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Mars Base

Strange Mystery Spheres on Mars Baffle Scientists | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/range-photo-martian-rocks.html

scibyte63 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 15 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • A strange picture of odd, spherical rock formations on Mars from NASA's Opportunity rover has scientists scratching their heads over what exactly they're looking at.
  • Mars photo by Opportunity shows a close-up of a rock outcrop
  • covered in blister-like bumps that mission scientists can't yet explain
  • ...19 more annotations...
  • At first
  • the formations appear similar to so-called Martian "blueberries" — iron-rich spherical formations first seen by Opportunity in 2004 — but they actually differ in several key ways, scientist said
  • This is one of the most extraordinary pictures from the whole mission
  • Kirkwood is chock full of a dense accumulation of these small spherical objects. Of course, we immediately thought of the blueberries, but this is something different
  • never have seen such a dense accumulation of spherules in a rock outcrop on Mars."
  • The new photo by Opportunity is actually a mosaic of four images taken by a microscope-like imager on its robotic arm
  • Opportunity is currently exploring a location known as Cape York along the western rim of a giant Martian crater called Endeavour
  • Despite its advanced age, Opportunity is still pumping out new discoveries after more than eight years on Mars.
  • first spotted Martian blueberries soon after its landing in 2004
  • blueberries are actually concretions created by minerals in water that settled into sedimentary rock.
  • Opportunity has seen Martian blueberries at many of its science site
  • bumpy, spherical formations on the Kirkwood rock represent something new
  • . In Opportunity's new photo, many of the strange features are broken, revealing odd concentric circles inside
  • seem to be crunchy on the outside, and softer in the middle
  • different in concentration. They are different in structure. They are different in composition. They are different in distribution
  • science team have several theories, but none that truly stand out as the best explanation
  • Kirkwood outcrop is just one science pit stop at Cape York for Opportunity. Mission scientists have already picked out another interesting rock outcrop nearby, a pale patch that may contain tantalizing clay minerals, for possibly study after Opportunity completes its current analysis.
  • spring equinox is approaching on Mars, ensuring increasing levels of sunshine for Opportunity's solar arrays
  • "Energy production levels are comparable to what they were a full Martian year ago
Mars Base

Opportunity Discovers Clays Favorable to Martian Biology and Sets Sail for Motherlode o... - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...il-for-motherlode-of-new-clues

scibyte95 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 26 May 13 - No Cached
  • Opportunity,
  • has just discovered the strongest evidence to date for an environment favorable to ancient Martian biology
  • Opportunity’s analysis of a new rock target named “Esperance” confirmed that it is composed of a “clay that had been intensely altered by relatively neutral pH water – representing the most favorable conditions for biology that Opportunity has yet seen in the rock histories it has encountered
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • Water that moved through fractures during this rock’s history would have provided more favorable conditions for biology than any other wet environment recorded in rocks Opportunity has seen
  • Opportunity accomplished the ground breaking new discovery by exposing the interior of Esperance with her still functioning Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT) and examining a pristine patch using the microscopic camera and X-Ray spectrometer on the end of her 3 foot long robotic arm.
  • “Esperance was so important, we committed several weeks to getting this one measurement of it
  • Esperance stems from a time when the Red Planet was far warmer and wetter billions of years ago.
  • made the discovery at the conclusion of a 20 month long science expedition circling around a low ridge called “Cape York”
  • What’s so special about Esperance is that there was enough water not only for reactions that produced clay minerals, but also enough to flush out ions set loose by those reactions
  • Opportunity can clearly see the alteration
  • Esperance is unlike any rock previously investigated by Opportunity; containing far more aluminum and silica which is indicative of clay minerals and lower levels of calcium and iron.
  • Most, but not all of the rocks inspected to date by Opportunity were formed in an environment of highly acidic water
Mars Base

Opportunity rover Spied atop Martian Mountain Ridge from Orbit - Views from Above and B... - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...bit-views-from-above-and-below

