Daily Archives: January 17, 2021

Mars was very bright in October, but has faded since then, as the red planet is now over 100 million miles away. Despite that, Mars is still easily found high in the southern Rochester evening sky. Just look for the brightest star-like object in that part of the sky with a distinctive orange-red hue.

If youre still unsure youre looking at Mars in the southern sky, the moon will confirm it for you this coming Wednesday evening. The moon will be parked just below the red planet in a very lovely celestial hugging.

Unfortunately, Mars is no longer much of a telescope target because its just so far away. Even with a larger scope, youll only see a reddish dot. However, with a small telescope, you can use Mars to find the planet George, currently over 1.8 billion miles from Earth. Planet George will be the next brightest star-like object you come across below and a little left of Mars. You might see that it has a pale green glow to it. Thats George.

If youre wondering why you havent heard of the planet George, that's because that was the original name of the planet we now know as Uranus, the seventh planet out from the sun. Its so far away that it takes 84 years to orbit our sun. Uranus is a giant planet, a gaseous globe made of mainly hydrogen, over 31,000 miles in diameter. For comparison, Mars is only 4,000 miles in diameter.

So why was Uranus originally called George? When the famous English astronomer Sir William Herschel discovered his new planet in 1781, he named it George. The name George didnt sit well with other astronomers worldwide, so George's official name was changed to Uranus, after the Greek god who was the father of Zeus, the king of the gods. Personally, I kind of like the name George!

Meanwhile, just above and a little to the right of Mars and George is a male sheep, the small but distinctive constellation Aries the Ram. Three moderately bright stars outline what kind of looks like the horn of a ram.

The two brightest stars are Hamal and Sheratan. Hamal is a humongous star, over 14 times the diameter of our own sun and almost 100 times more luminous! Hamal is over 850 trillion miles, or 66 light-years, away from Earth. Its so far away that the light you see from Hamal today left that star back in 1956, when yours truly was born.

Aries is one of the constellations that make up the zodiac 12 constellations that stretch in a band across the night sky. The zodiac band runs about 8 degrees on either side of the suns apparent path among the stars as Earth orbits the sun. Since all of the planets in our solar system, including Earth, orbit the sun in nearly the same mathematical plane, give or take a few degrees, the planets in our sky are always found somewhere in the zodiac band at any given time. Such is the case now with Mars and George, or Uranus if you prefer!

Not far away from Mars, Uranus and Aries is an incredibly bright array of stars that I'll tell you about next week.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul and is author of the book, Stars, a Month by Month Tour of the Constellations published by Adventure Publications. Send questions to mikewlynch@comcast.net.

The Rochester Astronomy Club welcomes new members and puts on public star parties. Their website is rochesterskies.org.

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Mars meets the planet George with a sheep watching - PostBulletin.com

Since the 1960s and 70s, scientists have come to view Mars as something of a dead planet. As the first close-up images from orbit and the surface came in, previous speculation about canals, water, and a Martian civilization were dispelled. Subsequent studies also revealed that the geological activity that created features like the Tharsis Mons region (especially Olympus Mons) and Valles Marineris had ceased long ago.

However, in the past few decades, robotic missions have found ample evidence that Mars is still an active place. A recent indication was an image taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), which showed relatively fresh landslides in a crater near Nili Fossae. This area is part of the Syrtis Major region and is located just north of the Jezero Crater (where the Perseverance rover will be landing in six weeks!)

The landslide was captured as a part of a larger image (shown below) acquired by the MROs Context Camera (CTX) on September 21st, 2018. The image covers an area that measures close to 5 km (3 mi) across and was taken while the MRO was 284 km (177 mi) above the surface. From all indications, this appears to have been the result of material in the crater wall becoming unstable.

The CTX is designed to provide large-scale background views of the terrain around smaller rock and mineral targets that are studied by other instruments on the MRO like the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) and the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM). It is also responsible for taking mosaic images of large areas to help with landing site selection for future missions.

