Monthly Archives: February 2022

A year ago, NASAs Perseverance rover was accelerating to a collision with Mars, nearing its destination after a 290-million-mile, seven-month journey from Earth.

On Feb. 18 last year, the spacecraft carrying the rover pierced the Martian atmosphere at 13,000 miles per hour. In just seven minutes what NASA engineers call seven minutes of terror it had to pull off a series of maneuvers to place Perseverance gently on the surface.

Given the minutes of delay for radio communications to crisscross the solar system, the people in mission control at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California were merely spectators that day. If anything had gone wrong, they would not have had any time to attempt a fix, and the $2.7 billion mission, to search for evidence that something once lived on the red planet, would have ended in a newly excavated crater.

But Perseverance performed perfectly, sending home exhilarating video footage as it landed. And NASA added to its collection of robots exploring Mars.

The vehicle itself is just doing phenomenally well, Jennifer Trosper, the project manager for Perseverance, said.

Twelve months later, Perseverance is nestled within a 28-mile-wide crater known as Jezero. From the topography, it is evident that more than three billion years ago, Jezero was a body of water roughly the size of Lake Tahoe, with rivers flowing in from the west and out to the east.

One of the first things Perseverance did was deploy Ingenuity, a small robotic helicopter and the first such flying machine to take off on another planet. Perseverance also demonstrated a technology for generating oxygen that will be crucial whenever astronauts finally make it to Mars.

The rover then set off on a diversion from the original exploration plans, to study the floor of the crater it landed in. The rocks there turned out not to be what scientists were expecting. It ran into trouble a couple of times when it tried to collect cores of rock cylinders about the size of sticks of chalk that are eventually to be brought back to Earth by a future mission. Engineers were able to solve the problems and most everything is going well.

Its been a very exciting year, exhausting at times, said Joel Hurowitz, a professor of geosciences at Stony Brook University in New York who is a member of the missions science team. The pace of work has been pretty incredible.

After months of scrutinizing the crater floor, the mission team is now preparing to head for the main scientific event: investigating a dried-up river delta along the west rim of Jezero.

That is where scientists expect to find sedimentary rocks that are most likely to contain blockbuster discoveries, maybe even signs of ancient Martian life if any ancient life ever existed on Mars.

Deltas are, at least on Earth, habitable environments, said Amy Williams, a professor of geology at the University of Florida and a member of the Perseverance science team. Theres water. Theres active sediment being transported from a river into a lake.

Such sediments can capture and preserve carbon-based molecules that are associated with life. Thats an excellent place to look for organic carbon, Dr. Williams said. So hopefully, organic carbon thats indigenous to Mars is concentrated in those layers.

Perseverance landed not much more than a mile from the delta. Even at a distance, the rovers eagle-eyed camera could make out the expected sedimentary layers. There were also boulders, some as large as cars, sitting on the delta, rocks that were washed into the crater.

This all tells a fascinating story, said Jim Bell, a planetary scientist at Arizona State University.

The data confirm that what orbital images suggested was a river delta is indeed that and that the history of water here was complex. The boulders, which almost certainly came from the surrounding highlands, point to episodes of violent flooding at Jezero.

It wasnt just slow, gentle deposition of fine grained silt and sand and mud, said Dr. Bell, who serves as principal investigator for the sophisticated cameras mounted on Perseverances mast.

Mission managers had originally planned to head directly to the delta from the landing site. But the rover set down in a spot where the direct route was blocked by sand dunes that it could not cross.

The geological formations to the south intrigued them.

We landed in a surprising location, and made the best of it, said Kenneth Farley, a geophysicist at the California Institute of Technology who serves as the project scientist leading the research.

Because Jezero is a crater that was once a lake, the expectation was that its bottom would be rocks that formed out of the sediments that settled to the bottom.

But at first glance, the lack of layers meant they did not look obviously sedimentary, said Kathryn Stack Morgan of NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the deputy project scientist. At the same time, nothing clearly suggested they were volcanic in origin, either.

Its really turned into a detective story sort of about why this region is one of the most geologically unusual in the planet, said Nicholas Tosca, a professor of mineralogy and petrology at the University of Cambridge in England and a member of the science team.

As the scientists and engineers contemplated whether to circle around to the north or to the south, the team that built a robotic helicopter named Ingenuity got to try out their creation.

The helicopter was a late addition to the mission, meant as a proof-of-concept for flying through the thin air of Mars.

On April 18 last year, Ingenuity rose to a height of 10 feet, hovered for 30 seconds, and then descended back to the ground. The flight lasted 39.1 seconds.

