NASA on where to drill once the rover has landed and influence where future generations of rover landers will touch down.

 

          

 

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Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

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Countdown to the Search for Life on Mars --One Day to Mars 'Curiosity' Landing

To achieve the precision needed for landing (see diagram at bottom of page) safely inside Gale Crater, the spacecraft will fly like a wing in the upper atmosphere instead of dropping like a rock. To land the 1-ton rover, an airbag method used on previous Mars rovers will not work. Mission engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., designed a "sky crane" method for the final several seconds of the flight. A backpack with retro-rockets controlling descent speed will lower the rover on three nylon cords just before touchdown.

           

During a critical period lasting only about seven minutes, the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft carrying Curiosity must decelerate from about 13,200 mph (about 5,900 meters per second) to allow the rover to land on the surface at about 1.7 mph (three-fourths of a meter per second). Curiosity is scheduled to land at approximately 10:31 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (1:31 a.m. EDT on Aug. 6).

"Those seven minutes are the most challenging part of this entire mission," said Pete Theisinger, the mission's project manager at JPL. "For the landing to succeed, hundreds of events will need to go right, many with split-second timing and all controlled autonomously by the spacecraft. We've done all we can think of to succeed. We expect to get Curiosity safely onto the ground, but there is no guarantee. The risks are real."

           

In early June, a NASA spacecraft in orbit around the Red Planet, called Mars Odyssey, suffered a malfunction on one of its reaction wheels, an instrument that helps control the probe's attitude in space.* "Odyssey looks like it may not be where we expect it to be," said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters.

The glitch does not pose a risk to Curiosity's impending arrival at the Red Planet, officials said. But Mars Odyssey's original orbit would have given it a complete view of Curiosity's landing, so the probe had been pegged to act as an orbiting outpost to relay communications and data back to mission managers on Earth.

With Odyssey in the picture, mission managers may be able to confirm Curiosity's touchdown by 10:31 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (1:31 a.m. EDT Aug. 6). Without Odyssey, however, mission controllers may not know the outcome of the landing maneuver until 10:35 p.m. PDT or later.

During the initial weeks after the actual landing, JPL mission controllers will put the rover through a series of checkouts and activities to characterize its performance on Mars, while gradually ramping up scientific investigations. Curiosity then will begin investigating whether an area with a wet history inside Mars' Gale Crater ever has offered an environment favorable for microbial life.

"Earlier missions have found that ancient Mars had wet environments," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Program at NASA Headquarters. "Curiosity takes us the next logical step in understanding the potential for life on Mars."

Curiosity will use tools on a robotic arm to deliver samples from Martian rocks and soils into laboratory instruments inside the rover that can reveal chemical and mineral composition. A laser instrument will use its beam to induce a spark on a target and read the spark's spectrum of light to identify chemical elements in the target.

Other instruments on the car-sized rover will examine the surrounding environment from a distance or by direct touch with the arm. The rover will check for the basic chemical ingredients for life and for evidence about energy available for life. It also will assess factors that could be hazardous for life, such as the radiation environment.

"For its ambitious goals, this mission needs a great landing site and a big payload," said McCuistion. "During the descent through the atmosphere, the mission will rely on bold techniques enabling use of a smaller target area and a heavier robot on the ground than were possible for any previous Mars mission. Those techniques also advance us toward human-crew Mars missions, which will need even more precise targeting and heavier landers."

The chosen landing site is beside a mountain informally called Mount Sharp. The mission's prime destination lies on the slope of the mountain. Driving there from the landing site may take many months.

Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater with its strangely sculpted mountain --three times higher than the Grand Canyon is deep--is the ideal place for Curiosity to conduct its mission of exploration into the Red Planet's past. Researchers plan to use Curiosity to study layers in the mountain that hold evidence about wet environments of early Mars.

"This may be one of the thickest exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks in the solar system," said Joy Crisp, MSL Deputy Project Scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old -- stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable."

An instrument on Curiosity can check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover's path. Today the Red Planet is a radiation-drenched, bitterly cold, bleak world. Enormous dust storms explode across the barren landscape and darken Martian skies for months at a time. But data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest that Mars once hosted vast lakes and flowing rivers.

"Gale Crater and its mountain will tell this intriguing story," says Matthew Golombek, Mars Exploration Program Landing Site Scientist from JPL. "The layers there chronicle Mars' environmental history."