Last, but not least, the CTX is responsible for monitoring locations on the Martian surface for possible changes over time. That is precisely what this image showed inside a crater wall near Nili Fossae, which experienced an infall of material since it was last photographed. The HiRISE camera also noted a similar infall of wall material on the craters other side.

These features are the result of what geologists characterize as mass wasting processes (or slope processes). This term is rather broad and deals with the downhill movement of rocks and debris, including large landslides, debris avalanches, rockfalls, debris flows, and soil creep. On Mars, previous images have shown a full range of these activities, ranging from giant rock avalanches to tiny slumps and single rockfalls.

As noted, the crater captured in the CTX image lies just northwest of the Jezero Crater, which is the landing site of the Perseverance rover. This site was selected because of the delta fan located near the western wall of the crater. On Earth, these features form in the presence of moving water which slowly deposit sedimentary material over time.

Like many features in the Gale Crater, which the Curiosity rover has been studying since it landed there in 2012, this feature is evidence that Mars had flowing water on its surface billions of years ago in the form of rivers, lakes, and even a large ocean that covered its Northern Lowlands. If life also emerged in this period, then one of the most likely places the fossilized remains would be is within delta fans.

Regardless of whether or not life once existed on Mars (or still does!) it is clear that planet is very much alive. Its geological features are a testament to both the past and present forces that actively shape it. Understanding these forces and the affect they have on the landscape are an essential part of our efforts to characterize the Martian environment (and maybe even live there someday).

Further Reading: University of Arizona

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Mars is Still an Active World. Heres a Landslide in Nili Fossae - Universe Today

The Mars 2020 Perseverance rover, which has started its approach to the Red Planet, will help answer the next logical question in Mars exploration.

With only about 50 million miles (80 million kilometers) left to go in its 293-million-mile (471-million-kilometer) journey, NASAs Mars 2020 Perseverance rover is nearing its new planetary home. The spacecraft has begun its approach to the Red Planet and in 43 days, on February 18, 2021, Perseverance will blaze through Mars atmosphere at about 12,100 mph (19,500 kph), touching down gently on the surface about seven minutes later.

Were working on our last adjustments to put Perseverance in perfect position to land in one of the most interesting places on Mars, said Fernando Abilleira, deputy mission manager at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. The team cant wait to put these wheels in some Martian dirt.

In a clean room at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, engineers observed the first driving test for NASAs Mars 2020 rover on December 17, 2019. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Built and managed by JPL for NASA, Perseverance will be joining another rover and lander currently at work on Mars, with several orbiters in the skies above. What sets this six-wheeled robot apart?

1. Perseverance is searching for signs of ancient life.

While the surface of Mars is a frozen desert today, scientists have learned from previous NASA missions that the Red Planet once hosted running water and warmer environments at the surface that could have supported microbial life.

We want Perseverance to help us answer the next logical question: Are there actually signs of past microbial life on Mars? said Katie Stack Morgan, deputy project scientist at JPL. This demanding goal means sending the most sophisticated robotic scientist yet to Mars.

To tackle this question, which is key in the field of astrobiology, Perseverance carries a new suite of cutting-edge science instruments. Two of them will play a particularly important role in the search for potential signs of past life: SHERLOC (short for Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals), which can detect organic matter and minerals, and PIXL (short for Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry), which maps the chemical composition of rocks and sediments. The instruments will allow scientists to analyze these features together at a higher level of detail than any Mars rover has achieved before.

This illustration shows NASAs Mars 2020 spacecraft carrying the Perseverance rover as it approaches Mars. Credit: NASA/JPL-Catech

Perseverance will also use some instruments to gather science data from a distance: Mastcam-Zs cameras can zoom in on rock textures from as far away as a soccer field, while SuperCam will use a laser to zap rock and regolith (broken rock and dust) to study their composition in the resulting vapor. RIMFAX (short for Radar Imager for Mars Subsurface Experiment) will use radar waves to probe geological features underground.

2. The rover is landing in a place with a high potential for finding these signs of past microbial life.

Terrain that is interesting to scientists can be challenging to land on. Thanks to new technologies that enable Perseverance to target its landing site more accurately and to autonomously avoid landing hazards, the spacecraft can safely touch down in a place as intriguing as Jezero Crater, a 28-mile-wide (45-kilometer-wide) basin that has steep cliffs, sand dunes, and boulder fields.