Over the following weeks, Ingenuity made four more flights of increasing time, speed and velocity.

That helped avoid wasting time driving to unexceptional rocks that had looked potentially interesting in images taken from orbit.

We sent the helicopter and saw the images, and it looked very similar to where we were, Ms. Trosper said. And so we chose not to drive.

The helicopter continues to fly. It just completed its 19th flight, and it remains in good condition. The batteries are still holding a charge. The helicopter has shown it can fly in the colder, thinner air of the winter months. It was able to shake off most of the dust that fell on it during a dust storm in January.

Everythings looking green across the board, said Theodore Tzanetos, who leads the Ingenuity team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

In the exploration of the rocks to the south of the landing site, scientists solved some of their secrets when the rover used its drill to grind shallow holes in a couple of them.

Oh wow, these look volcanic, Dr. Stack Morgan said, remembering her reaction. Exactly what youd expect for a basaltic lava flow.

The tools that Perseverance carries to study the ingredients of Martian rocks can take measurements pinpointed on bits of rock as small as a grain of sand. And cameras on the robotic arm can take close-up pictures.

Those observations revealed large grains of olivine, an igneous mineral that can accumulate at the bottom of a large lava flow. Later fractures emerged between the olivine grains that were filled with carbonates, a mineral that forms through interactions with water.

The thinking now is that the Jezero crater floor is the same olivine-rich volcanic rock that orbiting spacecraft have observed in the region. It might have formed before the crater filled with water.

Sediments from the lake probably did cover the rock, with water percolating through the sediments to fill the fractures with carbonate. Then, slowly, over a few billion years, winds blew the sediments away.

That the wispy air on Mars could erode so much rock is hard for geologists on Earth to wrap their minds around.

You dont find landscapes that are even close to that on Earth, Dr. Farley said.

The most troublesome moments during the first year have occurred during the collection of rock samples. For decades, planetary scientists have dreamed that pieces of Mars could be brought to Earth, where they could study them with state-of-the-art instruments in laboratories.

Perseverance is the first step in turning that dream into reality by drilling cores of rock and sealing them in tubes. The rover, however, has no means to get the rock samples off Mars and back to Earth; that awaits another mission known as Mars Sample Return, a collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency.

During the development of Perseverances drill, engineers tested it with a wide variety of Earth rocks. But then the very first rock on Mars that Perseverance tried to drill turned out to be unlike all of the Earth rocks.

The rock in essence turned to dust during the drilling and slid out of the tube. After several successes, another drilling attempt ran into problems. Pebbles fell out of the tube in an inconvenient part of the rover the carousel where the drilling bits are stored and that required weeks of troubleshooting to clean away the debris.

That was exciting, not necessarily in the best way, Dr. Stack Morgan said. The rest of our exploration has gone really well.

Perseverance will at some point drop off some of its rock samples for a rover on the Mars Sample Return mission to pick up. That is to prevent the nightmare scenario that Perseverance dies and there is no way to extricate the rocks it is carrying.

The top speed of Perseverance is the same as that of Curiosity, the rover NASA landed in another crater in 2012. But improved self-driving software means it can cover longer distances in a single drive. To get to the delta, Perseverance needs to retrace its path to the landing site and then take a route around the sand dunes to the north.

It could arrive at the delta by late May or early June. Ingenuity will try to stay ahead of Perseverance.

The helicopter flies faster than the rover can drive, but after each flight, its solar panels have to soak up several days of sunshine to recharge the batteries. Perseverance, powered by the heat from a hunk of plutonium, can drive day after day after day.

The helicopter, however, might be able to take a shortcut across the sand dunes.

Were planning to get to the delta, Mr. Tzanetos said. And were discussing what happens beyond the river delta.

But, he added that every day could be the last for Ingenuity, which was designed to last only a month. You hope that youre lucky enough to keep flying, he said, and were going to keep that streak going for as long as we can.

Once Perseverance gets to the delta, the most electrifying discovery would be images of what looked to be microscopic fossils. In that case, we have to start asking whether some globs of organic matter are arranged in a shape that outlines a cell, said Tanja Bosak, a geobiologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

It is unlikely Perseverance will see anything that is unequivocally a remnant of a living organism. That is why it is crucial for the rocks to be brought to Earth for closer examination.

Dr. Bosak does not have a strong opinion on whether there was ever life on Mars.

We are really trying to peer into the time where we have very little knowledge, she said. We have no idea when chemical processes came together to form the first cell. And so we may be looking at something that was just learning to be life.

