For nearly six years, Spirit roamed Mars, experiencing a number of close calls. In fact, the solar-powered robot has driven backwards since its right front wheel jammed in 2006.
Spirit’s most challenging ordeal yet began in April, when it got bogged down in a patch of loose soil on the edge of a small crater. As scientists plotted Spirit’s escape for months, they dubbed the area Troy, after the city the ancient Greeks struggled against in myth for a decade.
As frustrating as Spirit’s dilemma has proven, it has yielded an unexpected insight.
“Spirit had to get stuck to make its next discovery,” said geologist Ray Arvidson of the Washington University in St. Louis. “The rover’s spinning wheels have broken through a crust, and we’ve found something supremely interesting in the disturbed soil.”
Mars Rover Makes Discovery While Spinning Its Wheels
Mars Phoenix Lander Might Rise from the Dead
NASA’s Phoenix Mars lander lived up to its name – rising from the ashes of an earlier failed Mars landing attempt to go on to a successful mission. But now the Mars-bound probe has a chance to rise from the dead itself.
Touching down in the martian northern plains on May 25, 2008, Phoenix exceeded its original three-month mission, lasting five months and, quite literally, dug up a number of scientific findings including – perhaps – liquid water.
Eventually Phoenix succumbed to the bitterly cold winter on Mars.
But now scientists are warming up to the prospect of re-establishing contact with Phoenix.
NASA Finally Resurrects Sick Mars Orbiter
NASA has finally revived its most powerful Mars orbiter from its months-long slumber due to a computer glitch.
The spacecraft, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, slipped into a protective “safe mode” in late August, stalling its science observations but safeguarding the $720 million probe from further damage. Instead of rousing the orbiter within a few days, as in past glitches, NASA engineers spent months trying to find the source of the probe’s inexplicable computer rebooting malfunctions.
“The patient is out of danger, but more steps have to be taken to get it back on its feet,” said Jim Erickson, the spacecraft’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.
How to Protect Mars Samples on Earth
A returning spacecraft may someday hurtle through Earth’s atmosphere bearing evidence of life from Mars. But scientists won’t casually crack open the precious payload in any old laboratory. They will need a specially-designed building that not only protects the Martian samples from terrestrial contamination, but also prevents any Martian material or organisms from escaping into Earth’s biosphere.
Such a Mars sample return mission could signal a huge scientific coup for understanding the red planet’s ability to harbor life, and so NASA launched the initial phases of a sample return mission in the late 1990s. Programmatic considerations, including technical and budgetary concerns, killed the mission planning early on, but the U.S. space agency continued to study what type of sample return facility (SRF) might become necessary for such a mission.
Now NASA’s Mars team has released the results of that study. Three architectural firms drew up plans for how humans and robots could handle extraterrestrial samples within special facilities.
Stuck Mars Rover Finally Budges, a Little
NASA’s stuck Mars rover Spirit took a tiny step Thursday, its first progress in months, during the latest attempt to extricate the robot from deep Martian sand.
On Thursday, Spirit inched forward slightly after its second attempt to drive out of the patch of sandy soil called Troy, in which it has been mired since April.
The rover successfully completed the first of two commands to spin its wheels for a period equivalent to driving 8.2 feet (2.5 meters). The attempt moved Spirit’s center forward by about half an inch (1.2 cm), left by about 0.3 inches (7 mm), and about 0.2 inches (4 mm) down.
NASA to Test Drills for Cutting Ice on Mars
Scientists with NASA’s IceBite project are heading this week for University Valley, a hanging valley perched more than 1600 feet (more than 1 mile) above sea level in Antarctica’s McMurdo Dry Valleys. Their objective: to test a set of ice-penetrating drills and select one for use on a future mission to the Martian polar north, the same region of the planet that NASA’s Phoenix lander investigated in 2008.
The northern polar region on Mars is of particular interest to scientists because it once may have provided a habitable environment for life. Due to variations over time in Mars’ orbit and the angle at which it tilts toward the sun, Mars’ north pole received much more sunlight several million years ago than it does today — enough sunlight to produce liquid water, enough liquid water to support life. Indeed NASA’s Phoenix lander found evidence in Martian arctic soil that liquid water had been present there in the past.
NASA Unveils Plan to Free Stuck Mars Rover Spirit
Months of planning are finally coming to fruition: NASA engineers are ready to begin trying to maneuver the plucky rover Spirit out of its sandy trap on Mars.
Mission managers are sober about the prospects for freeing Spirit. They will send the first commands to the rover to try to move on Monday, “but this process could take quite awhile if it’s possible at all,” said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
The new plan will command Spirit to try to backtrack and use the tracks it left before getting stuck to make the escape attempt.
Spirit has been stuck in a spot of soft, sandy dirt (called “Troy”) on the Martian surface since April when it broke through what mission scientists call a “dirt crust” — a hard top layer of dirt disguising a layer of soft, talcum powder-like material below.
“Spirit did the equivalent of falling through the ice over a frozen pond,” McCuistion said.
Device Like ‘Star Trek’ Replicator Might Fly on Space Station
Space explorers have yet to get their hands on the replicator of “Star Trek” to create anything they might require. But NASA has developed a technology that could enable lunar colonists to carry out on-site manufacturing on the moon, or allow future astronauts to create critical spare parts during the long trip to Mars.
The method, called electron beam freeform fabrication (EBF3), uses an electron beam to melt metals and build objects layer by layer. Such an approach already promises to cut manufacturing costs for the aerospace industry, and could pioneer development of new materials. It has also thrilled astronauts on the International Space Station by dangling the possibility of designing new tools or objects, researchers said.
Bad Weather Delays Launch Test of NASA’s New Rocket
Bad weather and a series of unlucky events thwarted repeated attempts by NASA to launch the prototype Ares I-X rocket on a test flight Tuesday.
Launch teams tried to launch the rocket several times over the course of four hours, but clouds, winds and the threat of rain prevented the flight. NASA’s next chance to launch the untested rocket comes Wednesday.
“We had some opportunities, we just didn’t get there – the weather didn’t cooperate,” said launch director Ed Mango.
Mars Caves Might Protect Microbes (or Astronauts)
series of newly discovered depressions on the Martian surface could be the entrances to a cave system on the red planet.
Hints of subsurface tunnels have been found in images of Mars before, but the new evidence is more suggestive, said Glen Cushing, a physicist with the U.S. Geological Survey who discovered the possible caves.
Such a subsurface system could provide shelter to future Mars-visiting astronauts, as well as a protective habitat to any potential past or present Martian microbes, Cushing said.