"Be patient about the drive. It will be well worth the wait and we are apt to find some targets of interest on the way," said John Grotzinger, MSL project scientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "When we get to the lower layers in Mount Sharp, we'll read them like chapters in a book about changing environmental conditions when Mars was wetter than it is today.

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Image of the Day --NASA's Gale Crater Mars Landing Site for Tomorrow's 'Search-for-Life' Mission

Image of the Day --NASA's Gale Crater Mars Landing Site for Tomorrow's 'Search-for-Life' Mission
Image of the Day --NASA's Gale Crater Mars Landing Site for Tomorrow's 'Search-for-Life' MissionThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « NASA Countdown: "The Conditions for the Emergence of Life Were Present on Mars" (Weekend Feature) |Main| Ancient Mars: "The Water Planet"? --'Curiosity' Mission May Provide Proof (Weekend Feature) »

August 04, 2012 Image of the Day --NASA's Gale Crater Mars Landing Site for Tomorrow's 'Search-for-Life' Mission

 

        

 

This computer-generated view based on multiple orbital observations shows Mars' Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft north of the crater. Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater landing site, with its strangely sculpted mountain --three times higher than the Grand Canyon is deep--is the ideal place for Curiosity to conduct its mission of exploration into the Red Planet's past. Researchers plan to use Curiosity to study layers in the mountain that hold evidence about wet environments of early Mars.

"This may be one of the thickest exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks in the solar system," said Joy Crisp, MSL Deputy Project Scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old -- stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable."

Gale crater is 96 miles (154 kilometers) in diameter and holds a layered mountain rising about 3 miles (5 kilometers) above the crater floor. The ellipse superimposed on this image indicates the candidate landing area, 12.4 miles (20 kilometers) by 15.5 miles (25 kilometers). The portion of the crater within the landing area has an alluvial fan likely formed by water-carried sediments. The lower layers of the nearby mountain -- within driving distance for Curiosity -- contain minerals indicating a wet history. The candidate landing site is at 4.5 degrees south latitude, 137.4 degrees east longitude.

This view was created using visible-light imaging by the Thermal Emission Imaging System camera on NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter and three-dimensional information from the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter, which flew on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter. Color information is generalized from color imaging of portions of the scene by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The vertical dimension is not exaggerated.

In a prime mission lasting one Martian year -- nearly two Earth years -- after landing, researchers will use the rover's tools to study whether the landing region has had environmental conditions favorable for supporting microbial life and for preserving clues about whether life existed.

New NASA research that lays out the optimal depths and locations to probe for organic molecules like those that compose living organisms as we know them, could help the newest Mars rover scout for evidence of life beneath the surface and within rocks. The results suggest that, should Mars harbor simple organic molecules, NASA's prospects for discovering them during Curiosity's explorations are better than previously thought, said Alexander Pavlov of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, lead author of the study.

An instrument on Curiosity can check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover's path. Today the Red Planet is a radiation-drenched, bitterly cold, bleak world. Enormous dust storms explode across the barren landscape and darken Martian skies for months at a time. But data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest that Mars once hosted vast lakes and flowing rivers.

While simple molecules could provide evidence of ancient Martian life, they could also stem from other sources like meteorites and volcanoes. Complex organic molecules could hint more strongly at the possibility of past life on the planet. These molecules, made up of 10 or more carbon atoms, could resemble known building blocks of life such as the amino acids that make up proteins.

Although complex carbon structures are trickier to find because they're more vulnerable to cosmic radiation that continuously bombards and penetrates the surface of the Red Planet, the new research by Pavlov and his colleagues provides suggestions for where to start looking. The amounts of radiation that rock and soil is exposed to over time, and how deep that radiation penetrates – an indicator of how deep a rover would have to sample to find intact organic molecules – is a subject of ongoing research.

The scientists report that chances of finding these molecules in the first 2 centimeters (0.8 inches) of Martian soil is close to zero. That top layer, they calculate, will absorb a total of 500 million grays of cosmic radiation over the course of one billion years – capable of destroying all organic material. A mere 50 grays, absorbed immediately or over time, would cause almost certain death to a human.

However, within 5 to 10 centimeters (2 to 4 inches) beneath the surface, the amount of radiation reduces tenfold, to 50 million grays. Although that's still extreme, the team reports that simple organic molecules, such as a single formaldehyde molecule, could exist at this depth – and in some places, specifically young craters, the complex building blocks of life could remain as well.