NASAs Perseverance rover completes its journey to Mars on Feb. 18, 2021. To reach the surface of the Red Planet, it has to survive the harrowing final phase known as Entry, Descent, and Landing. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

More than 3.5 billion years ago, a river there flowed into a body of water about the size of Lake Tahoe, depositing sediments in a fan shape known as a delta. The Perseverance science team believes this ancient river delta and lake deposits could have collected and preserved organic molecules and other potential signs of microbial life.

3. Perseverance is also collecting important data about Mars geology and climate.

Context is everything. Mars orbiters have been collecting images and data from Jezero Crater from about 200 miles (322 kilometers) above, but finding signs of ancient life on the surface requires much closer inspection. It requires a rover like Perseverance.

This image shows the remains of an ancient delta in Mars Jezero Crater, as seen by the High Resolution Stereo Camera aboard the ESA (European Space Agency) Mars Express orbiter. Credit: ESA/FU-Berlin

Understanding Mars past climate conditions and reading the geological history embedded in its rocks will give scientists a richer sense of what the planet was like in its distant past. Studying the Red Planets geology and climate could also give us a sense of why Earth and Mars despite some early similarities ended up so different.

4. Perseverance is the first leg of a round trip to Mars.

The verification of ancient life on Mars carries an enormous burden of proof. Perseverance is the first rover to bring a sample caching system to Mars in order to package promising samples for return to Earth by a future mission.

Rather than pulverizing rock the way the drill on NASAs Curiosity rover does, Perseverances drill will cut intact rock cores that are about the size of a piece of chalk and will place them in sample tubes that it will store until the rover reaches an appropriate drop-off location on Mars. The rover could also potentially deliver the samples to a lander that is part of the planned Mars sample return campaign by NASA and ESA (the European Space Agency).

Once the samples are here on Earth, we can examine them with instruments too large and complex to send to Mars, providing far more information about them than even the most sophisticated rover could.

5. Perseverance carries instruments and technology that will help pave the way for human missions to the Moon and Mars.

Among the future-looking technologies on this mission that will benefit human exploration is Terrain-Relative Navigation. As part of the spacecrafts landing system, Terrain-Relative Navigation will enable the descending spacecraft to quickly and autonomously comprehend its location over the Martian surface and modify its trajectory.

Perseverance will also have more autonomy on the surface than any other rover, including self-driving smarts that will allow it to cover more ground in a days operations with fewer instructions from engineers on Earth. This fast-traverse capability will make exploration of the Moon, Mars, and other celestial bodies more efficient for other vehicles.

In addition, Perseverance carries a technology experiment called MOXIE (short for Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment) that will produce oxygen from Mars carbon dioxide atmosphere. It will demonstrate a way that future explorers might produce oxygen for rocket propellant as well as for breathing.

Two other instruments will help engineers design systems for future human explorers to land and survive on Mars: The MEDLI2 (Mars Entry, Descent, and Landing Instrumentation 2) package is a next-generation version of what flew on the Mars Science Laboratory mission that delivered the Curiosity rover, while the MEDA (Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer) instrument suite provides information about weather, climate, and surface ultraviolet radiation and dust.

Perseverance is also giving a ride to the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter. A technology experiment separate from the rovers science mission, Ingenuity will attempt the first powered, controlled aircraft flight at another world. If the helicopter is successful in its 30-Martian-day (31-Earth-day) demonstration window, the data could help future explorations of the Red Planet including those by astronauts by adding a new aerial dimension.

6. The Perseverance rover embodies the NASA and the scientific spirit of overcoming challenges.

Getting the spacecraft to the launch pad during a pandemic, searching for signs of ancient life, collecting samples, and proving new technologies are no easy feats. Nor is a soft touchdown on Mars: Only about 50% of Martian landing attempts, by any space agency, have been successful.

