SciByte

Technical Progress The Learning Curve

reliminary evaluation of the spacecraft and its systems so as to better understand it.

Most of the best information that we have been able to find has been from the people who worked on the project in the 1980's when the spacecraft was fully operational

This summer, you will get that chance to send a message to other worlds.

leaders of an initiative called New Horizons Message Initiative, announced

at the Smithsonian Future Is Here Festival in Washington, D.C., that NASA has agreed to upload a digital crowd-sourced message to the New Horizons spacecraft

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover used the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) instrument on its robotic arm to illuminate and record this nighttime view of the sandstone rock target "Windjana."

The rover had previously drilled a hole to collect sample material from the interior of the rock and then zapped a series of target points inside the hole with the laser of the rover's Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument

The hole is 0.63 inch (1.6 centimeters) in diameter.

NASA’s rover Curiosity said ‘Goodbye Kimberley’ having fulfilled her objectives of drilling into a cold red sandstone slab

sampling the

grey colored interior and pelting the fresh bore hole with a pinpoint series of parting laser blasts

Original mission: International Sun/Earth Explorer 3 (ISEE-3)

to investigate solar-terrestrial relationships at the outermost boundaries of the Earth's magnetosphere

to examine in detail the structure of the solar wind near the Earth and the shock wave that forms the interface between the solar wind and Earth's magnetosphere

30 years later and documents and magnetic tapes have predictably disappeared.

The software and hardware to program, command and transmit to ISEE-3 are long gone

An independent team of engineers

Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover shows the rock target "Windjana" and its immediate surroundings after inspection of the site by the rover

The drilling of a test hole and a sample collection hole produced the mounds of drill cuttings that are markedly less red than the other visible surfaces

The open hole from sample collection is 0.63 inch (1.6 centimeters) in diameter. It was drilled on Sol 621 (May 5, 2014).

Mars landing

In 1971, the U.S.S.R. Mars 3 was launched. It arrived at Mars on December 2, 1971. The lander was released from the Mars 3 orbiter and became the first spacecraft to land successfully on Mars. It failed after relaying 20 seconds of video data to the orbiter. The Mars 3 orbiter returned data until Aug 1972, sending measurements of surface temperature and atmospheric composition. The first USSR Mars probe was launched 10 Oct 1960, but it failed to reach earth orbit. The next four USSR probes, including Mars 1, also failed. The USA Mariner 3 Mars Flyby attempt in 1964 failed when its solar panels did not open. USA's Mariners 4, 6, and 7 successfully returned Mars photos. Also in 1971, the USSR Mars 2 lander crashed.

Animals in space

Einstein's relativity theory proved

In 1919, a solar eclipse permitted observation of the bending of starlight passing through the sun's gravitational field, as predicted by Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. Separate expeditions of the Royal Astronomical Society travelled to Brazil and off the west coast of Africa. Both made measurements of the position of stars visible close to the sun during a solar eclipse. These observations showed that, indeed, the light of stars was bent as it passed through the gravitational field of the sun. This was a key prediction of Albert Einstein's theory that gravity affected energy as in addition to the familiar effect on matter. The verification of predictions of Einstein's theory, proved during the solar eclipse was a dramatic landmark scientific event.

Mars probe

In 1971, the U.S. Mars space probe Mariner 9 blasted off from Cape Kennedy, Florida. It carried cameras, infrared spectrometer and radiometer, ultraviolet spectrometer, radio occultation and celestial mechanics instruments. On 13 Nov 1971, it entered orbit as the first artificial satellite of Mars. After waiting for a month-long planet-wide dust storm to clear, it began compiling a global mosaic of high-quality images for 100% of the Martian surface. The photos showed gigantic volcanoes, a grand canyon stretching 4,800 kilometers (3,000 miles) and relics of ancient riverbeds that were carved in the landscape of this seemingly dry and dusty planet. It also sent the first closeup pictures of the two Martian moons, Phobos and Deimos.

Donati comet

In 1858, the Donati Comet was first seen and named after its discoverer, Giovanni Battista Donati, at Florence. It was the second-brightest comet of the nineteenth century It reached perihelion on 30 Sep 1858. When nearest the earth on 9 Oct 1858, it was about 0.5 AU away, and had developed a scimitar-shaped triple tail. At that time, its very prominent dust tail had with an apparent length of 50°, more than half the distance from the horizon to the zenith, a linear distance of over 72 million km (about 45 million mi). It was the first comet to be photographed. With an orbital period estimated at more than 2000 years, it will not return until about the year 4000. An astronomical unit, AU, equals 93 million miles, the Sun-Earth distance.

Wednesday, May 28

New Moon

(exact at 2:40 p.m. EDT)