"Right now the challenge is that past Martian landers haven't seen any organic material whatsoever," Pavlov said. "We know that organic molecules have to be there but we can't find any of them in the soil."

As Mars revolves around the Sun, it is constantly bombarded by very small meteors and interplanetary dust particles, which have plenty of organic compounds in them, Pavlov said. Therefore, over time they would have accumulated at the Martian surface.

The Mars Science Laboratory is the newest and largest of NASA's Martian landers. Curiosity doesn't have a shovel but, equipped with drilling technology, it will collect, store, and analyze samples of Martian material down to 5 centimeters below the surface of rock and soil. Past Martian rovers have only collected loose soil atop the surface that has been directly exposed to cosmic radiation, making the possibility for detecting organic molecules exceedingly slim.

When evaluating how deep organic molecules might persist beneath the surface, previous studies have mainly focused on the maximum depth, approximately 1.5 meters (5 feet), that cosmic radiation reaches because beyond that point organic molecules could survive, unharmed, for billions of years, Pavlov said. However, drilling to 1.5 meters or deeper is currently too expensive to engineer for a Martian rover.

So the team focused on more attainable depths – the first 20 cm (8 in) below the surface. They modeled the complex scenario of cosmic ray accumulation and its effects on organic molecules using a collection of important variables, including Martian rock and soil composition, changes in the planet's atmospheric density over time, and cosmic rays' various energy levels.

In addition to the finding that some simple carbon-containing molecules could exist within 10 cm (4 in) depth, the scientists emphasize that certain regions on Mars may have radiation levels far lower than 50 million grays near the surface – and so more complex molecules like amino acids could remain intact.

In order to find these molecules within the rover's drilling range (1 to 5 cm), the scientists found the best bet is to look at "fresh" craters that are no more than 10 million years old, unlike past expeditionary sites that mainly sampled from landscapes undisturbed for billions of years.

Compared to Martian landscapes undisturbed for one billion years or more, relatively young craters exhibit freshly exposed rock and soil that was once deeper beneath the surface. The new research indicates that this material will have been near the surface for a short enough period of time that it's overall exposure to harmful radiation would not have been enough to wipe out organic molecules.

"When you have a chance to drill, don't waste it on perfectly preserved (landscapes)," Pavlov said. "You want to go to fresh craters because there's probably a better chance to detect complex organic molecules. Let Nature work for you."

"The next logical step," said Lewis Dartnell, a postdoctoral researcher at the University College London in the U.K, "is to actually experiment and have a radiation source hit amino acids with radiation of similar energies as cosmic rays and determine how quickly those amino acids are destroyed because models can only do so much."

Curiosity is set to land in the same crater where the Spirit rover landed in 2004. Whether this 3.5-billion-year-old crater has fresher craters within it is uncertain. However, Pavlov hopes that his team's findings will at least help guide NASA on where to drill once the rover has landed and influence where future generations of rover landers will touch down.

The Daily Galaxy via NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESA/DLR/FU Berlin/MSSS

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Can we please get some information on where the first bases and industry will be initiated. Is it true that a low gravity moon base with a industrial capacity to build a launch capability to Mars is the first step to a Colony there? How is the progress on 1G accelerated space flight to make human transportation to Mars possible in one week going? What is the status on the lack of Earth's magnetic field on human health which is very important to understand for human health during human space flight.

Posted by:Lee |August 04, 2012 at 02:55 PM

They need to explore the Cydonia complex to verify if there are really pyramids on Mars. Also search for abandoned cities nearby.

Posted by:Pete |August 04, 2012 at 03:17 PM

Pete, no they don't.

Posted by:Ruth Mc |August 04, 2012 at 04:07 PM

I hope a perfect landing... crossing fingers... I wish this rover will be the one that finds conclusive evidence of extraterrestial life.

Posted by:rob |August 04, 2012 at 05:19 PM

I don't see any protesters picketing, maybe that should answer the question finally.

Posted by:Ed Gould |August 04, 2012 at 09:12 PM

@ Pete... You do realize that when we took the original photos of Cydonia (revealing those faces) that our camera equipment was of very low resolution (compared to today's). Newer footage in high detail reveal it simply as being a hill will slight indentations in places.

Here, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cydonia_%28region_of_Mars%29

Posted by:Relentless |August 05, 2012 at 12:00 AM

Pete

My secrets shall be buried for many years to come.

