Tag: Mars
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After leading Mars rover missions, Steve Squyres joins Blue Origin as chief scientist
Cornell astronomer Steve Squyres, the principal investigator for the Mars Exploration Rovers, will become Blue Origin’s chief scientist. (Cornell University Photo) Just months after closing out the 15-year-long Opportunity rover mission on Mars, Cornell University astronomer Steve Squyres is taking advantage of a new opportunity: the post of chief scientist at Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos’…
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Mini-helicopter installed on NASA’s next Mars-bound rover
Members of the NASA Mars Helicopter team attach a thermal film to the exterior of the flight model of the Mars Helicopter. The image was taken on Feb. 1, 2019 inside the Space Simulator, a 25-foot-wide (7.62-meter-wide) vacuum chamber at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory…
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NASA checks SpaceX’s potential Starship landing sites on Mars, with water in mind
An artists’s conception shows SpaceX’s Starship craft on Mars. (SpaceX Illustration) NASA is helping SpaceX get a fix on potential landing sites on Mars for its Starship super-spaceship, with an emphasis on Arcadia Planitia and Amazonis Planitia, regions where deposits of water ice may be found. Another focus of NASA’s reconnaissance campaign in Phlegra Montes,…
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Hey, kids: Name NASA’s 2020 Mars rover!
This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s Mars 2020 rover on the surface of Mars. (NASA / JPL-Caltech) NASA says a student will provide the official name for its 2020 Mars rover, continuing a tradition that began 16 years ago. The space agency will kick off its “Name the Rover” contest on Sept. 3, just as most…
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ExoMars rover leaves British factory, heads for testing in France
The completed ExoMars rover, named “Rosalind Franklin,” is lifted in preparation for shipment from an Airbus facility in Stevenage, England. Credit: Max Alexander/Airbus The European Space Agency’s ExoMars rover left its Airbus factory in Britain on Wednesday, heading for a round of testing in France before integration with its carrier and descent modules on pace…
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National Space Council meeting highlights moon and Mars plan – plus nuclear power
Vice President Mike Pence delivers opening remarks during the sixth meeting of the National Space Council at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Va. The space shuttle Discovery towers over him. (NASA Photo / Aubrey Gemignani) The latest meeting of the National Space Council provided a forum to build…
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Mars 2020 rover on track for launch next July
In this image, taken July 19 in the clean room of the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, the rover’s 7-foot-long (2.1-meter-long) arm maneuvers its 88-pound (40-kilogram) sensor-laden turret as it moves from a deployed to a stowed configuration. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech The launch of NASA’s Mars 2020 rover is less than…
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First Mode celebrates first steps in space exploration – and looks ahead to the moon
First Mode’s president and chief engineer, Chris Voorhees, shows off the employee-owned company’s digs near Seattle’s Pike Place Market. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle) One year after engineers from the Planetary Resources asteroid mining company peeled off to form their own employee-owned startup, known as First Mode, they can point to the profitable work they’ve…
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Rescue plan for InSight lander’s stuck heat probe gets underway
Ever since its successful landing at Elysium Planitia on Mars back on November 26th of last year, NASA’s InSight spacecraft has been feverishly studying the planet’s internal structure to get a sense of how it formed and subsequently evolved over billions of years. These studies are currently being conducted by use of a plethora of…
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Mars lander’s ground team begins inspection of stuck instrument
The InSight lander’s robotic arm camera captured this view of the stuck mole from the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3) instrument June 30, soon after the arm lifted and moved the instrument’s support structure. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech In a bit of interplanetary troubleshooting, the robot arm on NASA’s InSight Mars lander has lifted a…