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Post by rugbytoffee on Oct 7, 2019 15:39:29 GMT
The saltwater lakes that once adorned the surface of Mars were evaporating around 3.3–3.7 billion years ago, reveal salt deposits analysed by NASA's Curiosity Rover.
Curiosity — which has been exploring Mars' Gale crater — has been using its on-board laser to vaporise rock samples to determine their composition.
It found concentrations of calcium and magnesium sulfates indicating conditions that were likely more arid that those of the older rocks already analysed by Curiosity.
The findings of climatic shifts during this period matches date previously gathered through orbital observations of the planet's surface. Planetary scientist William Rapin of the California Institute of Technology and colleagues studied data collected from Mars' Gale crater by NASA's Curiosity rover.
One of the rover's missions is to determine exactly how liquid water disappeared from the Red Planet's surface.
Various salts have been detected on the surface of Mars, which researchers have interpreted as having been deposited from ancient brines — saline waters that would have become more common as the planet's climate became more arid.
Curiosity can study the composition of salts on the planet's surface using a setup called ChemCam, which uses a laser to vaporise rocks and a camera to spectrographically analyse the composition of the resulting gases. Dr Rapin and colleagues report detecting sulfate salts in 3.3–3.7 billion-year-old sedimentary rocks from the planet's so-called Hesperian period.
They found localised accumulations of calcium sulfate in the bedrock —with concentrations ranging between 30–50 weight percent — spread over the equivalent of 150 metres of vertical rock.
Alongside this, they also found a thinner layer of hydrated magnesium sulfate, with weight percents ranging from 26–36, indicative of extreme evaporation conditions.
Salts had not been found in this form — or to such an abundance — in the older Martian rocks previously analysed by the Curiosity rover. From this, the researchers have determined that these salts are traces of an period of high salinity for the crater's lake which likely occurred as the lake's water evaporates.
Thus, the researchers infer that the measurements are evidence of an interval of high salinity of the crater's lake that may have occurred as water evaporated.
'Our findings support step-wise changes in Martian climate during the Hesperian, leading to more arid and sulfate-dominated environments as previously inferred from orbital observations,' the researchers wrote in their paper.
Looking forward, Curiosity will be continuing to explore Gale crater and will examine even younger-aged rocks to shine further light on the drying of the Martian surface.
The full findings of the study were published in the journal Nature Geoscience.
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Post by rugbytoffee on Oct 22, 2019 18:41:49 GMT
NASA officials are now aiming to put humans on Mars sometime in the 2030s --and as early as 2035.
Administrator Jim Bridenstine has suggested that the new timeline is a result of the accelerated mission to the moon, as the space agency is planning a return to the lunar surface in just five years.
Officials hope the moon mission will help humans learn how to live and work in another world and prove capabilities and technology, allowing them to be prepared for the Red Planet. Bridenstine made these announcements at the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) in Washington, as he recruited partners of the International Space Station to assist with the Artemis mission -- the official name of the mission back to the moon. 'If we are accelerating the moon landing, we are accelerating the Mars landing,' said Bridenstine, NASA's Administrator, according to Space.com. 'I suggest we can do it by 2035,' he added.
In April of this year, Bridenstine announced that humans could land on Mars by 2033, following President Donald Trump's desire to return to the moon by 2024. However, at the time, Bridenstine, admitted that the agency was working on an amendment to its budget request to deal with the accelerated shift towards the Moon.
'We want to achieve a Mars landing in 2033, but in order to do that we have to accelerate other parts of the program, the Moon is a big piece of that,' the administrator told the congressional Science, Space and Technology Committee in April.
'By moving up the Moon landing four years... we can move up the Mars landing.'
But today, the NASA official seems hopeful about accelerating the mission.
'We need to learn how to live and work in another world,' Bridenstine said in Washington today.
'The moon is the best place to prove those capabilities and technologies.'
'The sooner we can achieve that objective, the sooner we can move on to Mars.'
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Post by jimmy on Oct 24, 2019 11:11:34 GMT
Imagine being chosen.
