NASA PRESS RELEASE
NASA’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.
Continue reading ‘Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Completes Two-Year Mission, Still Going Strong’
NASA PRESS RELEASE
Climate cycles persisting for millions of years on ancient Mars left a record of rhythmic patterns in thick stacks of sedimentary rock layers, revealed in three-dimensional detail by a telescopic camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Researchers using the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera report the first measurement of a periodic signal in the rocks of Mars. This pushes climate-cycle fingerprints much earlier in Mars’ history than more recent rhythms seen in Martian ice layers. It also may rekindle debates about some patterns of rock layering on Earth.
Continue reading ‘NASA Orbiter Finds Martian Rock Record With 10 Beats to the Bar’
NASA MISSION UPDATE
NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed vast Martian glaciers of water ice under protective blankets of rocky debris at much lower latitudes than any ice previously identified on the Red Planet.
Scientists analyzed data from the spacecraft’s ground-penetrating radar and report in the Nov. 21 issue of the journal Science that buried glaciers extend for dozens of miles from edges of mountains or cliffs. A layer of rocky debris blanketing the ice may have preserved the underground glaciers as remnants from an ice sheet that covered middle latitudes during a past ice age. This discovery is similar to massive ice glaciers that have been detected under rocky coverings in Antarctica.
University of Arizona Communications
The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, has returned more than 8,214 gigapixel-size images of the Martian surface since the start of the science phase of the mission in November 2006.
HiRISE scientists released 1,005 observations of Mars made between April 26 and July 21 to NASA’s mission data archive, called the Planetary Data System, and also to the public last week.
BROWN UNIVERSITY PRESS RELEASE
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - The prevailing thinking is that Mars is a planet whose active climate has been confined to the distant past. About 3.5 billion years ago, the Red Planet had extensive flowing water and then fell quiet - deadly quiet. It didn’t seem the climate had changed much since.
Now, in a research article that graces the May cover of Geology, scientists at Brown University think Mars’ climate has been much more dynamic than previously believed. After examining stunning high-resolution images taken last year by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the researchers have documented for the first time that ice packs at least 1 kilometer (0.6 miles) thick and perhaps 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles) thick existed along Mars’ mid-latitude belt as recently as 100 million years ago. In addition, the team believes other images tell them that glaciers flowed in localized areas in the last 10 to 100 million years - akin to the day before yesterday in Mars’ geological timeline.
This evidence of recent activity means the Martian climate may change again and could bolster speculation about whether the Red Planet can, or did, support life.”We’ve gone from seeing Mars as a dead planet for three-plus billion years to one that has been alive in recent times,” said Jay Dickson, a research analyst in the Department of Geological Sciences at Brown and lead author of the Geology paper. “[The finding] has changed our perspective from a planet that has been dry and dead to one that is icy and active.”
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
NASA PRESS RELEASE
The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took two images of the larger of Mars’ two moons, Phobos, within 10 minutes of each other on March 23, 2008. This is the first, taken from a distance of about 6,800 kilometers (about 4,200 miles). It is presented in color by combining data from the camera’s blue-green, red, and near-infrared channels.
The illuminated part of Phobos seen in the images is about 21 kilometers (13 miles) across. The most prominent feature in the images is the large crater Stickney in the lower right. With a diameter of 9 kilometers (5.6 miles), it is the largest feature on Phobos.
Continue reading ‘Spacecraft Spots Largest Known Potato in Orbit Around Mars’
Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA PRESS RELEASE
Scientists on the HiRISE team have discovered never-before-seen impact “megabreccia” and a possibly once-habitable ancient lake on Mars at a place called Holden crater.
The megabreccia is topped by layers of fine sediments that formed in what apparently was a long-lived, calm lake that filled Holden crater on early Mars, HiRISE scientists say.
“Holden crater has some of the best-exposed lake deposits and ancient megabreccia known on Mars,” said HiRISE’s principal investigator, professor Alfred McEwen of the UA’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. ”Both contain minerals that formed in the presence of water and mark potentially habitable environments. This would be an excellent place to send a rover or sample-return mission to make major advances in understanding if Mars supported life.“
Continue reading ‘Scientists Find Possible Ancient Habitable Lake on Mars’
Credit: University of Arizona/JPL/NASA
NASA Press Release
Pasadena, Calif. — A NASA spacecraft in orbit around Mars has taken the first ever image of active avalanches near the Red Planet’s north pole. The image shows tan clouds billowing away from the foot of a towering slope, where ice and dust have just cascaded down.
The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took the photograph Feb. 19. It is one of approximately 2,400 HiRISE images being released today.
Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo mothership faces rudder problem
Flight International
Virgin Galactic’s WhiteKnightTwo may need to have its rudder and yaw stability improved to counter issues such as the greater fishtail effect that would be expected with a twin fuselage aircraft.
Witnesses to the 21 December maiden flight told Flight International that they noticed some yawing during take-off, indicating [...]
Report: Virgin Galactic Commercial Flights Set for 2011
Virgin Galactic on course to begin commercial space flights in 2011
Zaywa.com
The world’s first and only private space-liner Virgin Galactic will begin its commercial flights into space in 2011 with 300 passengers already booked for the gravity-defying journeys.
Virgin Galactic CEO Stephen Attenborough, who is also Commercial Director of Virgin Group of Sir Richard Branson, during a [...]
More on the Richardson Investigation
Richardson Withdraws Name for Cabinet (with Video)
MSNBC
NBC’s Lisa Myers reported last month: “The allegations now being investigated by a federal grand jury involve whether Richardson as governor steered state bond business to a firm whose founder made substantial contributions to Richardson’s political action committee. Two former state officials involved in the bond deals told NBC [...]
Spacehab to Support MRM1 for International Space Station
SPACEHAB PRESS RELEASE
SPACEHAB Incorporated, a leading provider of commercial space services, reached an agreement in principal with RSC Energia, Russia’s largest manufacturer of aerospace and space equipment, to provide facilities and support services for [...]
Spend $25 Grand to See a Man Boldly Go Where He’s Already Gone Before
Space Adventures Books Junket
Aviation Week
“Space Adventures, the Virginia firm that arranges for well-heeled tourists to fly to the International Space Station on Russian Soyuz vehicles, is booking a “VIP Launch Tour” for slightly less well-heeled tourists who want to see Charles Simonyi off on its second orbital trip. For $16,000-$24,000 a person, the company will [...]
Forgot Someone on the Old Christmas List? Buy Them a Walk in Space for $45 Million
The headline says it all. We now know how much it will cost to become the first private citizen to walk in space. Virginia-based Space Adventures is now advertising spacewalks at ISS for $45-$55 million. Meanwhile, if you just want to go up there for a little vacation, the price tag has soared to $35-$45 [...]