scibyte121 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 20 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • NASA’s renowned Mars rover Opportunity has been spied
  • y from above and below
  • orbital view above – just released
  • ...25 more annotations...
  • The highly detailed image was freshly taken on Feb. 14 (Valentine’s Day 2014) by the telescopic High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO)
  • orbital image shows not only rover Opportunity at her location today, but
  • some of the wheel tracks created
  • as she climbed from the plains below up to near the peak of Solander Poin
  • The scene is narrowly focused on a spot barely one-quarter mile (400 meters) wide.
  • Endeavour is an impact scar created billions of years ago.
  • that infamous ‘jelly doughnut’ rock was actually the impetus for this new imaging campaign by NASA’s MRO Martian ‘Spysat.’
  • shiny 1.5 inches wide (4 centimeters)
  • , the science team decided to enlist the unparalleled capabilities of the HiRISE camera and imaging team in pursuit of answers.
  • To help solve the mystery
  • ‘Pinnacle Island’ had suddenly appeared out of nowhere in a set of before/after pictures taken by Opportunity’s cameras on Jan, 8, 2014 (Sol 3540)
  • exact same spot had been vacant of debris in photos taken barely 4 days earlier.
  • the HiRISE research team was called in to plan a new high resolution observation of the ‘Murray Ridge’ area and gather clues about the rocky riddle
  • The purpose was to “check the remote possibility that a fresh impact by an object from space might have
  • thrown this rock to its new location
  • no fresh crater impacting site was found in the new image
  • the mystery was solved at last by the rover team after Opportunity drove a short distance away from the ‘jelly doughnut’ rock
  • snapped some ‘look back’ photographs to document the ‘mysterious scene’ for further scrutiny.
  • Opportunity unknowingly ‘created’ the mystery herself when she drove over a larger rock, crushing and breaking it apart with the force from the wheels and her hefty 400 pound (185 kg) mass.
  • “Once we moved Opportunity a short distance, after inspecting Pinnacle Island, we could see directly uphill an overturned rock that has the same unusual appearance,”
  • Opportunity Deputy Principal Investigator Ray Arvidson
  • Feb 19, marks Opportunity’s 3582nd Sol or Martian Day roving Mars. She is healthy with plenty of power.
  • snapped over 188,800
  • images
  • Her total odometry stands at over 24.07 miles (38.73 kilometers) since touchdown on Jan. 24, 2004
Mars Base

NASA's Opportunity Rover Begins Year 10 on Mars | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/over-opportunity-year-ten.html

scibyte79 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 24 Jan 13 - No Cached
  • NASA's Opportunity rover landed on Mars the night of Jan. 24, 2004 PST (just after midnight EST on Jan. 25), three weeks after its twin, Spirit, touched down
  • irit stopped operating in 2010, but Opportunity is still going strong
  • The car-size Curiosity weighs about 1 ton — five times more than either Spirit or Opportunity.
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • Spirit and Opportunity were originally supposed to spend three months searching for evidence of past water activity on the Red Planet
  • The golf-cart-size robots found plenty of such signs at their separate landing sites, showing that Mars was not always the cold and arid planet we know today
  • in 2007 Spirit uncovered an ancient hydrothermal system in Gusev Crater, suggesting that two key ingredients for life as we know it — liquid water and an energy source — were both present in some parts of Mars long ago
  • Opportunity is currently inspecting clay deposits along the rim of Mars' huge Endeavour Crater. Clays form in relatively neutral (as opposed to acidic or basic) water, so the area may once have been capable of supporting primitive microbial life
  • Spirit finally stopped communicating with Earth in March 2010, after getting mired in soft sand and failing to maneuver into a position that would allow it to slant its solar panels toward the sun over the 2009-2010 Martian winter. NASA declared the rover dead in 2011
  • Opportunity keeps chugging along. It has put 22.03 miles (35.46 kilometers) on its odometer since landing on Mars
  • just 1 mile (1.6 km) off the all-time record for most ground covered on the surface of another world
  • Soviet Union's unmanned Lunokhod 2 rover holds that mark, traveling 23 miles (37 km) on the moon back in 1973
Mars Base

Mars Rover Opportunity Exploring Possibly Habitable Ancient Environment | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/ortunity-endeavour-crater.html

scibyte74 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 05 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • Opportunity rover,
  • is currenlty studying clay deposits on the rim of the Red Planet's Endeavour Crater.
  • clays imply that the area was exposed to relatively neutral — as opposed to harshly acidic or basic — water long ago,
  • ...10 more annotations...
  • clearly show us a chemistry that would've been suitable for life at the Opportunity site
  • Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft spotted them from orbit, leading the rover team to point the golf-cart-size robot toward its current location, which is known as Matijevic Hill.
  • From orbit, we have seen the unambiguous infrared spectral signature of clays along the rim of Endeavour Crater
  • Opportunity has already circumnavigated Matijevic Hill
  • ikely stay at Matijevic Hill for a while, trying to understand how the clays were laid down billions of years ago
  • Opportunity is still going strong. It has some age-related issues, such as an arthritic arm, but the rover remains in good health
  • Part of the work will involve investigating mysterious tiny spherules Opportunity has discovered embedded in the clay matrix
  • initially thought the BB-size gray spheres were similar to the iron-rich "blueberries"
  • initial analyses have shown that's not the case, leading Squyres to dub them "newberries."
  • The team isn't sure exactly what the newberries are, or how they formed
Mars Base