The mission team draws inspiration from the name of its rover, with particular awareness of the challenges the entire world is experiencing at this time. With that in mind, the mission installed a special plate to honor the dedication and hard work of the medical community and first responders around the globe. The team hopes to inspire the entire world, and future explorers, to forge new paths and make discoveries on which the next generation can build.

7. You will get to ride along.

The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission carries more cameras than any interplanetary mission in history, with 19 cameras on the rover itself and four on other parts of the spacecraft involved in entry, descent, and landing. As with previous Mars missions, the Mars 2020 Perseverance mission plans to make raw and processed images available on the missions website.

Follow the Mars 2020 mission in real-time as it travels to the Red Planet. Zoom in and give the spacecraft a spin, or view the full interactive experience at Eyes on the Solar System. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

If all goes well, the public will be able to experience in high-definition what its like to land on Mars and hear the sounds of landing for the first time with an off-the-shelf microphone affixed to the side of the rover. Another microphone on SuperCam will help scientists understand the property of rocks the instrument is examining and can also listen to the wind.

If you are among the 10.9 million people who signed up to send your name to Mars, your name is stenciled on one of three silicon chips embedded on a plate on the rover that carries the words Explore as one in Morse code.

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7 Things to Know About the NASA Perseverance Rover About to Land on Mars - SciTechDaily

James Harden made his Nets debut in a 122-115 win over the Magic on Saturday night at Barclays Center. After a two-point first quarter, he became the first player in NBA history to finish with a 30-point triple-double in his debut with a new team.

Harden totaled 32 points, 14 assists, 12 rebounds, four steals and one blocked shot. OK, he also had nine turnovers, one away from an unhappy quadruple-double.

Even so, his new teammates were thrilled. Kyrie Irving did not play, but Kevin Durant did and scored a Nets career-high 42 points.

Describing Hardens debut, Durant said: "Man, it was incredible. You could see him trying to figure out the best way to play. Early on, I felt like we were overpassing. Trying to make everybody comfortable. Then he just got into his mode of being aggressive to score, and that opened up the whole game for all of us."

Durant totaled 14 points in the fourth quarter and could credit Harden for the assists on seven of those points.

Considering the Nets still didnt have Irving, who missed his sixth straight game and hasnt played since Jan. 5, Durant is supremely optimistic about the future.

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"I cant wait until we have our full team together and seeing how we can create shots for shooters, seeing how we can get our bigs some easy points in the paint," Durant said. "Its going to be tough for anybody to double us, especially from the three-point line."

Durant criticized the fact that he and Harden had a combined 15 turnovers.

"Weve got to be better," he said. "I should probably go talk to him about that right now."

Joe Harris had 17 points and shot 4-for-9 from three-point range. He found himself wide open several times because of the defensive attention paid to Harden and Durant.

"I think its exciting," Harris said of the addition of Harden. "Its one of those things where just the talent, the level of play, but even just the energy and the camaraderie that we had, it felt like we had been playing together for a long time, even though this is the first time this group has ever taken the floor together.

"I thought even early on, it was like we were making too many extra passes, trying to get guys involved and sort of people trying to be aggressive, take the shots they normally would take. It was like everybody was trying to make that extra one, get everybody a touch, get everybody involved.

"It was awesome to see, but at the same time, its one of those things where its the first time playing together and everybody is feeling each other out. But we came together a little bit more in that second half."

Asked how tough the Nets will be to defend when Irving returns to the lineup, Harris said: "Yeah, I think its a very difficult task defensively. Youve got Kevin, who can do it at all three levels. You have James, who can do it at all three levels, and you have Kyrie, who can do it at all three levels.

"A lot has been put on their scoring prowess, but they make the right play. Its an unbelievable luxury in this league."

Greg Logan has worked for Newsday since 1982 covering a wide array of sports and events, currently including the Brooklyn Nets beat.

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Turnovers all that mars Nets' win over Magic - Newsday

Mars Horizon is a much more cunning creature than it seems at first. When I played its demo last year, I thought it was a splendid little management sim about the space race, albeit with the words splendid and little arranged like the wheels of a penny farthing. It seemed a bit simple, if Im honest, with the potential to be a pretty linear walkthrough of the history of space exploration.

