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Rock Varnish: A Promising Habitat For Martian Bacteria
Tucson AZ (SPX) Dec 19, 2008As scientists search for life on Mars, they should take a close look at rock varnish, according to a paper in the current issue of the "Journal of Geophysical Research." The paper describes how a research team led by Kimberly R. Kuhlman, of the Tucson-based Planetary Science Institute, found bacteria associated with rock varnish in an area where the surrounding soils were essentially ... more Possible Explanation For Migration Of Volcanic Activity On Mars
Boulder CO (SPX) Dec 17, 2008Picture a ball. It's an ordinary ball in every way except that it is roughly 4,300 miles in diameter and is moving through the cold of space some 35 million miles from Earth, and hurtling around the sun in just less than two Earth years. This is Mars. After a first glance at the Martian surface, one may quickly notice two striking global-scale features. The first is the three-mile ... more Phoenix Site On Mars May Be In Dry Climate Cycle Phase
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 16, 2008The Martian arctic soil that NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander dug into this year is very cold and very dry. However, when long-term climate cycles make the site warmer, the soil may get moist enough to modify the chemistry, producing effects that persist through the colder times. Phoenix found clues increasing scientists' confidence in predictive models about water vapor moving through the soil ... more Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Completes Prime Mission
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 12, 2008NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has completed its primary, two-year science phase. The spacecraft has found signs of a complex Martian history of climate change that produced a diversity of past watery environments. The orbiter has returned 73 terabits of science data, more than all earlier Mars missions combined. The spacecraft will build on this record as it continues to examine Mars ... more UA Projects Make Time List Of Top Science Discoveries
Tempe AZ (SPX) Dec 12, 2008Two international science projects - one led by The University of Arizona, and one with considerable UA involvement - lead Time Magazine's list of Top 10 Scientific Discoveries, crowning a year of unprecedented science achievement for Arizona's land grant university. Time ranked the Large Hadron Collider - the massive particle acclerator straddling the Swiss-French border - at the top of ... more |
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Beijing (RIA Novosti) Dec 08, 2008China will send a space probe to Mars with Russia's assistance in October 2009, a Chinese newspaper said on Friday. Russia and China signed a cooperative agreement on the joint exploration of Mars on March 26, 2007. The project includes the launch of the Yinghuo-1 Chinese-made Mars probe. Yinghuo-1 and the Russian Phobos-Grunt probe will be sent together to Mars on a Russian Zenit ... more NASA lands a cosmic first with "tweets" from Mars
San Francisco (AFP) Dec 5, 2008If the Phoenix Lander comes back to life on Mars, Twitter users could be among the first to know. NASA gave the historic Space Age mission an Internet Age spin by adding a Twitter page, enabling the robotic interplanetary explorer to answer the hot micro-blogging website's trademark query: "What are you doing?" Twitter rocketed to popularity with technology that lets people use mobile ... more ESA Presents European Participants In Mars500 Isolation Study
Paris, France (ESA) Dec 08, 2008March 2009 will see two European participants entering a set of modules at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) in Moscow. Together with four Russian participants, they will be sealed inside these isolation chambers for 105 days. This joint ESA IBMP campaign is a preparatory study leading up to the 520-day isolation study in the form of a full-fledged simulation of a mission to Mars ... more Mars Science Lab Launch Delayed Two Years
Washington DC (SPX) Dec 05, 2008NASA's Mars Science Laboratory will launch two years later than previously planned, in the fall of 2011. The mission will send a next-generation rover with unprecedented research tools to study the early environmental history of Mars. A launch date of October 2009 no longer is feasible because of testing and hardware challenges that must be addressed to ensure mission success. The window ... more |
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Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 03, 2008After nearly a month of daily checks to determine whether Martian NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander would be able to communicate again, the agency has stopped using its Mars orbiters to hail the lander and listen for its beep. As expected, reduced daily sunshine eventually left the solar-powered Phoenix craft without enough energy to keep its batteries charged. The final communication from ... more Spirit Drained As Martian Dust Storms Continue
Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 02, 2008Spirit's condition has improved during the past week, though skies remain fairly dusty after the recent Martian dust storm. Since sol 1730 (Nov. 14, 2008), solar-array energy has averaged 169 watt-hours (100 watt-hours is the amount of energy needed to light a 100-watt bulb for 1 hour). The latest measurement of atmospheric darkness caused by dust, known as Tau, is 0.858. The dust factor, repres ... more Opportunity Set For Two Weeks Of Operational Independence
Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 02, 2008Opportunity is getting ready for solar conjunction, the time when the Sun is in the line of sight between Earth and Mars. During this two-week period, from Nov. 30, 2008 to Dec. 13, 2008, the mission team will not send new commands to the rover. The science team plans to position Opportunity on a rock outcrop, possibly near a cobble the rover can study with the Moessbauer spectrometer, during th ... more Dawn Set For Mars Flyby
Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 02, 2008The Dawn spacecraft is healthy and on course for its flyby of Mars early next year. The planet's gravity will help boost the probe on its way to rendezvous with Vesta. While the spacecraft has its sights set on the asteroid belt (via Mars), its path is now bringing it closer to Earth. Meanwhile, from Earth's perspective, Dawn appears to be approaching a blindingly close encounter with the Sun. ... more
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