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On Mars, a NASA Rover and Helicopters Year of Surprise and Discovery - The New York Times

NASAs Perseverance rover was not the only new arrival at Mars 12 months ago.

Two other spacecraft also made the trip from Earth to Mars during the last window when the two planets lined up, helping each of their countries achieve debuts in interplanetary exploration.

One countrys exploration is not a surprise. China is building a portfolio of impressive space missions, including robotic missions to the moon and a space station under construction in Earth orbit. In 2021, its Tianwen-1 mission arrived at Mars with three parts: an orbiter, a lander and a rover named Zhurong.

Months after the mission arrived in Mars orbit, the lander, carrying Zhurong, set down in the southern part of Utopia Planitia, a volcanic plain. That made China only the second country to pull off a lasting mission on the surface of the red planet. Chinese scientists are scheduled to present some of their early scientific results next month at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Woodlands, Texas.

The other country was an unexpected newcomer: the United Arab Emirates. Without much experience in spaceflight, it collaborated with engineers at the University of Colorados Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics to build Hope, a spacecraft about the size of a small car.

Hope is smaller in size and ambition than Perseverance or Tianwen-1, but building it provided on-the-job training for budding Emirati engineers and scientists who worked side-by-side with their American counterparts in Boulder, Colo.

Hope entered orbit around Mars and continues looping around the planet, making measurements of the atmosphere. It has made some unexpected findings, particularly the quantity of oxygen in the upper atmosphere.

When we were comparing it to the models, it was around 50 percent higher than were expected, said Hessa al-Matroushi, the missions science lead. So that was surprising.

Hopes instruments found structures in the upper atmosphere with higher concentrations of oxygen. Scientists are trying to figure out the significance of the surprise.

Another spacecraft, the ExoMars 2022 mission, a collaboration between the European Space Agency and Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, is planned for launch to Mars this year. It was originally scheduled for launch in 2020, but technical problems and the pandemic the mission was postponed. The next opportunity for launch opens in late September.

ExoMars is carrying a rover named Rosalind Franklin, which is to look for indications of past life in Oxia Planum, a 120-mile-wide plain near the equator that possesses clay-rich minerals.

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NASA Isnt the Only Space Program Celebrating a Year at Mars - The New York Times

NASA's Curiosity rover has left plenty of marks on Mars over the past nine-plus years, and the Red Planet is returning the favor.

The rugged landscape inside Mars' Gale Crater has taken some substantial bites out of Curiosity's six aluminum wheels, as CNET recently pointed out. The damage looks dramatic, but don't panic; Curiosity should be able to keep trundling along for a while yet.

"The current predicted odometry remaining is expected to be sufficient to support Curiosity throughout the remainder of the mission," Andrew Good, a spokesman for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, which manages Curiosity's mission, told Space.com via email.

The gouges and gashes on the rover's wheels "always look nastier than they are," Good added.

Related: Amazing Mars photos by NASA's Curiosity rover

The car-sized Curiosity landed on Gale's floor in August 2012, on a mission to determine if the area could ever have supported microbial life. The robot soon answered that question, finding that Gale hosted a potentially habitable lake-and-stream system in the ancient past that likely persisted for millions of years at a time.

Since September 2014, Curiosity has been climbing the flanks of Mount Sharp, which rises 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the sky from Gale's center. The rover is reading the rock layers as it goes, searching for clues about Mars' long-ago shift from a relatively warm and wet world to the frigid desert planet we know today.

Curiosity has traveled a total of 16.86 miles (27.14 km) on Mars to date, many of them across rugged, rocky terrain. The rover's wheels started showing signs of wear and tear relatively early in the mission, spurring its handlers to take some mitigation measures picking routes across gentler terrain when possible, for example, and eventually beaming up "traction control" software that adjusts Curiosity's speed depending on the type of ground it's traversing.

Those measures seem to have worked, Good said, noting that the mission team recently started snapping wheel-inspection imagery every 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) of ground traveled rather than every 1,650 feet (500 m), as had been the norm.

Curiosity's wheel-wear experiences helped shape the design of NASA's next Mars rover, Perseverance, which touched down on the floor of Jezero Crater in February 2021. For example, Perseverance's wheels are slightly larger in diameter and have twice as many treads as those of Curiosity.

In addition, the life-hunting, sample-caching Perseverance's treads are gently curved instead of chevron-shaped. And they don't spell out "JPL" in Morse code on the red dirt as the rover drives, like those of Curiosity were designed to do.