But I have been proved wrong, as comprehensively as flat earthers were on December 7th, 1972. I still think the game would benefit from a more lax approach to counterhistorical material (let me build a rocket powered by nuclear bombs, cowards!), but despite keeping you close to reality, it gets a lot deeper as it goes on, and offers some masterfully balanced strategic dilemmas. Indeed, just like in a film where an unassuming training instructor karates the face off a macho braggart, Mars Horizon has taught me a valuable lesson about underestimation. The way I learned this lesson, was by bankrupting myself on the moon.

It all started so well for the Walsall Space Agency. We were the first in the world to launch a satellite into space. Then we chucked a hound up there, and then a lady, and while the dog didnt make it, the lady did and so did the WSA. In the year 1960, the West Midlands was at the undisputed forefront of the final frontier.

This is a piece of piss, I thought, as I selected the obvious best option at every decision point. Of course Ill build the best rocket! click. Of course Ill pay to fix this ominously damaged system before we launch! click. No expense shall be spared, for these brave men and women from the black country!

Because Id played games like this before, I thought I knew the drill. You probably know it too. Risks are underplayed dramatically when first foreshadowed, so that idiots will leap at cheap wins like a wolverine into a carrier bag full of ham, only to face the consequences later when things get out of hand. Thinking myself wise to these pitfalls, I took the sober, sensible route at every turn. And of course, I ploughed resources into research too, because scrambling up the tech tree is always how you win at these things.

But ten years later, at the dawn of the 1970s, the tables had turned. At Bloxwich mission control, the WSAs top brass sat glumly and ate their pies as China, the USSR and then Japan launched crewed moon landings, one by one. Meanwhile, our world-beating booster system, Big Bloke 2.0, was still lying half-finished in a shed, because we couldnt afford a launch pad big enough to assemble it on.

That was when I learned that the moon isnt just a harsh mistress in Mars Horizon; shes a bloody findom. Id thrown everything at my version of the Apollo programme, but it had proved to be a financial bridge too far, and while I had been desperately trying to make it work, other agencies had quietly built themselves up on more humble missions. We made it in the end, of course. But since nobody really cared who was fourth to the moon, the WSA never truly recovered from that loss of momentum.

You know how I could have pulled it off? By cutting corners. By accepting a marginally higher risk of explosions. By condemning a few more of Dudley zoos chimps to the uncaring void. I could have eased off on the throttle in the 50s, and started accruing unsexy long-term infrastructure bonuses, rather than slamming through the early milestones as if my scientists had been working with guns to their heads. Turns out I had been the wolverine, and my bag of ham had gone rotten before Id been able to guzzle it all.

Im not frustrated by this, as I thoroughly deserved it. I was a victim of the very specific hubris of thinking I knew how to avoid hubris. And in tripping me up like this, the game was saying two interesting things.

The first thing was that risk mitigation will only get you so far from the surface of the earth. Space is so insanely dangerous, after all, that if you do everything necessary to make it safe, youll have no cash left to actually get there. You cant make an ISS without breaking a few Ariane 5s, after all, and Mars Horizon does a great, nuanced job of exploring how risk works for space agencies.

The second thing was a reminder that head starts dont always last. To me, one measure of a well-designed management or strategy game is its ability to prevent early wins from snowballing into inevitable victory. Winning stops being fun when you know you cant lose, and Mars Horizon manages to keep things permanently precarious in a way that even giants like the Civ series struggle with.

Next time I play, I wont be complacent in the early game Ill forego a few world firsts for the sake of later successes, and ease off on the research. But at the same time, I will be complacent, at least a little bit, when it comes to safety. Ill risk my rockets, and chance my chimps. I will fuck around, as they say, and find out. And that, Auroch Digital, is why you should totally let me make rockets powered by nuclear bombs, OK?

Disclosure: Alice Liguori, formerly of this parishs YouTube channel, now works for Auroch Digital, the developers of Mars Horizon.

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How I got findommed by the moon in Mars Horizon - Rock Paper Shotgun