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In 1959, Rhesus monkey Abel and squirrel monkey Baker, both female, were launched for a brief suborbital space flight in the nose cone of Jupiter Missile AM-18. They reached 300 miles altitude, and travelled 1500 miles at speeds over 10,000 mph. Heart rate and sounds, body temperature, blood pressure and radiation were monitored, plus muscle performance by electromyogram. Abel was trained to tap a switch when a red light flashed, to collect data on performance. After the mission, their successful recovery was the first for living beings. The monkeys survived the flight. Afterwards Able died during anesthesia as doctors were about to remove an electrode from under her skin. Baker died of kidney failure in 1984 at age 27.

several recent gusts of wind – or perhaps small dust devils – have cleaned much of the dust off the rover’s solar panels.

The rover team reported that between Sols 3605 and 3606 (March 15 and March 16, 2014), there was a dust cleaning event

resulted in about a 10% improvement in power production to 574 watt-hours

another cleaning event this week has put the power output to 615 watt-hours.

In 1871, Mary Florence Potts of Ottumwa, Iowa patented the "Mrs. Potts' sad iron (No.113,448). The invention is a detachable handle for pressing irons. Thus a person could heat a number of iron bodies on a stove, using each in turn with one handle. It was widely manufactured and licensed in the U.S. and Europe with advertising featuring her picture. The body of the iron was cast hollow and was later filled with an insulating material, such as plaster of Paris, cement or clay. Mrs. Potts claimed in her patent that this material held the heat longer so that more garments could be ironed without reheating the iron. Three irons, one handle and one stand were sold as a set. Mrs. Potts' iron is well known by antique dealers and collectors

That instrument provides information about the target's composition by analysis of the sparks of plasma generated by the energy of the laser beam striking the target

This view combines eight separate MAHLI exposures, taken at different focus settings to show the entire scene in focus

The exposures were taken after dark on the 628th Martian day, or sol, of Curiosity's work on Mars (May 13, 2014)

MAHLI includes light-emitting diodes as well as a color camera.

Using the instrument's own lighting yields an image of the hole's interior with less shadowing than would be seen in a sunlit image

The camera's inspection of the interior of the hole provides documentation about what the drill bit passed through as it penetrated the rock -- for example, to see if it cut through any mineral veins or visible layering

engineers scour the Dumont Dunes area and look for the best spot to practice driving over dunes like those Curiosity may drive over on Mars

a course of sand ripples for the Scarecrow rover to drive over. On Mars, the Curiosity rover may cross similar sand ripples on its way to Mount Sharp

Engineers test the rover’s driving skills on soft sand ripples