Mike Wall is the author of "Out There" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom or on Facebook.

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Rugged Mars has taken big bites out of the Curiosity rover's wheels (photos) - Space.com

No matter your take on Valentines Day and its lovey-dovey reputation, theres no denying the romantic vibes in the universe this week. Cosmically, love-centric Venus and passionate Mars are essentially flirting as they move toward a conjunction (aka a meet-up) in Capricorn and then in Aquarius, making the energy intimate, sexy, and ripe for connection. This is eros manifested in real lifein concrete form, says astrologer Stefanie Iris Weiss, referencing the Greek god of erotic love. And as several Venus and Mars conjunctions unfold over the next few weeks, that vibe will shift from relationship planning and plotting to a lighter-hearted exploration of pleasure.

In astrology, a conjunction simply refers to two planets aligning within the same sign and at the same degree of that sign. As a result, during that time, the areas over which both planets rule are magnified and play off each other within the lens of the sign theyre occupying. In this case, its the love (Venus) and sex (Mars) planets getting it on, with the first Venus and Mars conjunction happening in 16 degrees of Capricorn on February 16, and the second in 0 degrees of Aquarius on March 6. Even so, you can still expect some extra spice in your Valentine's Day vibe. This sweet conjunction, luckily, is already heating up as these cosmic consorts have been slow-dancing near each other for a few days now, Weiss says.

The meeting of these two planets, especially after a cosmically radical time in Capricorn and Aquarius, can bring stability and initiation in how we want to feel in relationships and in love. Corina Crysler, astrologer

In mythology, a Venus and Mars conjunction reflects a sacred union of equal and opposite energies, says astrologer Corina Crysler. The meeting of these two planets, especially after a cosmically radical time in Capricorn and Aquarius [thanks to multiple retrogrades], can bring stability and initiation in how we want to feel in relationships and in love, she says.

And that extends to how you physically feel, too. Mars and Venus understand pleasure, Chrysler adds. As they join forces, you could feel pushed to reconnect to your body and embody desire, and to uncover new ways to take your relationshipswith others, and also with yourselfto the next level of ecstasy, she says.

But exactly how that pans out will depend, in part, on the sign of each upcoming Venus-Mars conjunction in question. Below, astrologers share how the conjunctions in Capricorn and Aquarius may spark different, if equally impactful, effects for your love life.

If Capricorn is known for one thing, it would be work-hard, play-hard vibes. Apply that energy to the worlds of love and romance, and its easy to see how this phase of Venus and Mars current meet-up is all about getting solid and serious in partnerships. This could be a time when people decide to move in together or get engaged, says astrologer Mecca Woods, particularly given the fact that this planetary pairing also takes place during a passionate full moon in Leo.

Since you may feel more attuned to the value and integrity of relationships in your life during this time, its also very possible that you find motivation to leave a relationship thats no longer in alignment, says Woods: The Venus retrograde that we just went through may have opened your eyes about your relationships, for better or for worse. And as Venus now joins Mars in Capricorn, its offering support for taking the next step forward based on that new wisdom.

For folks who are single, seeking a relationship will be a common theme. Dont be surprised if you find yourself ready to get back on the dating apps like its your job, says Weiss. That said, youre bound to be on the lookout for something deep and intimate rather than a light fling. Mars and Venus going through Capricorn can help us heal old paradigms and discover new kinds of relationships built on equality, support, safety, and loyalty, says Crysler.

When Venus and Mars come together again in air-sign Aquarius in early March, relationship energy takes a turn for the experimental and creative. While love and sex will still be front and center, Weiss says this time can offer an unusual perspective on both: Its almost like we can observe our own behavior or become slightly emotionally detached from it, which is a healthy way to take a break from any obsessiveness.

This reflective, intellect-driven period may encourage you, whether youre single or in a relationship, to rethink old relational patterns. Aquarius wants us to break free from time bonds that hold us in outdated ideologies, says Crysler. This will lead us to ask ourselves, 'What do I really need in relationships?' And the answer could prove different than you might assume.

Perhaps your focus shifts to love outside of traditional romantic contexts, says Woods. For example, platonic relationships in your life could feel highlighted, she says, as Venus in Aquarius, in particular, tends to value friendship more than emotionally sapping one-on-one connections. Or maybe you get more inventive in the bedroom, guiding a partner toward what you desire or reconnecting to your own sexuality, says Crysler. And perhaps that exploration involves new toys, tooAquarius is the sign of technology, after all, says Weiss.