Posted by:Cydonia |August 05, 2012 at 07:41 AM

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View Now! NASA Live Streams Mars 'Curiosity' Landing

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"The Seven Minutes of Terror" --All Systems "Go" for NASA's August 5th Landing on Mars

"The Seven Minutes of Terror" --All Systems "Go" for NASA's August 5th Landing on Mars
"The Seven Minutes of Terror" --All Systems "Go" for NASA's August 5th Landing on MarsThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « EcoAlert: Less than 1% of Earth's Mass Water |Main| Image of the Day: The Orion Nebula --An Engine of Life in the Milky Way? »

July 17, 2012 "The Seven Minutes of Terror" --All Systems "Go" for NASA's August 5th Landing on Mars

 

         

 

NASA's most advanced planetary rover, the 1-ton Curiosity , the centerpiece of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission, is slated to land at the Gale Crater on the night of Aug. 5 to look for chemical evidence of ancient life preserved within exposures near the base of a five-kilometers high mound of layered materials at the center of Gale crater (above). However, getting the Curiosity rover to the surface of Mars will be a hair-raising event --that has been nicknamed the "seven minutes of terror."

"The Curiosity landing is the hardest NASA mission ever attempted in the history of robotic planetary exploration," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "While the challenge is great, the team's skill and determination give me high confidence in a successful landing."

To achieve the precision needed for landing (see diagram at bottom of page) safely inside Gale Crater, the spacecraft will fly like a wing in the upper atmosphere instead of dropping like a rock. To land the 1-ton rover, an airbag method used on previous Mars rovers will not work. Mission engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., designed a "sky crane" method for the final several seconds of the flight. A backpack with retro-rockets controlling descent speed will lower the rover on three nylon cords just before touchdown.

During a critical period lasting only about seven minutes, the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft carrying Curiosity must decelerate from about 13,200 mph (about 5,900 meters per second) to allow the rover to land on the surface at about 1.7 mph (three-fourths of a meter per second). Curiosity is scheduled to land at approximately 10:31 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (1:31 a.m. EDT on Aug. 6).

"Those seven minutes are the most challenging part of this entire mission," said Pete Theisinger, the mission's project manager at JPL. "For the landing to succeed, hundreds of events will need to go right, many with split-second timing and all controlled autonomously by the spacecraft. We've done all we can think of to succeed. We expect to get Curiosity safely onto the ground, but there is no guarantee. The risks are real."

In early June, a NASA spacecraft in orbit around the Red Planet, called Mars Odyssey, suffered a malfunction on one of its reaction wheels, an instrument that helps control the probe's attitude in space.* "Odyssey looks like it may not be where we expect it to be," said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters.

The glitch does not pose a risk to Curiosity's impending arrival at the Red Planet, officials said. But Mars Odyssey's original orbit would have given it a complete view of Curiosity's landing, so the probe had been pegged to act as an orbiting outpost to relay communications and data back to mission managers on Earth.

With Odyssey in the picture, mission managers may be able to confirm Curiosity's touchdown by 10:31 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (1:31 a.m. EDT Aug. 6). Without Odyssey, however, mission controllers may not know the outcome of the landing maneuver until 10:35 p.m. PDT or later.

During the initial weeks after the actual landing, JPL mission controllers will put the rover through a series of checkouts and activities to characterize its performance on Mars, while gradually ramping up scientific investigations. Curiosity then will begin investigating whether an area with a wet history inside Mars' Gale Crater ever has offered an environment favorable for microbial life.

"Earlier missions have found that ancient Mars had wet environments," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Program at NASA Headquarters. "Curiosity takes us the next logical step in understanding the potential for life on Mars."

Curiosity will use tools on a robotic arm to deliver samples from Martian rocks and soils into laboratory instruments inside the rover that can reveal chemical and mineral composition. A laser instrument will use its beam to induce a spark on a target and read the spark's spectrum of light to identify chemical elements in the target.

Other instruments on the car-sized rover will examine the surrounding environment from a distance or by direct touch with the arm. The rover will check for the basic chemical ingredients for life and for evidence about energy available for life. It also will assess factors that could be hazardous for life, such as the radiation environment.

"For its ambitious goals, this mission needs a great landing site and a big payload," said McCuistion. "During the descent through the atmosphere, the mission will rely on bold techniques enabling use of a smaller target area and a heavier robot on the ground than were possible for any previous Mars mission. Those techniques also advance us toward human-crew Mars missions, which will need even more precise targeting and heavier landers."

