Blog Archive

Curiosity drills at Cumberland, sol 279 (before-and-after flicker gif)

Opportunity and Curiosity updates: Rolling and drilling and a little wear on the wheels

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/05/20 11:27 CDT | 3 comments

For most of April, while Mars scuttled behind the Sun as seen from Earth, both Mars rovers were pretty inactive. Now that conjunction has ended, both are doing what rovers should be doing: roving and exploring. As of sol 3312 Opportunity had moved more than 300 meters southward toward Solander Point, while on her sol 279 Curiosity drilled at a second site, Cumberland.

Curiosity on Mars - Design, Planning, and the First Mars Year of Operations

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/04/26 04:14 CDT | 13 comments

Last month, I formally entered a new phase of my career: I signed my first book contract. I'll be writing a book about the Curiosity mission through its prime mission, for Springer-Praxis.

Tides of light and ice: Water and rock made from snowmelt on Mars

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/04/17 01:29 CDT | 4 comments

A recently published paper proposes that much of the sedimentary rock on Mars formed during rare, brief periods of very slight wetness under melting snow.

One Day in the Solar System

Posted by Bill Dunford on 2013/04/08 09:12 CDT | 4 comments

Dispatches from five different worlds--all sent by robotic spacecraft on the same day.

More Evidence for a Habitable Mars from EGU 2013

Posted by Casey Dreier on 2013/04/08 06:36 CDT | 3 comments

NASA's Curiosity rover has acquired further evidence that Mars's atmosphere was once dense enough to support liquid water on the surface.

Pew Pew Pew! Curiosity Chemcam profiles a drill hole, sol 227

Curiosity update, sol 227: Some sharpshooting and a dusty deck

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/03/29 10:50 CDT | 4 comments

Curiosity is back to science operations, though the activities are limited in scope by the fact that conjunction is fast approaching. Here's a couple of neat images from sol 227.