Mars Archives

November 29, 2023November 29, 2023 by Matt Williams

Odyssey Gives Us a Cool New View of Mars

This unusual view of the horizon of Mars was captured by NASA’s Odyssey orbiter using its THEMIS camera, in an operation that took engineers three months to plan. It’s taken from about 250 miles above the Martian surface – about the same altitude at which the International Space Station orbits Earth. NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU

Chances are that you’ve seen images of Earth from space, thanks to the astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS), who regularly share stunning photos of our planet. These images provide us regularly with breathtaking views of cities, oceans, storms, eruptions, clouds, the curvature of the planet, and the way the atmosphere glows against the horizon. Thanks to NASA’s Mars Odyssey Orbiter, which has been in orbit for over 22 years, we now have an equally breathtaking view of Mars from orbit that captured what its curvature and atmosphere look like from space.

November 29, 2023November 30, 2023 by Nancy Atkinson

There are Mysterious Polygons Beneath the Surface of Mars

China's Zhurong rover on Mars — An image from China's Zhurong rover shows spacecraft hardware in the foreground and Martian terrain in the background. (Credit: CNSA)

China’s Zhurong rover was equipped with a ground-penetrating radar system, allowing it to peer beneath Mars’s surface. Researchers have announced new results from the scans of Zhurong’s landing site in Utopia Planitia, saying they identified irregular polygonal wedges located at a depth of about 35 meters all along the robot’s journey. The objects measure from centimeters to tens of meters across. The scientists believe the buried polygons resulted from freeze-thaw cycles on Mars billions of years ago, but they could also be volcanic, from cooling lava flows.

November 28, 2023November 28, 2023 by Mark Thompson

A Tiny Quadcopter Could Gather Rocks for China’s Sample Return Mission

Mars Ingenuity helicopter on the surface of Mars — Image of the Mars Ingenuity helicopter (Source : NASA)

Space exploration is always changing. Before February 2021 there had never been a human made craft flying around in the atmosphere of another world (other than rocket propelled landers arriving or departing). The Mars Perseverance rover changed that, carrying with it what can only be described as a drone named Ingenuity. It revolutionised planetary exploration and now, China are getting in on the act with a proposed quadcopter for a Mars sample return mission.

November 27, 2023November 29, 2023 by Nancy Atkinson

Aerocapture is a Free Lunch in Space Exploration

Visualisation of the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter aerobraking at Mars. Credit: ESA/ATG medialab.

This article was updated on 11/28/23

When spacecraft return to Earth, they don’t need to shed all their velocity by firing retro-rockets. Instead, they use the atmosphere as a brake to slow down for a soft landing. Every planet in the Solar System except Mercury has enough of an atmosphere to allow aerocapture maneuvers, and could allow high-speed exploration missions. A new paper looks at the different worlds and how a spacecraft must fly to take advantage of this “free lunch” to slow down at the destination.

November 25, 2023November 25, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

NASA Tests its Next-Generation Mars Helicopter Blades

Artist illustration of three solar-powered Mars helicopters from NASA: Ingenuity (upper right), along with the proposed design for Sample Recovery Helicopter to be use on the future NASA-ESA Mars Sample Return Mission (foreground) and a concept for a future Science Helicopter (upper center). (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

While NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter continues to break records for both airspeed and altitude while it explores Jezero Crater on the Red Planet, NASA engineers back on Earth are hard at work testing carbon fiber blades for next-generation Mars helicopters that could exceed the performance of Ingenuity on future missions to Mars, specifically with the planned Mars Sample Return mission that NASA hopes to accomplish sometime in the 2030s.

November 22, 2023November 22, 2023 by Evan Gough

What’s Going on With the Mars Sample Return Mission?

