Galactic Informer

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Supernova Captured By Hubble Space Telescope

Image Credit: ESA/NASA, acknowledgement: Andre van der Hoeven [ Full Size Image ]

NASA has released a hauntingly beautiful composite image showing a superbubble in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The LMC is a small satellite galaxy of the Milky Way located about 160,000 light years from Earth.

A superbubble is a cavity, filled with 106 Kelvin gas blown into the interstellar medium by multiple supernovae and stellar winds, hundreds of light years across. These cavities are carved out of the surrounding gas by the shockwaves and winds from supernova explosions.

Many new stars, some of them very massive, are forming in the star cluster NGC 1929, which is embedded in the nebula N44, so named because it is the 44th nebula in a catalog of such objects in the Magellanic Clouds. The massive stars produce intense radiation, expel matter at high speeds and race through their evolution to explode as supernovas.

In the image, x-rays from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory (blue) show hot regions created by those winds and shockwaves. Infrared data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope (red) outline where the dust and cooler gas are found. Optical light from the 2.2 meter Max-Planck-ESO telescope (yellow) in Chile shows where ultraviolet radiation from hot, young stars is causing gas in the nebula to glow.

A long-running problem in high-energy astrophysics has been that some superbubbles in the LMC, including N44, give off a lot more X-rays than expected from models of their structure, which assume that hot, X-ray emitting gas has been produced by winds from massive stars and the remains of several supernovas.

Another Chandra study from 2011 showed that there are two extra sources of N44′s X-ray emission not included in these models: supernova shockwaves striking the walls of the cavities, and hot material evaporating from the cavity walls. Chandra also showed no evidence for the enhancement of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in the cavities, ruling out the possibility as an explanation for the bright X-ray emission. Only by making full use of Chandra’s capabilities has it become possible to distinguish between different sources of X-rays produced by superbubbles.

The Chandra study of N44 and another superbubble in the LMC was led by Anne Jaskot from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The co-authors were Dave Strickland from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD, Sally Oey from University of Michigan, You-Hua Chu from University of Illinois and Guillermo Garcia-Segura from Instituto de Astronomia-UNAM in Ensenada, Mexico.

NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra’s science and flight operations from Cambridge, Mass.

Source: April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online

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Japanese Space Agency Sending Hayabusa 2 To Land On Asteroid

Image Credit: Photos.com

Following the success of its Hayabusa mission, the Japanese space agency JAXA is shooting for another asteroid in 2018.

Dennis Normille wrote in a report in Physics World that JAXA is planning to land another spacecraft on an asteroid in 2018 to search for clues as to how life on Earth began.

Hayabusa 2 will be the sequel to its previous mission, which was the first to collect material from an asteroid and return it back to Earth in June 2010.

The new mission will be launched in 2014, sending a spacecraft to land on an asteroid named 1999 JU3 in mid-2018, then returning back to Earth in 2020.

Once Hayabusa 2 safely reaches its target, it will fire off fingertip-sized bullets into the surface of the asteroid at speeds of about 1,000 feet per second, and then collect the shrapnel created from the blast.

After moving away, it will detonate an impactor module, firing off a 4-pound projectile into the asteroid to create a 6.5-foot crater.

Hayabusa 2 will then return to the crater and collect more samples from the asteroid, according to Normille. The spacecraft will not be collecting samples that have been exposed to space weather and solar radiation before, but samples that were created in the early days of the solar system.

The asteroid’s distance from the Sun means it will be a better environment for preserving water and amino acids, meaning it is a promising candidate in the hunt for signs of life outside Earth.

JAXA proved what it was capable of with Hayabusa, overcoming engine failures, fuel loss, and communication blackouts.

The spacecraft was the limelight of Japan as citizens watched it enter the Earth’s atmosphere through Internet streaming, and more than 100,000 people gathered at venues across the world to see the capsule on display.

During the original mission, bullets were not fired due to a malfunction, but the spacecraft still grabbed specks of dust from the asteroid in a collection canister.

Shogo Tachibana, a cosmological chemist at Hokkaido University, said he hopes the material from the second mission will be free of contamination and will give a clearer insight into the early days of the solar system.