In any case, itll be a time for leaning into new depths of relational and sexual energy. And it wont end abruptly in March, either. Although Venus and Mars wont be at the same degree again for a while after these two exact conjunctions, theyll be traveling close together through the signs all the way through May, says Weiss. And throughout this period, well stay open and ready for dating, mating, and relating of all kinds.

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This Major Astrological Transit Is About To Dial Up Your Love and Sex LifeHeres How - Well+Good

This Perseverance rover image from April 2021 shows a collection of rocks. The red circle highlights the one under discussion.

Combing through NASA Mars rover images looking for fun shapes in the rocks is a fun pastime, but it's important to remember those fish,faces and posteriors are just cool chunks of the landscape. Sometimes, goofy rock sightings leak into wider media, as with recent news of an "alien" seen in an image snapped by NASA's Perseverance rover. Some headlines are claiming the figure is "100% proof of intelligent life."

Let's break it down.

Scott Waring, who runs a UFO-focused site, highlighted a rover view with a flat rock with a shape on top of it, suggesting it was proof of life on the red planet. As a reminder, Mars is a horrifically inhospitable place and scientists haven't even found proof of ancient microbial life there, though explorers like Perseverance are looking for evidence.

From the lab to your inbox. Get the latest science stories from CNET every week.

Waring spotted the rock in a panoramic image posted to Gigapan. I traced that back to the original raw images taken by Perseverance in April 2021. Waring sees an "alien figure," a small person in a dark suit reclining and watching the rover. By zooming in to where it gets all fuzzy, I can see where that interpretation comes from.

Is that you, Ian Malcolm?

In my imagination, the "figure" looks like a tiny sculptural representation of that famous Jurassic Park scene where sweaty Jeff Goldblum is reclining like he's at a boudoir photo shoot.

I don't blame Waring for the excitement. I get positively giddy when I see a neat Martian rock (here's looking at you, butt rock). And I'd be thrilled if a day came when scientists found intelligent alien life traipsing across Mars. But photos of nifty rock shapes aren't proof of life, past or present, on Mars.

There's something beautiful in the human desire to find familiar objects, faces and figures in random rocks on Mars. I see it as a form of optimism, of hope that we're not the only planet inhabited by brainy beings. So please keep seeing wild things on Mars, but let us also know them for what they really are.

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No, the reclining 'alien figure' in NASA Mars rover image isn't proof of life - CNET

Sally Hedberg| Special to The Desert Sun

After two very successful author events at the new facility, the Friends of the Desert Hot Springs Library are pleased to announce the next two for February and March.

The first is about California history; the second takes us to Mars.

On Thursday, Feb. 24, from 1 to 2:30 p.m., a newly published book based on Cabot's iconic Adobe Museum in Desert Hot Springs, "The Man Who Saved a Legacy: How Colbert Henry Eyraud Preserved Cabot's Pueblo Museum," will be presented by Irene Rodriguez, the museum's executive director, and the book's author, Janice Kleinschmidt, Cabot's board chair.

Every year, thousands of visitors marvel at Cabot Yerxa's Adobe Museum, which was once his home and is now owned by the City of Desert Hot Springs. When Yerxa died in 1967, the pueblo he spent decades of his life building from recycled materials was in danger of succumbing to the decay of vacancy, vandalism and threat of demolition by the city. One man, Eyraud, had the vision to restore the property for public visitation and education, thus saving Cabot's Pueblo from disappearing from the face of the earth.

On Thursday, March 10, from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m., "Why Mars? Why Now?" is the topic of James Melton's latest book, "Red Planet Leadership." According to Melton, "the question of Mars has plagued humanity since we first looked up into the nighttime sky."

His presentation will explain why it is so important for humans to go to Mars, how we can work together to accomplish this, and what makes us think it can and will happen. Topics to be discussed include: What opportunities await us in the new Martian world? Are we destined to become a multi-planet species? Plus insight on who will ideally settle the red planet, what role can you play and why we can no longer remain earthbound.

Melton is a contributing columnist for the National Space Society's magazine, Ad Astra, and an ambassador for the Mars Society. His thought-provoking discussion should be of interest to anyone who is curious about technology, science and our future.

The authors' books will be available for sale and signing. Both events take place in the Community Room at the Desert Hot Springs Library, 14-380 Palm Drive, Desert Hot Springs, and are free and open to the public.

For more information, call (760) 329-5926.

Sally Hedberg serves as secretary and grant administrator of Friends of the Desert Hot Springs Library.

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Interested in Mars? Local history? Try these events at the Desert Hot Springs Library - Desert Sun