Help Shape the Future of Space Exploration

Join The Planetary Society Now 

Join our eNewsletter for updates & action alerts

   Please leave this field empty
Blogs

See other posts from May 2008

Headshot of Emily Lakdawalla

Messages from Earth

Posted By Emily Lakdawalla

2008/05/28 05:25 CDT

Topics:

That image of the Phoenix DVD sitting calmly on Mars has been getting quite a lot of play across the Internet today, including on the home pages of NASA and the Phoenix mission at the University of Arizona.

Visions of Mars, on Mars

NASA / JPL / U. Arizona

Visions of Mars, on Mars
This image shows the DVD provided by The Planetary Society to the Phoenix mission, which contains 250,000 names of people who signed up to send their names to Mars. It also contains "Visions of Mars," messages to future Martian explorers, science fiction stories and art inspired by the Red Planet. The DVD is mounted on the deck of the lander, which sits about one meter above the Martian surface, visible in the background.
It really speaks to the emotional connection that people feel to a space mission when they know their name is flying on it, which is why we here at The Planetary Society go to great lengths to try to get a disk (or microchip, or, in the case of Hayabusa, a piece of foil) with names from members of the public to fly on every space mission that we can. It's all part of a program we call Messages from Earth. Currently, you can sign up to send your name to the Moon on Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. The deadline for that is only a month away, June 27, 2008.

We just put together a promotional video about Messages from Earth, featuring Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson. Check it out, and share it with your friends.

Comments:

Leave a Comment:

You must be logged in to submit a comment. Log in now.
Facebook Twitter Email RSS AddThis

Blog Search

Support our Asteroid Hunters

They are Watching the Skies for You!

Our researchers, worldwide, do absolutely critical work.

Asteroid 2012DA14 was a close one.
It missed us. But there are more out there.

I want to help

Fly to an Asteroid!

Send your name and message on Hayabusa-2.

Send your name

Join the New Millennium Committee

Let’s invent the future together!

Become a Member

Connect With Us

Facebook! Twitter! Google+ and more…
Continue the conversation with our online community!

facebook.png twitter.png rss.png youtube.png flickr.png googleplus.png