Source redOrbit

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SETI’s Allen Telescope Array Is Getting Funded

Image Caption: A single antenna of the Allen Telescope Array at night. Credit: SETI

Accoriding to Red Orbit,  Uwingu announced it would be funding the SETI Institute‘s Allen Telescope Array through donations it has received so far.

Uwingu is an organization previously reported about here on redOrbit that aims to help fund space exploration, research, and education efforts around the world.

The organization has determined that its first priority is to donate half of its “bonus” funds above its $75,000 business launch target to the Allen Telescope Array (ATA).

“We don’t have to wait to begin helping space research until we launch our first product, we’re starting now!” Uwingu CEO, Dr. Alan Stern, said in a prepared statement distributed through PRLog. “We hope this will be a double-win—generating more funds available to launch our own commercial products, and more funds available to the ATA’s research teams.”

The ATA is an array of 42 radio telescopes in Northern California that studies exoplanetary systems discovered through the Kepler mission.

“We know where exoplanets planets are located, and the ATA is systematically exploring them to try to uncover evidence that one of these systems is generating radio signals,” ATA’s Dr. Jill Tarter said. “We hope that Uwingu will accelerate this process and bring us closer to answering the question of whether we share this cosmos with others.”

Uwingu (which means “sky” in Swahili, and is pronounced “oo-wing-oo”) was formed by astronomers, planetary scientists, former space program executives, and educators.

Uwingu’s crowd-sourcing campaign will last until September 14th. The organization said that it already has almost 300 sponsors for its upcoming launch and is nearing half way in meeting its crowd-funding goal.

“Alternative funding in the form of entrepreneurship is an absolute necessity if we are to continue exploring and solving grand challenges,” Tarter said.

Unwingu’s crowd funding agent is through IndieGoGo.

“All of us can participate in the IndieGoGo campaign and the launch of Uwingu, and purchase its products to generate revenues to fund the best ideas from scientists today and into tomorrow,” Tarter said.

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Mars Has Plate Tectonics

For decades, scientists thought the only place in our solar system that consisted of plate tectonics was right here on Earth. But a UCLA scientist has discovered, analyzing data from two instruments, that the Red Planet has also shown evidence of tectonic plate movement.

The science of plate tectonics revolves around the idea that huge crustal plates beneath a planet’s surface are constantly moving, rubbing and grinding against each other. These movements are the driving force of earthquakes, volcanic activity, and the building up of mountain ranges, among other things.

An Yin, the UCLA scientist who discovered the geological phenomena on Mars, said: “Mars is at a primitive stage of plate tectonics. It gives us a glimpse of how the early Earth may have looked and may help us understand how plate tectonics began on Earth.”

Yin, professor of Earth and space sciences at UCLA, discovered the phenomena through an analysis of satellite images taken from NASA’s THEMIS spacecraft and also from theHIRISE camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). He said about a dozen of the 100-or-so images collected show signs of plate tectonics.

Yin has previously conducted plate tectonic research in the Himalayas and Tibet, where two of the Earth’s major plates divide. “When I studied the satellite images from Mars, many of the features looked very much like fault systems I have seen in the Himalayas and Tibet, and in California as well, including the geomorphology,” he said.

In one image, Yin observed a very smooth, flat side of a canyon wall, which can only be generated by a fault; a steep cliff also observed, much like the cliffs found in California’s Death Valley, is also typical of a fault line. Yin also said he found a linear volcanic zone on Mars, which is another formation of tectonic plate movement.

“You don’t see these features anywhere else on other planets in our solar system, other than Earth and Mars,” said Yin, whose research is featured as the cover story in the August issue of the journal Lithosphere.

For the better part of the last half century, scientists had wondered how one of Mars’ largest canyon systems, Valles Marineris (Latin for Mariner Valleys), was formed. For a long time the standing theory was a huge crack opened up on the planet’s surface, resulting in the formation of the vast system of canyons and valleys. Yin said the nearly 2,500-mile-long canyon system was actually formed through plate tectonics.

“In the beginning, I did not expect plate tectonics, but the more I studied it, the more I realized Mars is so different from what other scientists anticipated,” Yin said. “I saw that the idea that it is just a big crack that opened up is incorrect. It is really a plate boundary, with horizontal motion. That is kind of shocking, but the evidence is quite clear.”

“The shell is broken and is moving horizontally over a long distance. It is very similar to the Earth’s Dead Sea fault system, which has also opened up and is moving horizontally.”