Opportunity Scaling Solander Mountain Searching for Science and Sun - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...-searching-for-science-and-sun

scibyte105 opportunity SpacecraftUpdae

shared by Mars Base on 30 Sep 13 - No Cached
  • Opportunity rover has begun
  • the ascent of Solander Point, the first mountain she will ever climb, after roving the Red Planet for nearly a decade
  • l Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO)
  • ...18 more annotations...
  • recently succeeded in collecting “really interesting” new high resolution survey scans of Solander Point
  • The new MRO data are crucial for targeting the rover’s driving in coming months.
  • Solander Point is an eroded ridge located along the western rim of huge Endeavour Crater where Opportunity is currently located
  • it will take some time to review and interpret the bountiful new spectral data and decide on a course of action
  • Expect that analysis to take a “couple of weeks”
  • The new CRISM survey from Mars orbit will vastly improve the spectral resolution – from 18 meters per pixel down to 5 meters per pixel
  • Another important point about ‘Solander Point’ is that it also offers northerly tilted slopes that will maximize the power generation during Opportunity’s upcoming 6th Martian winter
  • winter’s last six full months
  • The rover recently investigated an outcrop target called ‘Poverty Bush’.
  • deployed her 3 foot long (1 meter) robotic arm and collected photos with the Microscopic Imager (MI)
  • collected several days of spectral measurements with the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS).
  • There are several geologic units that are overlapping
  • Opportunity is sitting on the contact
  • the east side of the contact are rocks maybe a billion years older than those on the west side of the contact
  • So far
  • has snapped over 184,500
  • images
  • total odometry stands at over 23.82 miles (38.34 kilometers) since touchdown on Jan. 24, 2004
Mars Base

Opportunity rover rolling again after fifth Mars winter - 0 views

phys.org/...rtunity-rover-mars-winter.html

scibyte46 mars opportunity rover

shared by Mars Base on 10 May 12 - No Cached
  • NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity drove about 12 feet (3.67 meters) on May 8, 2012, after spending 19 weeks working in one place while solar power was too low for driving during the Martian winter.
  • While at Greeley Haven for the past 19 weeks, Opportunity used the spectrometers and microscopic imager on its robotic arm to inspect more than a dozen targets within reach on the outcrop
  • Radio Doppler signals from the stationary rover during the winter months served an investigation of the interior of Mars by providing precise information about the planet's rotation
  • ...13 more annotations...
  • Opportunity will look back with its panoramic camera to acquire multi-filter imaging of the surface targets it studied on Greeley Haven.
  • rover team will also check that the power supply still looks sufficient with the rover at a reduced tilt.
  • first drive since Dec. 26, 2011, took the rover about 12 feet (3.67 meters) northwest and downhill on Tuesday, May 8.
  • exploring the Meridiani region of Mars since landing in January 2004
  • arrived at the Cape York section of the rim of Endeavour Crater in August 2011
  • studying rock and soil targets on Cape York since then.
  • next goal is a few meters farther north on Cape York, at a bright-looking patch of what may be dust
  • haven't been able to see much dust in Meridiani
  • Endeavour Crater offers Opportunity a setting for plenty of productive
  • crater is 14 miles (22 kilometers) in diameter
  • Unless wind removes some dust from Opportunity's solar array, allowing more sunlight to reach the solar cells, the rover will need to work during the next few weeks at locations with no southward slope
  • kept a northward tilt of about 15 degrees in recent months at its winter haven
  • favorably angled toward the winter sun low in the northern sky
Mars Base

Mystery of the Martian 'Jelly Doughnut' Rock - Solved - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...ian-jelly-doughnut-rock-solved

scibyte121 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 17 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • It turns out that the six wheeled Opportunity unknowingly ‘created’ the mystery herself when she drove over a larger rock, crushing it with the force from the wheels and her 400 pound (185 kg) mass.
  • Fragments were sent hurtling across the summit of the north facing Solander Point
  • One piece unwittingly rolled downhill.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • Pinnacle Island measures only about 1.5 inches wide (4 centimeters) with a noticeable white rim and red center
  • The Martian riddle was finally resolved when Opportunity roved a tiny stretch and took some look back photographs to document the ‘mysterious scene’ for further scrutiny
  • “Once we moved Opportunity a short distance, after inspecting Pinnacle Island, we could see directly uphill an overturned rock that has the same unusual appearance,” said Opportunity Deputy Principal Investigator
  • New pictures showed another fragment of the rock – dubbed ‘Stuart Island’ – eerily similar in appearance to the ‘Pinnacle Island’ doughnut.
Mars Base