The chosen landing site is beside a mountain informally called Mount Sharp. The mission's prime destination lies on the slope of the mountain. Driving there from the landing site may take many months.

Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater with its strangely sculpted mountain --three times higher than the Grand Canyon is deep--is the ideal place for Curiosity to conduct its mission of exploration into the Red Planet's past. Researchers plan to use Curiosity to study layers in the mountain that hold evidence about wet environments of early Mars.

"This may be one of the thickest exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks in the solar system," said Joy Crisp, MSL Deputy Project Scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old -- stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable."

An instrument on Curiosity can check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover's path. Today the Red Planet is a radiation-drenched, bitterly cold, bleak world. Enormous dust storms explode across the barren landscape and darken Martian skies for months at a time. But data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest that Mars once hosted vast lakes and flowing rivers.

"Gale Crater and its mountain will tell this intriguing story," says Matthew Golombek, Mars Exploration Program Landing Site Scientist from JPL. "The layers there chronicle Mars' environmental history."

"Be patient about the drive. It will be well worth the wait and we are apt to find some targets of interest on the way," said John Grotzinger, MSL project scientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "When we get to the lower layers in Mount Sharp, we'll read them like chapters in a book about changing environmental conditions when Mars was wetter than it is today."

 

        

The Daily Galaxy via NASA Curiosity Mission

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Sounds like a pretty good plan dude. Wow.
www.Privacy-Been.tk

Posted by:ZundoRannYankDenn |July 17, 2012 at 10:27 AM

This is amazing. All the best to NASA scientists and the human ingenuity.

Posted by:Dayanand Sutar |July 21, 2012 at 01:45 PM

Can't wait!

Posted by:Ruth Mc |July 23, 2012 at 06:48 AM

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Odyssey Tweaked to Monitor Mars Science Lab Aug 5 Landing in Realtime

Odyssey Tweaked to Monitor Mars Science Lab Aug 5 Landing in Realtime
Odyssey Tweaked to Monitor Mars Science Lab Aug 5 Landing in RealtimeThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « SPRAWL! What Our Future Will Look Like When Earth Hits Pop. 10 Billion |Main| Image of the Day: 1st Ever Comet Storm Observed »

July 25, 2012 Odyssey Tweaked to Monitor Mars Science Lab Aug 5 Landing in Realtime

 

          

 

NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft has successfully adjusted its orbital location to be in a better position to provide prompt confirmation of the August landing of the Curiosity rover at the Gale Crater site.

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft carrying Curiosity can send limited information directly to Earth as it enters Mars' atmosphere. Before the landing, Earth will set below the Martian horizon from the descending spacecraft's perspective, ending that direct route of communication. Odyssey will help to speed up the indirect communication process.

NASA reported during a July 16 news conference that Odyssey, which originally was planned to provide a near-real-time communication link with Curiosity, had entered safe mode July 11. This situation would have affected communication operations, but not the rover's landing. Without a repositioning maneuver, Odyssey would have arrived over the landing area about two minutes after Curiosity landed.

A spacecraft thruster burn Tuesday, July 24, lasting about six seconds has nudged Odyssey about six minutes ahead in its orbit. Odyssey is now operating normally, and confirmation of Curiosity's landing is expected to reach Earth at about 10:31 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (early Aug. 6, EDT and Universal Time), as originally planned.

"Information we are receiving indicates the maneuver has completed as planned," said Mars Odyssey Project Manager Gaylon McSmith of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "Odyssey has been working at Mars longer than any other spacecraft, so it is appropriate that it has a special role in supporting the newest arrival."

Two other Mars orbiters, NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and the European Space Agency's Mars Express, also will be in position to receive radio transmissions from the Mars Science Laboratory during its descent. However, they will be recording information for later playback, not relaying it immediately, as only Odyssey can.

The graphic below shows key features at the MSL landing site in Gale crater. A possible traverse path is shown in orange. Branching valleys from the crater wall lead to an alluvial fan in the center of the ellipse. At the end of the alluvial fan, the terrain transitions to a fractured, layered unit with a high thermal inertia. Several fresh craters in this unit are accessible.

Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater landing site, with its strangely sculpted mountain --three times higher than the Grand Canyon is deep--is the ideal place for Curiosity to conduct its mission of exploration into the Red Planet's past. Researchers plan to use Curiosity to study layers in the mountain that hold evidence about wet environments of early Mars.