Valles Marineris is divided by two plates that have moved roughly 93 miles horizontally relative to each other, Yin explained. That is similar to the San Andreas Fault in California. While the San Andreas fault has moved twice as much, the similarity can be made because Earth is also nearly twice as big as Mars, making the two situations comparable.

Unlike Earth, which has seven major plates, Mars has relatively few, according to Yin. He does believe that Mars could be on its way to becoming “very broken,” which would mean the formation of more plates; more plates would mean more Mars-quakes. For now, he added, quakes probably don’t happen very often. The plates wake up “every once in a while, over a very long duration — perhaps every million years or more.”

While he is confident in his findings, Yin said there are still mysteries, including how far beneath the surface the plates are located. “I don’t quite understand why the plates are moving with such a large magnitude or what the rate of movement is; maybe Mars has a different form of plate tectonics… The rate is much slower than on Earth.”

Yin said he will continue to study plate tectonics on Mars and plans to publish a future update paper in the journal Lithosphere. His research has been partly funded by the National Space Foundation.

  Source: Lawrence LeBlond

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Panoramic Look At Mars From The Curiosity Rove

Image Credit: NASA [ View Full Image ]

NASA is releasing even more photographs taken by the Curiosity rover during its first week of service on the Red Planet.

The rover landed on Mars on Sunday night and NASA has been testing the rover out to see if all of its functions work properly.

In one of the latest images released by the space agency, you get a full 360-degree view of what Curiosity gets to see on the alien planet in Gale Crater.

The panoramic image is in color, and was made using Curiosity’s thumbnail versions of images taken by its Mast Camera.

NASA said scientists will be looking at several splotches seen in the foreground that appear gray, to try and determine exactly what those are.  These areas could be the effects of the descent stage’s engines blasting the ground.

It said what appears as a dark strip in previous pictures can also be seen along the top of this panoramic image.  The color reveals some additional shades of reddish brown around the dunes as well, likely indicating different textures or materials, according to NASA.

The panoramic image was made with 130 different 144 by 144 pixel images. NASA said full frames of these images at 1,200 by 1,200 pixels each are expected to reach Earth at a later time.

Also seen in images received from Curiosity is a higher-resolution image of Mount Sharp, the rover’s ultimate destination for its primary mission.

In the panoramic view, the mountain’s summit cannot be seen, but the mountain, which is located in the center of Gale Crater, does show up on the horizon of the image.

Curiosity’s Navcams have also been working hard to provide images for NASA, giving a 360-degree view of Mars and a couple of higher-resolution photos.

“These Navcam images indicate that our powered descent stage did more than give us a great ride, it gave our science team an amazing freebie,” John Grotzinger, project scientist for the mission from the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, said in a press release. “The thrust from the rockets actually dug a one-and-a-half-foot-long [0.5-meter] trench in the surface. It appears we can see Martian bedrock on the bottom. Its depth below the surface is valuable data we can use going forward.”

The new rover carries 10 science instruments, including tools such as a laser-firing instrument for checking rocks’ elemental composition from a distance.

Curiosity will use a drill and scoop to gather up soil and powdered samples of rock interiors, then sieve and parcel out these samples into its analytical laboratory instruments.

  Source: Lee Rannals http://s.tt/1kwgg)

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Russian Proton-M Rocket Suffers Booster Failure

Russian space agency Roscosmos has been dealt another major blow to its faltering space program after a Monday launch of its Proton-M rocket failed to lift two satellites into orbit.

The Telkom 3 satellite, belonging to PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia, and a Russian satellite — Russian Express MD2 — failed to reach orbit after launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Monday night, due to a malfunction of the Briz-M booster on the rocket, according to Roscosmos. It said the Briz-M booster fired its engines on schedule but only burned for 7 of the 18 minutes needed to push the satellites into orbit.

Officials said the booster’s first stages worked fine, but the upper stage intended to give the satellites a final push into space switched off prematurely. The launch failure is the latest in a string of space mission failures including last year’s Progress re-supply vessel disaster that shut down manned missions to the International Space Station for nearly three months.

“The satellites can be considered lost,” Roscosmos spokeswoman Anna Vedishcheva said on Rossiya television. They are now stranded in a low orbit where they cannot be recovered.

The total loss of the two satellites is estimated at $100-$150 million, a source told Interfax news agency.

