All
All
Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
Introducing PlanetFour
The Mars I study is really active; the surface constantly changes. We have collected a lot of image data about changing seasonal features near the south pole. There is so much that we can't analyze all of it on our own. We need your help, through a new Zooniverse project named PlanetFour.
Pretty picture: new HiRISE view of Curiosity, sol 145
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured a new view of Curiosity on Mars on January 2 (sol 145). Curiosity was in the same location as the one from which it shot the sol 137 panorama I posted earlier. You can see the rover's tracks leading all the way back to the landing site!
Curiosity update, sol 157: Glenelg isn't just a test site anymore; it's a scientific "candy store"
The Curiosity mission held a press briefing this morning for the first time since the American Geophysical Union meeting, and it was jam-packed with science. The biggest piece of news is this: it was worth it, scientifically, to go to Glenelg first, before heading to the mountain.
Crazy Far
Louis Friedman discusses what he expects to be the future of space exploration. According to him, it won't be in manned missions, but in remote, virtual exploration available to anybody.
Field Report From Mars: Sol 3182-3188 - January 6-11, 2013
We finished up with examination of the big outcrop (
New Details on the 2020 Mars Rover
The 2020 Rover will achieve its cost-savings by using $200 million of existing hardware left over from the Curiosity mission, said the Director of the Planetary Science division within NASA.
Curiosity's Scoop Campaign, a Summary
Stephen Kuhn is the CHIMRA and the scoop systems lead on the Curiosity rover. He explains what the team was doing at Rocknest, and why it took so long!
Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Opportunity Zeroes In on Clay Minerals and We Look Back on 2012
Despite the lull of the holidays, the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission recorded one of the expedition's best months ever in December as Opportunity and her team confirmed the location of the smectite clay minerals on Matijevic Hill, effectively grabbing the scientific brass ring they came hoping to find at Endeavour Crater.
Planetary Society Weekly Hangout, Thu Jan 3 1200PT/2000UT: Jim Bell
Join Emily Lakdawalla and Casey Dreier for a chat with Jim Bell, a scientist who wears many hats. He's the team lead for the Pancam color cameras on the Spirit and Opportunity rovers; he's a member of the Curiosity science team; and he's the esteemed President of the Planetary Society's Board of Directors. We'll talk about the great science being done by both Curiosity and Opportunity, and about what's in store for the future.
Who is the photographer behind Mars rover photos? Answer from Mark Lemmon
A Mars imaging scientist answers the question: who is the
Planetary Radio Live Celebrates Curiosity/Truly Haute Cuisine!
Listen to or watch the webcast recorded Saturday, December 15th with MSL Project Manager Richard Cook and Project Scientist John Grotzinger. Bonus: enjoy a neat little French animation.
Mars Express VMC resumes raw data posting
ESA brought Mars Express' VMC back online in May, but hasn't been posting the images. This week, they launched a new process to release VMC images automatically to a Flickr page.
Watch Planetary Radio LIVE on Saturday!
Watch the live show at 2pm Pacific on Saturday, December 15 to see Bill Nye, Emily Lakdawalla and the leaders of the Mars Science Laboratory rover mission.
Blast from the past: Mariner 4's images of Mars
While hunting for photos to use in a presentation, I came across a couple of different amateur takes on the Mariner 4 photo catalog.
Field Report From Mars: Sol 3151-3153 - December 5-7, 2012
An attempt to bump left and get a small bright vein into the instrument deployment device (IDD) work volume failed to get the target in the work plane.
The 2020 Rover in Context
The 2020 rover announced today is entirely consistent with NASA's reduced commitment to planetary exploration due to its 2013 budget.
Planetary Society Weekly Hangout: present and future rovers
The Planetary Society has a new weekly Google+ Hangout time slot, Thursdays at noon PT / 1800 UT. This week, Casey Dreier and I talked about the Curiosity kerfuffle and NASA's future rover plans. Here's the archived recording.
Curiosity update, sol 117: Progress report from AGU
Monday was the big Curiosity day at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union. A morning press briefing was followed by an afternoon science session. I traveled to San Francisco briefly just to attend those two events. Here's my notes on the first science reports from the mission.
Field Report From Mars: Sol 3150 - December 3, 2012
Here at station 14 we have decided to do a detailed investigation of an outcrop that is well exposed and lies within an area where there is orbital remote-sensing evidence for clay minerals. These particular rocks are interesting in that they contain a lot of thin veins and alteration zones along joints (cracks) in the outcrops.
Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Opportunity Digs In at Matijevic Hill
While Curiosity and her team found themselves entangled in a media furor over comments, assumptions, and rumors of findings that have yet to be found, Opportunity roved on in November, finishing up the geologic survey of Matijevic Hill and setting a new mileage record along the way.