"This may be one of the thickest exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks in the solar system," said Joy Crisp, MSL Deputy Project Scientist from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old -- stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable."

An instrument on Curiosity can check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover's path. Today the Red Planet is a radiation-drenched, bitterly cold, bleak world. Enormous dust storms explode across the barren landscape and darken Martian skies for months at a time. But data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggest that Mars once hosted vast lakes and flowing rivers.

While simple molecules could provide evidence of ancient Martian life, they could also stem from other sources like meteorites and volcanoes. Complex organic molecules could hint more strongly at the possibility of past life on the planet. These molecules, made up of 10 or more carbon atoms, could resemble known building blocks of life such as the amino acids that make up proteins.

Although complex carbon structures are trickier to find because they're more vulnerable to cosmic radiation that continuously bombards and penetrates the surface of the Red Planet, research by Pavlov and his colleagues provides suggestions for where to start looking. The amounts of radiation that rock and soil is exposed to over time, and how deep that radiation penetrates – an indicator of how deep a rover would have to sample to find intact organic molecules – is a subject of ongoing research.

The scientists report that chances of finding these molecules in the first 2 centimeters (0.8 inches) of Martian soil is close to zero. That top layer, they calculate, will absorb a total of 500 million grays of cosmic radiation over the course of one billion years – capable of destroying all organic material. A mere 50 grays, absorbed immediately or over time, would cause almost certain death to a human.

However, within 5 to 10 centimeters (2 to 4 inches) beneath the surface, the amount of radiation reduces tenfold, to 50 million grays. Although that's still extreme, the team reports that simple organic molecules, such as a single formaldehyde molecule, could exist at this depth – and in some places, specifically young craters, the complex building blocks of life could remain as well.

"Right now the challenge is that past Martian landers haven't seen any organic material whatsoever," according to AlexanderPavolov of NASA's GoddardSpace FlightCenter. "We know that organic molecules have to be there but we can't find any of them in the soil."

As Mars revolves around the Sun, it is constantly bombarded by very small meteors and interplanetary dust particles, which have plenty of organic compounds in them, Pavlov said. Therefore, over time they would have accumulated at the Martian surface.

The Mars Science Laboratory is the newest and largest of NASA's Martian landers and is scheduled to touch down August 2012. Curiosity doesn't have a shovel but, equipped with drilling technology, it will collect, store, and analyze samples of Martian material down to 5 centimeters below the surface of rock and soil. Past Martian rovers have only collected loose soil atop the surface that has been directly exposed to cosmic radiation, making the possibility for detecting organic molecules exceedingly slim.

When evaluating how deep organic molecules might persist beneath the surface, previous studies have mainly focused on the maximum depth, approximately 1.5 meters (5 feet), that cosmic radiation reaches because beyond that point organic molecules could survive, unharmed, for billions of years, Pavlov said. However, drilling to 1.5 meters or deeper is currently too expensive to engineer for a Martian rover.

So the NASA team has focused on more attainable depths – the first 20 cm (8 in) below the surface. They modeled the complex scenario of cosmic ray accumulation and its effects on organic molecules using a collection of important variables, including Martian rock and soil composition, changes in the planet's atmospheric density over time, and cosmic rays' various energy levels.

In addition to the finding that some simple carbon-containing molecules could exist within 10 cm (4 in) depth, the scientists emphasize that certain regions on Mars may have radiation levels far lower than 50 million grays near the surface – and so more complex molecules like amino acids could remain intact.

In order to find these molecules within the rover's drilling range (1 to 5 cm), the scientists found the best bet is to look at "fresh" craters that are no more than 10 million years old, unlike past expeditionary sites that mainly sampled from landscapes undisturbed for billions of years.

Compared to Martian landscapes undisturbed for one billion years or more, relatively young craters exhibit freshly exposed rock and soil that was once deeper beneath the surface.  The new research indicates that this material will have been near the surface for a short enough period of time that it's overall exposure to harmful radiation would not have been enough to wipe out organic molecules.

"When you have a chance to drill, don't waste it on perfectly preserved (landscapes)," Pavlov said. "You want to go to fresh craters because there's probably a better chance to detect complex organic molecules. Let Nature work for you."