RIA Novosti reported that Roscosmos is planning to suspend future Proton-M rocket launches with the Briz-M booster, which is produced by Khrunichev Research and the State Production Center, until investigations into the matter are complete.

Slamet Riyadi, a spokesman for Telkom, said the company’s Telkom-3 satellite was meant to provide support for the firm’s two other satellites, Telkom-1 and Telkom-2, which were near the end of their mission life. Slamet noted Telkom-2, launched in 2005, still had some mission life left in it. Telkom-1 on the other hand, built in 1997, may not last much longer.

Communications and Information Ministry spokesman, Gatot S. Dewabroto, pointed out that despite the loss of the Telkom-3 satellite there should not be any telecommunication problems for the near future. Telkom has a number of other satellites in orbit that can handle the workload.

“They can still handle operations well,” he told Mariel Grazella at the Jakarta Post, adding that the company needed a “Plan B” following the incident. However, he pointed out that the ministry would not become involved in proceedings between the company and its Russian counterparts following the failure to launch. “This is strictly a business-to-business affair.”

Vladimir Popovkin, head of Roscosmos, has ordered the establishment of quality inspection teams at plants that produce rocket parts. These inspectors have the authority to stop production if quality standards are not being met.

Igor Marinin, the editor of the Novosti Kosmonavtiki monthly magazine, said despite the latest malfunction, the Proton-M rocket is considered a solid investment among global customers. The rocket has been the main cash-cow for the space industry since the 1990s. “Proton is a very good and solid design.”

Source: Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit (http://s.tt/1kjlj)

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NASA 's New Unmanned Aircraft X-48C Flight Was Successful

Image Caption: The remotely operated X-48C Blended Wing Body aircraft lifts off Rogers Dry Lake at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., on its first test flight Aug. 7. The sub-scale technology demonstrator, modified from the prior X-48B configuration, is entering a new flight test phase in a partnership between NASA and The Boeing Company's Phantom Works research and technology division. Credit: NASA / Carla Thomas

The unmanned aircraft X-48C successfully flew for the first time on Tuesday at the Edwards Air Force Base, according to NASA.

The Boeing aircraft was formerly known as the X-48B Blended Wing Body aircraft, and was modified to evaluate the low-speed stability and control of a low-noise version of a notional, future Hybrid Wing Body (HWB) aircraft design. This HWB design, NASA said, stems from kept studies being conducted at the space agency’s Environmentally Responsible Aviation project of future potential aircraft designs.

“We are thrilled to get back in the air to start collecting data in this low-noise configuration,” Heather Maliska, X-48C project manager at NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center, said in a press release. “Our dedicated team has worked hard to get the X-48C off the ground for its first flight and we are excited learning about the stability and control characteristics of this low-noise configuration of the blended wing body.” NASA said the changes made to the C model from the B model were geared to transforming the aircraft to an airframe noise-shielding configuration. External modifications included relocating the wingtip winglets onboard next to the engines, turning them into twin tails.

The aircraft’s aft deck was extended about 2 feet to the rear as well, and the team replaced the X-48B’s three 50-pound thrust jet engines with two 89-pound thrust engines. The X-48C will also be a better handling craft than its predecessor, because the team developed flight control system software modifications for it, according to NASA. The space agency said this will enable the aircraft to have a stronger and safer prototype flight control system.

“We are very pleased to begin flight tests of the X-48C,” Mike Kisska, Boeing X-48C project manager, said in a press release. “Working with NASA, we’ve successfully passed another milestone in our work to explore and validate the aerodynamic characteristics and efficiencies of the blended wing body concept.” During the upcoming test, the X-48C will also help researchers further develop methods to validate the design’s aerodynamics and control laws, including a goal of reducing aerodynamic drag through engine yaw control tests. NASA will be testing engine yaw control software during the second block of flight testing planned for this fall. The team will use asymmetric engine thrust to create nose left or right movements, for trim and for relatively slow maneuvers.

Source NASA redOrbit

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Curiosity Mars Rover Sends Back First 3D Image

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Since landing on Mars, Curiosity has been uploading tons of data back to Earth, including 3D images taken by its onboard cameras. The first thumbnail was received at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory just moments after it was confirmed that Curiosity had a successful landing.