Mars Rover Breaks U.S. Record for Off-Planet Driving: Scientific American - 0 views

www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm

scibyte94 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 18 May 13 - No Cached
  •  Opportunity rover drove 263 feet (80 meters) on
  • (May 15), bringing its total odometry on the Red Planet to 22.220 miles (35.760 kilometers
  • Opportunity still trails another robot for the international distance record
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • The Soviet Union's remote-controlled Lunokhod 2 rover traveled 23 miles (37 km) on the moon in 1973.
  • golf-cart-size Opportunity
  • landed on Mars in January 2004 on three-month missions to search for signs of past water activity on the Red Planet
  • Spirit stopped communicating with Earth in 2010 and was declared dead a year later
  • Opportunity had been working at a section of the rim dubbed "Cape York" since the middle of 2011
  • this week it began trekking toward an area called Solander Point, which lies 1.4 miles (2.2 km) away
  • Opportunity's handlers have said they'd like to add this milestone to the rover's resume, though science remains the mission's top priority
Mars Base

Self-Portrait by Freshly Cleaned Opportunity Mars Rover in March 2014 - 0 views

photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/...PIA18079

scibyte128 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 28 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • This self-portrait of
  • Opportunity shows effects of wind events that had cleaned much of the accumulated dust off the rover's solar panels
  • It combines multiple frames taken
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • from March 22 to March 24, 2014, the 3,611th through 3,613th Martian days, or sols, of Opportunity's work on Mars.
  • With the cleaner arrays and lengthening winter days, Opportunity's solar arrays were generating more than 620 watt-hours per day in mid-April 2014, compared to less than 375 watt-hours per day in January 2014
  • Mars Base on 28 Apr 14
     
    Self-Portrait by Freshly Cleaned Opportunity Mars Rover in March 2014
  • Mars Base on 28 Apr 14
     
    Self-Portrait by Freshly Cleaned Opportunity Mars Rover in March 2014
Mars Base

Opportunity Peers Out from 'Pillinger Point' - Honoring British Beagle 2 Mars Scientist... - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...ist-where-ancient-water-flowed

scibyte135 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 17 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Opportunity rover has reached a long sought after region of aluminum-rich clay mineral outcrops at a new Endeavour crater ridge now “named ‘Pillinger Point’ after Colin Pillinger the Principal Investigator for the [British] Beagle 2 Mars lander”
  • ‘Pillinger Point’ – where ancient water once flowed billions of year ago.
  • The Beagle 2 lander was built to search for signs of life on Mars
  • ...10 more annotations...
  • new photo mosaic above captured by Opportunity peering out from ‘Pillinger Point’ ridge on June 5, 2014 (Sol 3684) and showing a panoramic view around the eroded mountain ridge and into vast Endeavour crater
  • crater spans 14 miles (22 kilometers) in diameter
  • For the past several months, the six wheeled robot has been trekking southwards from Solander towards the exposures of aluminum-rich clays
  • The rover mission scientists ultimate goal is travel even further south to ‘Cape Tribulation’ which holds a motherlode of the ‘phyllosilicate’ clay minerals
  • “The idea is to characterize the outcrops as we go and then once we reach the valley travel quickly to Cape Tribulation and the smectite valley, which is still ~2 km to the south of the present rover location,” Arvidson
  • Prof. Ray Arvidson, Deputy Principal Investigator for the rover
  • June 16, marks Opportunity’s 3696th Sol or Martian Day
  • snapped over 193,400
  • images
  • odometry stands at over 24.51 miles (39.44 kilometers) since touchdown on Jan. 24, 2004
Mars Base

Mars Rover Opportunity Nears Nebulous Off-Planet Driving Record | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/pportunity-driving-record.html

scibyte97 scibyte98 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 08 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • The all-time mark is held by the Soviet Union's remote-controlled Lunokhod 2 rover, which traveled about 23 miles (37 kilometers) on the moon back in 1973
  • Opportunity
  • racked up 22.75 miles (36.61 km) on Mars
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • it's unclear
  • the old moon rover's mark is imprecise
  • 37 kilometers is highly uncertain
  • Scientists now have high-quality images of the moon taken by spacecraft such as NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, and some of these photos even show Lunokhod 2's tracks
  • researchers could nail down the longstanding off-planet driving record if they wanted to
  • But he and his fellow Opportunity team members have no plans to do this work themselves
Mars Base