 

          

 

The Daily Galaxy via NASA Curiosity Mission 

Image credit: Wikipedia Commons

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NASA's August 5th Mars Landing --Will Launch the Robotic Search for Life

NASA's August 5th Mars Landing --Will Launch the Robotic Search for Life
NASA's August 5th Mars Landing --Will Launch the Robotic Search for LifeThe Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel: Sci, Space, TechFollow the Daily Galaxy  « Image of the Day: 1st Ever Comet Storm Observed |Main| NASA Researchers Discover the Origin of a Major Aspect of Creation of Life »

July 26, 2012 NASA's August 5th Mars Landing --Will Launch the Robotic Search for Life

 

                           

"Gale Crater and its mountain will tell this intriguing story," says Matthew Golombek, Mars Exploration Program Landing Site Scientist from JPL. "The layers there chronicle Mars' environmental history."

In the gentle slopes around the mountain, Curiosity will prospect for organic molecules, the chemical building blocks of life. Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has found an intriguing signature of clay near the bottom of the mountain and sulfate minerals a little higher up. Both minerals are formed in the presence of water, which increases potential for life-friendly environments.

"All the types of aqueous minerals we've detected on Mars to date can be found in this one location," explains Golombek.

Clay settles slowly in water and forms little platelets that conform around things, hardening over time and encasing them in ''casts." Clay could seal organics off from the outside environment much like it preserved dinosaur bones on Earth.

"If organics ever existed on Mars, they could be preserved in the clay."

Even on planet Earth, teeming with life, finding billion year-old well-preserved organics is difficult. But Curiosity will find them if they're present in the samples it takes. The rover is equipped with the most advanced suite of instruments for scientific studies ever sent to the Martian surface1. When these are brought to bear on Gale crater’s mysteriously layered mountain, the odds of a discovery will be at an all-time high.

As seasoned travelers know, however, the journey is just as important as the destination. Curiosity can travel up to 150 meters per Mars day, but will stop often to gather and analyze samples.

"It could take several months to a year to reach the foot of the mountain, depending on how often the rover stops along the way," says Golombek. "There will be plenty to examine before getting to the central mound."

A high-resolution camera on the rover's mast will take pictures and movies of the scenery, taking us Earthlings on an extraterrestrial sightseeing tour.

"As Curiosity climbs toward higher layers, you'll see spectacular valleys and canyons like those in the U.S. desert southwest. The walls on either side of the rover will rise over 100 feet. The sights alone will be worth the trip." 

The Mars Science Laboratory mission will use 10 instruments on Curiosity to investigate whether the area selected for the mission has ever offered environmental conditions favorable for life and favorable for preserving evidence about life.

"The strength of Mars Science Laboratory is the combination of all the instruments together," Mitrofanov stressed.

The Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons instrument, or DAN, will scout for underground clues to a depth of about 20 inches (50 centimeters). 

DAN will bring to the surface of Mars an enhancement of nuclear technology that has already detected Martian water from orbit. "Albedo" in the instrument's name means reflectance -- in this case, how original high-energy neutrons injected into the ground bounce off atomic nuclei in the ground. Neutrons that collide with hydrogen atoms bounce off with a characteristic decrease in energy, similar to how one billiard ball slows after colliding with another. By measuring the energies of the neutrons leaking from the ground, DAN can detect the fraction that was slowed in these collisions, and therefore the amount of hydrogen.

Oil prospectors use this technology in instruments lowered down exploration holes to detect the hydrogen in petroleum. Space explorers have adapted it for missions to the moon and Mars, where most hydrogen is in water ice or in water-derived hydroxyl ions.  

Mitrofanov is the principal investigator for a Russian instrument on NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter, the high-energy neutron detector (HEND), which measures high energy of neutrons coming from Mars. In 2002, it and companion instruments on Odyssey detected hydrogen interpreted as abundant underground water ice close to the surface at high latitudes. That discovery led to NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander going to far northern Mars in 2008 and confirming the presence of water ice. 

"You can think of DAN as a reconnaissance instrument," Mitrofanov said. Just as Phoenix investigated what Odyssey detected, Curiosity can use various tools to investigate what DAN detects. The rover has a soil scoop and can also dig with its wheels. Its robotic arm can put samples into instruments inside the rover for thorough analyses of ingredients. Rock formations that Curiosity's cameras view at the surface can be traced underground with DAN, enhancing the ability of scientists to understand the geology.