From the moment the heat shield was ejected from the Mars Science Laboratory, Curiosity began snapping photos. NASA released a video of the spacecraft’s descent towards the Martian surface, composed of nearly 300 images. A new video will be available in the coming days of the descent, showing an even more detailed video of the landing. Curiosity also took images with its Hazard-Avoidance cameras, showing a picture of Mount Sharp, its target within Gale Crater. Images keep coming live from NASA as Curiosity just starts to begin its primary one-Martian-year mission of discovery and exploration.

Part of the images released by NASA are colored, while others are images coming in from the Martian surface are actually 3D. The space agency even released an image taken by its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft during its overpass of Curiosity while it was landing. The picture shows Curiosity parachuting down to the Martian surface. As details emerge from the Mars Science Laboratory mission, redOrbit will make sure to keep you update.

Source: Lee Rannals  http://s.tt/1keoy)

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New Images Show Apollo Mission flags still standing on the Moon

  LRO image of Apollo 17 landing site, with flag still standing nearby. Credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State University Images taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter have helped to answer a long-standing question about the old Apollo landing sites on the Moon - are any of the flags planted there by the astronauts still standing today? It turns out that yes, almost all of them are.

See Examiner.com for the full article.

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High resolution view inside Gale crater Mars

A small portion of the “oblique view” image of Mount Sharp and surrounding terrain in Gale crater. Credit: NASA / JPL

A new “oblique view” image has been posted on the HiRISE website showing an area inside Gale crater, the landing spot of the Curiosity rover. The high-resolution image, taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows a portion of Mount Sharp and the surrounding terrain of layers, canyons, buttes and sand dunes. The viewing angle is 45˚, similar to looking out the window of an airplane.  http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/images/2012/details/cut/mt-sharp-oblique.jpg

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Live Video From Mars Curiosity Rover Landing

NASA released a low-resolution video taken by Mars newest citizen, Curiosity, as it hurtled its way towards the Red Planet. The video is derived from 297 color, low-resolution images, giving you a view of the surface of Mars coming closer and closer. NASA said that this is just a view of the approximately 1,504 images of descent currently held in the rover’s onboard memory. Once the highest resolution images are put together, the video is expected to depict the rover’s descent from the moment the entry system’s heat shield is released through touchdown.

“The image sequence received so far indicates Curiosity had, as expected, a very exciting ride to the surface,” Mike Malin, imaging scientist for the Mars Science Lab mission from Malin Space Systems in San Diego, said in a press release. “But as dramatic as they are, there is real other-world importance to obtaining them. These images will help the mission scientists interpret the rover’s surroundings, the rover drivers in planning for future drives across the surface, as well as assist engineers in their design of forthcoming landing systems for Mars or other worlds.” The photos were taken by the onboard Mars Descent Imager (MARDI), which is located on the chassis of the rover. Just before the heat shield fell away, MARDI started to snap photos. The images selected by the rover to send to Earth first were taken at different points in Curiosity’s final descent. During the video, one of the earliest images that can be seen shows the vehicle’s heat shield falling away after separating from Curiosity. Another set of images depicts the final moments as the rover was lowered toward the Martian surface by the Sky Crane. During this part of the video, dust can be seen being kicked up by the Sky Crane’s 742 pounds of thrust rockets. “A good comparison is to that grainy onboard film from Apollo 11 when they were about to land on the moon,” Malin said. The images downloaded so far are low-resolution thumbnails, 192 by 144 pixels. As communications between rover and Earth become more robust, full-frame images 1,600 by 1,200 pixels in size will provide a complete story of the rover’s landing onto the planet. NASA also released a new high-resolution Hazcam image of Mount Sharp located in the Gale Crater. Mount Sharp is Curiosity’s target for exploration. Source NASA

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Mars Rover Curiosity Landing Was Successfull

  The US space agency has just landed the Nucleur Powerd Rover Curiosity.

The one-ton vehicle touched down in a deep crater near the planet's equator after a plunging through the atmosphere.

It is going to look for evidence that Mars could once have supported life.

A signal confirming the rover was on the ground safely was relayed to Earth via Nasa's Odyssey satellite, which is in orbit around the Red Planet.

The success was greeted with a roar of approval here at mission control at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Engineers and scientists who have worked on this project for the best part of 10 years punched the air and hugged each other.