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Post by rugbytoffee on Jul 30, 2020 16:40:06 GMT
"The Mars 2020 Perseverance rover, powered by the United Launch Alliance Atlas V 541 rocket, has blasted off from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station! The liftoff went right on time, at 7:50 am EDT," NASA said.
United Launch Alliance (ULA) is the only space launch provider certified to handle RTGs, the company's president and CEO, Tory Bruno, said during NASA's live broadcast. NASA certifies the rocket, but NASA and DOE together certify the provider to carry a nuclear payload, he explained.
Perseverance will spend at least one Mars year (687 Earth days) searching for signs of past microbial life and helping scientists better understand the Martian geology and climate. During that time it will also collect rock and soil samples for a possible return to Earth. The INL-developed Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (MMRTG) will provide the rover with heat and power, providing electricity for the rover's basic operations and also keeping its tools and systems at optimal temperatures.
The MMRTG is a radioisotope power system, converting heat from the decay of plutonium-238 (Pu-238) into electrical power. It has an operational lifespan of 14 years. The Pu-238 fuel was supplied by DOE's Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Perseverance also carries a SuperCam laser, supplied by the DOE's Los Alamos National Laboratory. This piece of equipment will be able to determine the minerology, chemistry, and even molecular and atomic composition of rocks and soils by firing a laser to study targets more than 20 feet (6 metres) away, but can also function as a cleaning tool for the rover by removing dirt and sand from rock samples, allowing the rover's instruments to have a clearer view.
DOE has enabled space exploration on nearly 30 missions over the past 50 years, including the Curiosity rover which is currently on Mars, US Under Secretary for Science Paul Dabaar said. NASA and DOE are already planning for their next goal: NASA's Dragonfly mission to Saturn’s moon, Titan, in 2026, which will also be powered by DOE, he said.
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Post by rugbytoffee on Feb 19, 2021 11:46:06 GMT
Nasa's Mars Perseverance rover has landed on the red planet, the space agency has announced.
Its mission is to search for signs of ancient life, and explore and collect samples for future return to Earth from diverse environments on Mars.
Perseverance will spend the coming years scouring for signs of ancient microbial life in a mission that will bring back samples from Mars to Earth and prepare the way for future human visitors.
The research destination of the rover - a scientific laboratory the size of a car - is Jezero crater, a 28-mile-wide depression containing sediments of an ancient river delta.
Scientists know that 3.5 billion years ago, Jezero was the site of a large lake, complete with its own delta.
They believe that while the water may be long gone, somewhere within the crater, or maybe along its 2,000-foot-tall (610 metre) rim, evidence that life once existed there could be waiting.
Any hunt for these signs will include the rover's cameras, especially Mastcam-Z, which is located on the rover's mast.
It can zoom in to inspect scientifically interesting targets.
The mission's science team can task Perseverance's SuperCam instrument - also on the mast - to fire a laser at a promising target, generating a small plasma cloud that can be analysed to help determine its chemical composition.
Martian surface ready for a return mission to bring around 30 samples to Earth in the early 2030s.
Professor Sanjeev Gupta, from Imperial College London, will help Nasa oversee mission operations from a science and engineering point of view.
Professor Mark Sephton, also from Imperial, will help to identify samples that could contain evidence of past life.
Professor Caroline Smith, from the Natural History Museum, will study the mineralogy and geochemistry of the rocks found in Jezero crater.
Dr Keyron Hickman-Lewis, also from the Natural History Museum, will study the environments reflected by sedimentary rocks exposed in the crater and the potential for the preservation of ancient microbial life.
The researchers are supported by more than £400,000 in funds from the UK Space Agency (UKSA). Selected samples will be collected by drilling down to several centimetres and then sealed in sample tubes and stored on the rover.
When the rover reaches a suitable location, a cache of tubes will be dropped on the surface of Mars to be collected by the Sample Fetch Rover, being developed by Airbus in Stevenage, which will take them to the Nasa Mars Ascent vehicle.
Perseverance also carries the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, which will fly short distances from the rover in the first attempt at powered, controlled flight on another planet.
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