The neutron detectors on Odyssey rely on galactic cosmic rays hitting Mars as a source of neutrons. DAN can work in a passive mode relying on cosmic rays, but it also has its own pulsing neutron generator for an active mode of shooting high-energy neutrons into the ground. In active mode, it is sensitive enough to detect water content as low as one-tenth of one percent in the ground beneath the rover.  

The neutron generator is mounted on Curiosity's right hip. A module with two neutron detectors is mounted on the left hip. With pulses lasting about one microsecond and repeated as frequently as 10 times per second, key measurements by the detectors are the flux rate and delay time of moderated neutrons with different energy levels returning from the ground. The generator will be able to emit a total of about 10 million pulses during the mission, with about 10 million neutrons at each pulse. 

"We have a fixed number of about 10 million shots, so one major challenge is to determine our strategy for how we will use them," said Maxim Litvak, leading scientist of the DAN investigation from the Space Research Institute.

Operational planning anticipates using DAN during short pauses in drives and while the rover is parked. It will check for any changes or trends in subsurface hydrogen content, from place to place along the traverse. Because there is a low possibility for underground water ice at Curiosity's Gale crater landing site, the most likely form of hydrogen in the ground of the landing area is hydrated minerals. These are minerals with water molecules or hydroxyl ions bound into the crystalline structure of the mineral. They can tenaciously retain water from a wetter past when all free water has gone.

"We want a better understanding of where the water has gone," said Alberto Behar, DAN investigation scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "DAN fits right into the follow-the-water strategy for studying Mars."

 "DAN will provide the ability to detect hydrated minerals or water ice in the shallow subsurface, which provides immediate clues as to how the geology of the subsurface might guide exploration of the surface, said Mars Science Laboratory Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology. "In addition, DAN can tell us how the shallow subsurface may differ from what the rover sees at the surface. None of our other instruments have the ability to do this. DAN measurements will tell us about the habitability potential of subsurface rocks and soils -- whether they contain water -- and as we drive along, DAN may help us understand what kinds of rocks are under the soils we drive across."

Information from DAN will also provide a ground-truth calibration for the measurements that the gamma-ray and neutron detectors on Odyssey have made and continue to make, all around the planet, enhancing the value of that global data set. The team leader of Odyssey's gamma-ray spectrometer suite, William Boynton of the University of Arizona in Tucson, is a co-investigator on the DAN investigation, with the major responsibility to provide DAN data products to NASA's Planetary Data System for usage by scientists everywhere. 

The Daily Galaxy via  nasa.gov/msl

Posted at 08:45 AM | Permalink

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I hope it doesn't crash.

Posted by:PP |July 26, 2012 at 09:26 AM

After following the development of the uk's rover n seeing that near indestructable device apparently break on landing after being left in the hands of the usa, i kinda hope it does :/

Posted by:FreeWorldForAll |July 26, 2012 at 04:37 PM

With the, soon to be, landing of the robotic probe of Curiosity there will be the continuing search for life outside our mother Earth, but as far as our search for worlds that would support human habitation; do we really need to find a planet that is ready made and "sustainable". What would happen if we do find that Mars has microbial life on it, how would that affect future missions to the Red Planet? What would happen if we don't find life on the Red Planet? How can we learn to live on other planets if we don't go there ourselves, even if the challenges seem formidable and daunting. We want to send people to Mars in a tin can and have them live on Mars in a tin can; fetching water in a pail,

Jack and Jill went up the hill to see if there were any microbes in the Martian water. Jack feel down and broke his crown and Jill made ice tea with the Martian filtered water.

Posted by:kristi276 |July 26, 2012 at 11:30 PM

@ Kristie - i would say finding microbial life on Mars would be a massive acheivement and proof that life can form elsewhere in the galaxy. I'm azmazed at how you managed to trivialize perhaps what would be the most important discovery of man-kind lol.

Posted by:Noochy |July 27, 2012 at 08:03 AM

you did the same for mans potential ability to live and spread beyond our home planet (another mankind laltering acheivement)in a sustainable basis haha. you are probably terrible in bed.

Posted by:Noochy |July 27, 2012 at 08:04 AM

Sending a robot to mars to find micro organisms/ life is a waste of a trip and money that could feel those who are starving on our planet. Why? Because it would make much more sense and waste much less time and money to send a organism there to see if it can survive. This seems like a much more logical process. You would think that NASA would have the brains to realize this.

Posted by:DaveG |July 27, 2012 at 01:42 PM

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