The descent through the atmosphere after a 570-million-km journey from Earth had been billed as the "seven minutes of terror" - the time it would take to complete a series of high-risk manoeuvres that would slow the rover from an entry speed of 20,000km/h to just 1m/s to allow its wheels to set down softly.

The mission team will now spend the next few hours assessing the health of the vehicle (also referred to as the Mars Science Laboratory, MSL).

An attempt also will be made to retrieve some images of the landing location.

These first pictures will be low-resolution, wide-angle, black-and-white thumbnail pictures of the rear wheels.

A first colour image of Curiosity's surroundings should be returned in the next couple of days.

This is the fourth rover Nasa has put on Mars, but its scale and sophistication dwarf all previous projects.

Its biggest instrument alone is nearly four times the mass of the very first robot rover deployed on the planet back in 1997.

Curiosity has been sent to investigate the central mountain inside Gale Crater that is more than 5km high.

It will climb the rise, and, as it does so, study rocks that were laid down billions of years ago in the presence of liquid water.

The vehicle will be looking for evidence that past environments could have favoured microbial life.

Scientists warn, however, that this will be a slow mission - Curiosity is in no hurry.

For one thing, the rover has a plutonium battery that should give it far greater longevity than the solar-panelled power systems fitted to previous vehicles.

"People have got to realise this mission will be different," commented Steve Squyres, the lead scientist of the Opportunity and Spirit rovers landed in 2004.

"When we landed we only thought we'd get 30 sols (Martian days) on the surface, so we had to hit the ground running. Curiosity has plenty of time," he told the BBC.

Initially, the rover is funded for two years of operations. But many expect this mission to roll and roll for perhaps a decade or more.

[gallery columns="4"]

View First Raw Images From This Mars Mission http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/?rawid=RLA_397506118EDR_F0010008AUT_04096Z_&s=0

  To the amazing people that made this possible we all thank your for your incredible efforts. We look forward to the missions rewards!

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Mars Rover Curiosity Live Coverage

NASA's Curiosity rover moves in for a tricky and highly-anticipated landing on the Mars surface tonight. Watch the landing live   between 11 PM and 2 AM ET.

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Mars Curiosity Closing In On Seven Minutes Of Terror

Curiosity Rover is approaching the red planet at about 8,000 mph, on the way to its date with destiny and the history books. However, that is not the upper limit of speed for Curiosity. Mar’s gravity is taking hold and pulling the rover down hard. By the time the spacecraft hits the top of Mars’ atmosphere, about seven minutes before touchdown, Martian gravity will accelerate it to approximately 13,200 mph.

“After flying more than eight months and 350 million miles since launch, the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft is now right on target to fly through the eye of the needle that is our target at the top of the Mars atmosphere,” said Mission Manager Arthur Amador of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

The Atlas V rocket powered spacecraft is on course and on target for delivering Curiosity to the Gale Crater and Mt. Sharp at 10:31 p.m. tonight, PDT (1:31 a.m. Monday, EDT). That is when NASA expects to get a signal confirming a safe landing, give or take a minute due to atmospheric conditions. As of 2:25 p.m. PDT today, Curiosity was approximately 261,000 miles from Mars.

NASA will receive that safe landing signal via relay from the Mars Odyssey orbiter. Curiosity will not have direct communication with Earth because the Earth will set below the Martian horizon about two minutes before Curiosity sets down. Landing is the biggest hurdle NASA expects Curiosity to face, so those few minutes of delay will be tense and critical.

Mars itself even seems to be welcoming Curiosity. A dust storm in southern Mars that is being monitored by NASA’s Reconnaissance Orbiter appears to be dissipating. “Mars is cooperating by providing good weather for landing,” said JPL’s Ashwin Vasavada, deputy project scientist for Curiosity.

The plan is for Curiosity to investigate whether the study area in Gale Crater has ever offered the right environmental conditions favorable for microbial life, including the chemical ingredients for life. According to two University of Tennessee researchers, Linda Kah and Jeffrey Moersch, critical evidence may include frozen water, organic compounds, or other chemical ingredients.

“In particular, we will be examining sedimentary rocks that form Mount Sharp, which is a more than five-kilometer-high mountain within Gale Crater, the area the rover is exploring,” said Kah. “These rocks might serve as a time capsule of Mars’s transition from a warm, wet planet to a cold, dry one.”

