Tag: Mars
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Get your cycler to Mars: Buzz Aldrin lays out his plan to settle Red Planet in 2040
Apollo 11 moonwalker Buzz Aldrin addresses the 32nd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colo., with an Apollo-era picture of himself serving as a backdrop. (GeekWire photo by Alan Boyle) COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Nearly five decades after his first spaceflight, Buzz Aldrin is still thinking about the next giant leap to Mars. Today he shared…
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Moon Village vs. Journey to Mars: Which space vision will the next president pick?
An artist’s conception shows a permanent lunar base that’s part of the European Space Agency’s “Moon Village” vision. (Credit: ESA) COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Over the past eight years, the focus of NASA’s space vision has shifted from the moon, to a near-Earth asteroid, to the journey to Mars. The European Space Agency’s director-general, meanwhile,…
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Opportunity rover snaps photo of Martian dust devil
Credit: NASA / JPL / Cornell / Ken Kremer (kenkremer.com) / Marco Di Lorenzo NASA’s Opportunity Mars rover has captured a dust devil spinning across the barren floor of Endeavour Crater, an impact basin the robot has explored since 2011 in the mission’s long-lived second act. The color mosaic presented here, created by Dr. Ken Kremer and Marco…
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Mars rover re-routed after spinning wheels on steep hillside
A shadow and tracks of NASA’s Mars rover Opportunity appear in this March 22, 2016, image, which has been rotated 13.5 degrees to adjust for the tilt of the rover. The hillside descends to the left into “Marathon Valley.” The floor of Endeavour Crater is seen beneath the underside of a solar panel. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech…
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Microsoft and NASA team up to create virtual Mars tour with HoloLens
Erisa Hines, a driver for the Mars Curiosity rover, talks to participants during the “Destination: Mars” mixed-reality tour. (Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Microsoft) Microsoft and NASA are bringing HoloLens to the masses – and bringing the masses to Mars – with a mixed-reality experience that will make its debut this summer. “Destination: Mars,” an exhibit opening at…
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Europe’s ExoMars orbiter smoothly cruising toward red planet
Artist’s concept of the Trace Gas Orbiter releasing the Schiaparelli lander on approach to Mars on Oct. 16. Credit: ESA/ATG medialab Ground controllers are running Europe’s ExoMars orbiter through a post-launch checkup a week after its successful liftoff aboard a Proton rocket, and a first look at the probe’s systems revealed no problems, the mission’s…
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Marvel at Monday’s Mars launch with these photos
Take a look back at the fiery blastoff of a Russian Proton rocket Monday with the ExoMars 2016 mission to examine the red planet’s atmosphere and test new European entry, descent and landing technologies. The 191-foot-tall (58-meter) rocket took off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 0931:42 GMT (5:31:42 a.m. EDT) Monday with the…
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Video: ExoMars mission blasts off on Proton rocket
A massive spacecraft bound for Mars lifted off on a Russian Proton rocket Monday, riding more than 2 million pounds of thrust from the launcher’s six main engines through low clouds hanging over the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter and Schiaparelli lander, bolted together inside the nose cone of the 191-foot-tall…
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Massive European spacecraft launched toward Mars
Photo credit: ESA–Stephane Corvaja, 2016 Boosted off planet Earth by a Russian Proton rocket, a European-built space probe departed for Mars on Monday, beginning a mission to test future landing technologies and search for methane, a potential signature of microbial life. The mission also aims to map Mars in high-resolution and search for hydrogen embedded…
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Proton-M successfully launches first ExoMars spacecraft
Europe’s ExoMars orbiter has begun its journey to the Red Planet on Monday with its launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome atop a Russian Proton-M rocket. The first of two ExoMars missions, launch occurred on schedule at 15:31 local time (09:31 UTC) ahead of seven month journey to Mars. ExoMars: The Exobiology on Mars, or ExoMars,…