05-08-2012 18:44

See the rest here:

Science Chat with NASA's John Grunsfeld and JPL's Charles Elachi - Video

NASA's Curiosity rover has transmitted a low-resolution video showing the last 2 1/2 minutes of its white-knuckle dive through the Mars atmosphere, giving Earthlings a sneak peek of a spacecraft landing on another world.

As thumbnails of the video flashed on a big screen on Monday, scientists and engineers at the NASA Jet Propulsion let out "oohs" and "aahs".

The recording began with the protective heat shield falling away and ended with dust being kicked up as the rover was lowered by cables inside an ancient crater.

It was a sneak preview since it'll take some time before full-resolution frames are beamed back depending on other priorities.

The full video "will just be exquisite", said Michael Malin, the chief scientist of the instrument.

NASA celebrated the precision landing of a rover on Mars and marvelled over the mission's flurry of photographs - grainy, black-and-white images of Martian gravel, a mountain at sunset and, most exciting of all, the spacecraft's white-knuckle plunge through the red planet's atmosphere.

Curiosity, a roving laboratory the size of a compact car, landed right on target late on Sunday night after an eight-month, 566-million kilometre journey.

It parked its six wheels about 6 1/2 kilometres from its ultimate science destination - Mount Sharp rising from the floor of Gale Crater near the equator.

Extraordinary efforts were needed for the landing because the rover weighs one tonne, and the thin Martian atmosphere offers little friction to slow down a spacecraft.

Curiosity had to go from 20,920km/h to zero in seven minutes, unfurling a parachute, then firing rockets to brake. In a Hollywood-style finish, cables delicately lowered it to the ground at 3.2km/h.

See the original post:

NASA releases video of Mars rover descent

Log in to manage your products and services from The New York Times and the International Herald Tribune.

Don't have an account yet? Create an account

E-Mail or Member ID

Password

Remember Me Log In

More here:

NASA Sends First Images of Rover on Mars

PASADENA, Calif. - NASA's Curiosity rover on Monday transmitted a low-resolution video showing the last 2 1/2 minutes of its white-knuckle dive through the Mars atmosphere, giving Earthlings a sneak peek of a spacecraft landing on another world.

Go here to read the rest:

NASA welcomes striking new views from the red planet after Mars rover nails the landing

NASA celebrated the precision landing of a rover on Mars and marveled over the mission's first photographs Monday — grainy, black-and-white images of Martian gravel, a mountain at sunset and, most exciting of all, the spacecraft's white-knuckle plunge through the red planet's atmosphere.

Excerpt from:

NASA cheers Mars landing, welcomes new photos

NASA's Curiosity rover has transmitted a low-resolution video showing the last 2 1/2 minutes of its white-knuckle dive through the Martian atmosphere, giving earthlings a sneak peek of a spacecraft landing on another world.

Go here to read the rest:

NASA releases low-res video of Mars rover descent

06-08-2012 02:20 Curiosity beamed back pictures from the surface showing its wheel and its shadow. *More:

Follow this link:

NASA Mars Rover Landing: Curiosity Lands, Beams Back Pictures of Mars Surface - Video

The robotic explorer Curiosity's daring plunge through the pink skies of Mars was more than perfect. It landed with spectacular style, said a NASA scientist, describing the first images of its mechanical gymnastics.

See the article here:

Touchdown: NASA rover Curiosity lands on Mars

In an almost giddy late-night press conference, the NASA Mars laboratory Science team celebrated the Curiosity Rover's successful landing on a "nice, flat spot -- beautiful, really beautiful" on Mars. It's a patch of dusty land that's since been immortalized in a couple of low-resolution thumbnails that arrived at mission control moments after Curiosity touched down. Now there's a new pic -- and ...

Read more from the original source:

NASA: Mars Curiosity Beams First High-Res Pic

NASA's most high-tech Mars rover plunged into the red planet's atmosphere Sunday night in an attempt to safely reach the surface with a complex new landing technique.

Read the original post:

NASA rover begins nail-biting Mars plunge

PASADENA, California (Reuters) - NASA's Mars science rover Curiosity performed a daredevil descent through pink Martian skies late on Sunday to clinch an historic landing inside an ancient crater, ready to search for signs the Red Planet may once have harbored key ingredients for life. Mission controllers burst into applause and cheers as they received signals confirming that the car-sized rover ...

Original post:

NASA rover Curiosity makes historic Mars landing, beams back photos

NASA opened a new chapter in the history of interplanetary exploration on Monday when its $2.5 billion nuclear-powered robot Curiosity beamed back pictures from the surface of Mars.

See the original post:

NASA lands rover on Mars to seek signs of life

NASA may only consume 0.5 percent of the federal budget, but it generates practically all of Uncle Sam's viral marketing buzz. Never was that more apparent than on Monday morning following the successful Mars landing of Curiosity, the biggest and most advanced spacecraft ever dispatched to another planet. In an explosion of tweets, Tumbls, status updates, and blog posts, the Internet showed its ...

Go here to see the original:

NASA Is the Government's One True Viral Hit Factory

05-08-2012 08:16 NASA attempts to safely land Curiosity rover on surface of the red planet. Related Story: Mars Rover On Final Approach for Landing Tonight NASA's Mars Curiosity Rover closed in on its target today, all systems go for a landing on Mars late tonight (Monday morning at 1:31 am EDT). If there's anxiety at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., which controls the mission, one can understand. Curiosity (the mission's formal name is Mars Science Laboratory) is the largest, most expensive and most ambitious Mars probe sent by the United States in a generation. It's been a decade in the making and ran up bills of $2.5 billion. NASA is playing down expectations, but if the building blocks of life are buried in the Martian soil, Curiosity's miniature onboard chemistry laboratory is designed to pick them out. "Can we do this? Yeah, I think we can do this. I'm confident," Doug McCuistion, head of the Mars exploration program at NASA headquarters, said Saturday. "We have the A-plus team on this. They've done everything possible to ensure success, but that risk still exists." For more, click here:

More here:

NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover: '7 Minutes of Terror' Animation Video - Video

PASADENA, Calif. — NASA's next Mars rover is just hours away from its harrowing Red Planet touchdown, an unprecedented landing attempt that is leaving some of its handlers "emotionally terrified."

See the article here:

NASA on Edge for Mars Rover Landing's 'Seven Minutes of Terror'

NASA's Curiosity Rover Lands Safely on Mars

See original here:

NASA's Curiosity Rover Lands Safely on Mars

Provided NASA's 'Curiosity' Mars rover can survive an extremely difficult landing process, the biggest machine we've ever sent to Mars will spend the next two years trying to prove that life once existed on the red planet. 

Read the rest here:

NASA's 'Curiosity' Rover Landing on Mars Tonight

The most high-tech rover NASA has ever designed was speeding toward Mars on Sunday to attempt an acrobatic landing on the planet's surface.

Continued here:

NASA counting down to nail-biting Mars plunge

The spectacular landing of a car-size NASA rover on the surface of Mars late Sunday (Aug. 5) won high praise from U.S. President Barack Obama.

Read the original here:

President Barack Obama Hails NASA Mars Rover Landing

With a mixture of tense nerves and confidence, NASA counted down to the landing of its largest ever robotic rover on Mars, where it will search for signs that life may once have existed.

Link:

NASA counts down to dramatic Mars landing