Kah and Moersch are searching in different ways. Kah is part of a camera team searching for features within rocks that might provide clues to the rules of fluids in the planet’s past. Moersch is searching for hydrogen in the form of water, ice or hydrated minerals. They aren’t’ the only scientists working on these problems, though. Twice a day, data will be downlinked and disseminated to five teams of scientists, all looking for signs of ancient life.

“I expect that we will find evidence for the building blocks of life, although that is a far cry from actually finding evidence for life,” said Kah. “Personally, I am more excited by the opportunity to ask a whole set of higher-order questions about what the Martian surface was like and how it might have changed through time.”

The first pictures from Curiosity will be reduced-resolution fisheye black-and-white images during the first hours after touchdown. Higher resolution and color images will be transmitted later in the first week. Plans are for Curiosity to deploy a directional antenna on day one and raise the camera mast on day two.

The process of searching is slow. Curiosity will only be moving about 200 meters a day, on a good day. The mission is slated to continue through 2014, two full years on Earth, but only one year on Mars. Source  redorbit

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India Is Launching A Satellite To Mars

India is joining the ambitions of other space agencies by putting forth a goal to send a satellite to Mars, according to a report by the Hindustan Times.

Plans presented to the government by Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) suggested a spacecraft be launched during October or November 2013, with the goal of entering Mars orbit in September 2014.

The proposed spacecraft will collect satellite images and send them back to Earth to help Indian scientists study whether there is a possibility for life there.

The 3,000-pound spacecraft will be launched by PSLV-XL from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh.

India will just be catching up to other countries like the U.S., Russia, the European Space Agency, Japan and China, which have sent a total of 44 space missions to Mars.

Although many attempts have been made, only 19 of the 44 space missions sent out by other countries have succeeded, with the U.S. finding the biggest success rate.

If India proves to be successful, it will be only the third country to conduct a successful mission to the Red Planet.

redOrbit

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Australia’s CSIRO To Assist NASA With Mars Rover Curiosity’s Landing

  As NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory gets closer to the Red Planet by the second, other countries are preparing to help aid the space agency in the difficult landing. The Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex (CDSCC), managed for NASA by CSIRO in Australia, will be the main tracking station for the landing. The Australian dishes will be the ones following MSL’s mission when it attempts the “seven minutes of terror” on Sunday. CDSCC will be the main tracking station for landing activities. The center’s 230-foot and two 110-foot antennas will receive signals from the spacecraft both directly, and those relayed through another NASA spacecraft, Mars Odyssey. CSIRO’s 210-foot Parkes telescope will be recording signals directly from the spacecraft as a backup, just in case there is a problem with the relaying.

“The expertise of Australian personnel in space communications and CSIRO’s partnership with NASA will be showcased during this critical event in the Mars Science Laboratory’s mission,” Chief of CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science, Dr Phil Diamond, said in a press statement. “All of our technology and our people are ready.” The European Space Agency (ESA) will also be providing NASA assistance in getting its Curiosity rover safely on Mars. An ESA antenna will be receiving signals from the spacecraft recorded and re-sent through the space agency’s Mars Express satellite. Canberra station signals will be sent directly to mission scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

Landing on Mars is not a guarantee, so NASA is taking whatever help it can get when it comes to tracking its spacecraft. Curiosity will be embarking on the most difficult landing in NASA’s history, as MSL travels from 13,000 mph to just 1.7 mph in only seven minutes. The success of the mission is not guaranteed, so all eyes will be watching on Sunday to see if the space agency succeeds in another Mars rover mission.

  Source: redOrbit

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HiRISE Images Martian Craters

Impact craters that are only a few kilometers in size on Mars usually have simple bowl shaped interiors with craters in weaker material being larger than craters in stronger material.

Occasionally though, nature is more complicated and these simple rules don't apply. One such case is shown here where is appears as if there are craters nested within each other. These nested craters are probably caused by changes in the strength of the target material. This usually happens when a weaker material overlies a stronger material.

We can use craters like this to tell us something about what lies below the surface. What could be causing the change in strength in the subsurface? Mars has a lot of ice in its terrain near the surface. This ice-rich layer could be the weaker material and the deeper ice-free layer could be the stronger material.

Credits: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

From redOrbit

Original Article