The ESA/NASA Mars Sample Return will be one of the most complex missions ever devised. Image Credit: ESA

Anybody with a modicum of intellectual curiosity is looking forward to the NASA/ESA Mars Sample Return Mission. NASA’s Perseverance rover is busily collecting and caching samples for eventual return to Earth. While the technical and engineering challenges in getting those samples into scientists’ hands here on Earth are formidable, budgeting and funding might be the mission’s biggest headaches.

November 21, 2023November 21, 2023 by Carolyn Collins Petersen

It’s Time for the Mars Rovers to Hunker Down and Wait for the Earth to Return

Mars Perseverence rover sent back this image of its parking spot during Mars Solar Conjunction. Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech

If you’ve noticed a slowdown in Mars news lately, it’s because of the Sun. Or, rather, it’s because the Sun is temporarily blocking our “view” of the Red Planet, which is on the other side of the Sun from Earth, in what’s called “Mars Solar Conjunction.”

November 20, 2023November 20, 2023 by Evan Gough

A Robotic Chemist Could Whip up the Perfect Batch of Oxygen on Mars

Astronauts on Mars will need oxygen. There's oxygen in the atmosphere, but only small amounts. But there's lots of subterranean water on Mars, and that means there's lots of oxygen, too. (Credit: NASA)

Humans on Mars will need oxygen, and Mars’ atmosphere is pretty anemic when it comes to the life-sustaining element. NASA’s Perseverance rover successfully extracted oxygen from CO2 in Mars’ atmosphere, but there are other ways to acquire it. There seem to be vast amounts of water buried under the Martian surface, and oxygen in the water is just waiting to be set free from its bonds with hydrogen.

On Earth, that’s no problem. Just run an electrical current through water, and you get oxygen. But Mars won’t give up its oxygen so easily.

November 17, 2023November 17, 2023 by Matt Williams

Martian Green Nightglow Seen for the First Time

Artist's impression of the ExoMars Trace Gas orbiter spotting daylight green oxygen at Mars. Credit: ESA

On Earth, there is a phenomenon known as nightglow, where the atmosphere experiences faint light emissions that prevent the night sky from becoming completely dark. This is caused by various processes in the upper atmosphere, like the recombination of atoms, cosmic rays striking the atmosphere, or oxygen and nitrogen interacting with hydroxyl a few hundred kilometers from the surface. Thanks to data obtained by the ESA’s ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), the same phenomenon has been observed in the Martian atmosphere for the first time.

While scientists have long suspected that Mars also experiences this atmospheric phenomenon, this is the first time that effectively proves it. The revelation was made by an international team of scientists based on their analysis of data from the TGO’s Nadir and Occultation for MArs Discovery (NOMAD) spectrometer. When astronauts and rovers explore Mars’ polar regions in the near future, they will see a green glow whenever they look up at the sky and could even use the glow to navigate and find their way in the dark of night.

November 12, 2023November 12, 2023 by Matt Williams

China Wants to Retrieve a Sample of Mars by 2028

This image was taken by a small camera that was jettisoned from China's Tianwen-1 spacecraft to photograph the spacecraft in orbit above the Martian north pole. Credit: CNSA/PEC

China continues to take great strides as part of its goal to become a superpower in space and a direct competitor with NASA. In addition to its proposed expansion of the Tiangong space station and the creation of the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), China is also planning on sending crewed missions to Mars in the coming decade. In preparation for the arrival of taikonauts on the Red Planet, China is gearing up to return samples of Martian soil and rock to Earth roughly two years ahead of the proposed NASA-ESA Mars Sample Return (MSR).

This mission will be the third in the China National Space Administration’s (CNSA) Tianwen program (Tianwen-3) and will consist of a pair of launches in 2028 that will return samples to Earth in July 2031. According to a new study recently published in the journal Chinese Science Bulletin, Chinese scientists announced that they have developed a new numerical model to simulate the atmospheric environment of Mars. Known as the Global Open Planetary atmospheric model for Mars (aka. GoPlanet-Mars, or GoMars), this model offers research support in preparation for the Tianwen-3 mission.