Mars Rover Opportunity Back in Action After Glitch | Mars Solar Conjunction | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/-rover-exits-standby-mode.html

scibyte92 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 02 May 13 - No Cached
  • Mars rover Opportunity has overcome a glitch that put the robot into standby mode late last month
  • ortunity apparently put itself into standby automode — in which it maintains power balance but waits for instructions from the ground — on April 22, after sensing a problem during a routine camera check, mission officials said.
  • rover's handlers didn't notice the problem until April 27, when Opportunity got back in touch after a nearly three-week communications moratorium
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Opportunity's controllers prepared a new set of commands on April 29 designed to get things back to normal, and the fix has apparently worked
Mars Base

Distance Traveled, Extraterrestrial Vehicles | Wheeled Vehicles, Moon & Mars | Space.com - 0 views

www.space.com/es-driven-on-other-worlds.html

scibyte79 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 24 Jan 13 - No Cached
  • So far, robotic rovers have reached out to the moon and Mars, with astronauts actually driving a lunar car on the moon during NASA's Apollo program
  • Leading the pack is an oldie of a space mission: the Soviet-era Lunakhod 2. This huge moon rover drove 23 miles (37 kilometers) on the moon during its 1973 mission and is currently the world champion for off-world driving, winning the gold medal
  • In second place
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • is NASA's Apollo 17 moon rover, which was driven by astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt in 1972
  • 22.3 miles (35.89 km) during their mission, which was the last moon landing of NASA's Apollo program.
  • bronze medal for space driving goes to NASA's Mars rover Opportunity,
  • driving across the plains of Meridiani Planum on the Red Planet since 2004
  • Opportunity has driven more than 22.03 miles (35.46 km) and is still going today.
  • The latest to enter the race is Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity, which is just getting started with only 0.4 mile (0.7 km) traveled so far.
Mars Base

Opportunity Gets a View From The Edge - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...nity-gets-a-view-from-the-edge

scibyte48 mars opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 23 May 12 - No Cached
  • currently the only operational manmade object on the surface of Mars… or any other planet besides Earth, for that matter
  • until the arrival of Mars Science Laboratory at Gale Crater this August.
  • presented in false color to emphasize differences in materials such as dark dunes on the crater floor.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Since landing in the Meridiani region of Mars in January 2004, Opportunity has driven 21.4 miles (34.4 kilometers).
Mars Base

Opportunity Rover Gets Power Boost from Wind Events on Mars - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...-boost-from-wind-event-on-mars

scibyte125 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 29 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • Opportunity rover on Mars has gotten a 70% boost in power over the past few weeks
  • A good portion of that comes from the fact that its springtime in Mars’ southern hemisphere where Oppy now sits
  • so the Sun is now shining longer and higher in the sky.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • 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.
Mars Base

Mars Exploration Rover Mission: The Mission - 0 views

marsrover.nasa.gov/...status.html

scibyte67 opportunity

shared by Mars Base on 13 Oct 12 - No Cached
  • Opportunity is conducting
  • science campaign at a location where orbital observations show the presence of clay minerals
  • rover is positioning near a large, light-toned block of exposed rock outcrop, called "Whitewater Lake."
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Sol 3092 (Oct. 4, 2012), the rover moved, likely the smallest amount ever, with less than an inch (1 centimeter) of total motion in order to position the robotic arm favorable on a dark-rind surface target
  • n Sol 3094 (Oct. 6, 2012), Opportunity performed a 15-minute brush of a surface target with the Rock Abrasion Tool (RAT)
  • followed with the collection of a Microscopic Imager (MI) mosaic
  • then the placement of the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) for an overnight integration
  • Total odometry is 21.78 miles (35,050.07 meters)
Mars Base

Opportunity Rover Glimpses Conditions Suitable for Life - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...s-conditions-suitable-for-life

scibyte74

shared by Mars Base on 05 Dec 12 - No Cached
  • first glimpse ever at conditions on ancient Mars that clearly show us a chemistry that would have been suitable for life.”
  • both the MER rovers have found evidence of past water on Mars, all indications are that it would have been very acidic
  • “battery-acid kind of numbers making it very challenging for life
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Newly found clays that are sprinkled with two different kinds of previously unseen features point to a different type of water “that you could drink,”
  • Orbital data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
  • originally led the MER team to Endeavour Crater, the huge crater where Opportunity is now traversing around the rim.
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