* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: Mars Science Laboratory mission

Blobrana · L

NASA Lands Car-Size Rover Beside Martian Mountain

NASA's most advanced Mars rover Curiosity has landed on the Red Planet. The one-ton rover, hanging by ropes from a rocket backpack, touched down onto Mars Sunday to end a 36-week flight and begin a two-year investigation.
The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) spacecraft that carried Curiosity succeeded in every step of the most complex landing ever attempted on Mars, including the final severing of the bridle cords and flyaway manoeuvre of the rocket backpack.
Read more

Blobrana · L

The nuclear-powered Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) (named "Curiosity"), is scheduled to land on Aeolis Palus in Gale Crater, Mars, on the 6th August, 2012.

Mars Landing is at 05:31 UT

Blobrana · L

MSL/Curiosity Pre-Landing News Conference and Rover Communication Overview

Blobrana · L

Curiosity Rover Just Hours from Mars Landing

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft is healthy and right on course for a landing in several hours that will be one of the most difficult feats of robotic exploration ever attempted.
Emotions are strong in the control room at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., as the hours and miles race toward touchdown of the car-size Curiosity at about 05:31 UT. 6th August.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Newest NASA Mars Mission Connects Past and Future

NASA's newest Mars mission, landing in three days, will draw on support from missions sent to Mars years ago and will contribute to missions envisioned for future decades.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Mars Tugging on Approaching NASA Rover Curiosity

The gravitational tug of Mars is now pulling NASA's car-size geochemistry laboratory, Curiosity, in for a suspenseful landing in less than 40 hours.
The spacecraft is healthy and on course for delivering the mission's Curiosity rover close to a Martian mountain at 05:31 Monday, Aug. 6 UT. That's the time a signal confirming safe landing could reach Earth, give or take about a minute for the spacecraft's adjustments to sense changeable atmospheric conditions.
Read more

Blobrana · L

What to Expect When Curiosity Starts Snapping Pictures

The car-size rover's very first images will come from the one-megapixel Hazard-Avoidance cameras (Hazcams) attached to the body of the rover. Once engineers have determined that it is safe to deploy the rover's Remote Sensing Mast and its high-tech cameras, a process that may take several days, Curiosity will begin to survey its exotic surroundings.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Curiosity's First Daredevil Stunt

For the past nine months, Curiosity has been acting as a stunt double for astronauts, exposing itself to the same cosmic radiation humans would experience following the same route to Mars.
Unlike previous Mars rovers, Curiosity is equipped with an instrument that measures space radiation. The Radiation Assessment Detector, nicknamed "RAD," counts cosmic rays, neutrons, protons and other particles over a wide range of biologically-interesting energies. RADs prime mission is to investigate the radiation environment on the surface of Mars, but NASA turned it on during the cruise phase so that it could sense radiation en route to Mars as well.
Read more

Blobrana · L

Nasa's Curiosity rover on course for Mars landing

Nasa says the big robot rover it is sending to Mars looks in excellent shape for its Monday (GMT) landing.
The vehicle, known as Curiosity, was launched from Earth in November last year and is now nearing the end of a 560-million-km journey across space.
Read more