Mars News and Discussions

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Cracks in Martian Mud Could be a Sign of Conditions Right for Life
August 22, 2023

Introduction:

(Futurity) In surprise discovery, NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has found cracks in ancient Martian mud.

Scientists aren’t entirely sure how life began on Earth, but one prevailing theory posits that persistent cycles of wet and dry conditions on land helped assemble the complex chemical building blocks necessary for microbial life.

This is why the patchwork of well-preserved ancient mud cracks found by the Curiosity rover is so exciting to the mission’s team.

A new paper in Nature details how the distinctive hexagonal pattern of these mud cracks offers the first evidence of wet-dry cycles occurring on early Mars.

“These particular mud cracks form when wet-dry conditions occur repeatedly, perhaps seasonally,” says the paper’s lead author, William Rapin of France’s Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie.

Read more of the Futurity article here: https://www.futurity.org/nasa-rover-cr ... 2963992/

This article has been adapted from an article first published by NASA: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41 ... TrQ6A%3D

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NASA's Ingenuity helicopter flies on Mars for the 56th time
By Mike Wall published 2 days ago
Ingenuity covered 1,344 feet (410 meters) of ground on the Aug. 26 flight.

NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter keeps adding to its tally of off-Earth flights.
The 4-pound (1.8 kilograms) Ingenuity flew for the 56th time on Aug. 26, staying aloft for nearly 2.5 minutes on the Mars sortie.

"The #MarsHelicopter completed Flight 56, traveling 1,334 ft (410 m) across the Martian surface at a maximum altitude of ~39 ft (12 m). The goal of this flight was to reposition the helicopter," NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, which manages the little rotorcraft's mission, wrote via X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday (Aug. 31).

Ingenuity landed with NASA's Perseverance rover inside Mars' Jezero Crater in February 2021. The helicopter quickly aced its five-flight demonstration mission, showing that powered flight is possible on the Red Planet despite its thin atmosphere.

NASA then granted Ingenuity a mission extension, during which the chopper is serving as a scout for the life-hunting, sample-collecting Perseverance. The robotic duo are working together to explore the 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero, which hosted a big lake and a river delta billions of years ago.

More:
https://www.space.com/ingenuity-mars-he ... -flight-56

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NASA's Curiosity rover reaches Mars ridge where water left debris pileup

by NASAS

Three billion years ago, amid one of the last wet periods on Mars, powerful debris flows carried mud and boulders down the side of a hulking mountain. The debris spread into a fan that was later eroded by wind into a towering ridge, preserving an intriguing record of the Red Planet's watery past.

Now, after three attempts, NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has reached the ridge, capturing the formation in a 360-degree panoramic mosaic. Previous forays were stymied by knife-edged "gator-back" rocks and too-steep slopes. Following one of the most difficult climbs the mission has ever faced, Curiosity arrived Aug. 14 at an area where it could study the long-sought ridge with its 7-foot (2-meter) robotic arm.

"After three years, we finally found a spot where Mars allowed Curiosity to safely access the steep ridge," said Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity's project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. "It's a thrill to be able to reach out and touch rocks that were transported from places high up on Mount Sharp that we'll never be able to visit with Curiosity."

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Mars Rover Finds Ancient Debris Left by Flowing Water
The dark rocks were carried from high up on Mount Sharp, where Curiosity will never be able to reach.
By Ryan Whitwam September 20, 2023

With all the news about NASA's Perseverance rover and its helicopter sidekick, it can be easy to forget it's not the only rover trundling around Mars. Curiosity has been hard at work exploring the red planet for more than a decade, and NASA has announced it finally reached a fascinating geological formation after two failed attempts. To celebrate, NASA has released a 360-degree video of Gediz Vallis Ridge, which scientists believe is a remnant of massive flooding in the planet's past.

Since 2014, Curiosity has been ascending Mount Sharp, the central peak in Gale Crater. The first two times scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) attempted to reach the ridge, the rover was turned back by sharp "gator-back" rocks and steep slopes. Rather than risk toppling the robot, the team looked for other routes. Finally, on Aug. 14, the team found an area where Curiosity could access the formation.

Gediz Vallis Ridge covers a large patch of the mountainside, reaching a height of 70 feet (21 meters). Geologists believe the ridge is an example of a debris flow fan, a type of formation seen on both Earth and Mars associated with water flowing downhill. The ridge was then eroded over billions of years as Mars dried up, but the debris remains.

https://www.extremetech.com/science/mar ... wing-water

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Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Sets Altitude Record in Latest Flight
The craft rose to 20 meters (66 feet), breaking the previous record of 18 meters.
By Ryan Whitwam September 21, 2023

NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter just aced its 59th flight—this was not supposed to happen. The technology demonstration has far outlived its design life, demonstrating how effective an aerial drone can be on the red planet. The helicopter has set a new record on this flight, reaching a maximum altitude of 20 meters (66 feet), breaking the previous record of 18 meters.

The 59th flight took place on Sept. 16, which was the 915th Sol (Martian day) of the Perseverance mission. The robot lifted off from Airfield Sigma, where it landed during the previous flight on Sept. 11 (Sol 910). NASA didn't have to designate yet another landing zone, though. Ingenuity didn't cover any horizontal distance—this was a pop-up flight similar to flight 54, which Ingenuity undertook after an unexpected emergency landing in July.

Even though it didn't go anywhere, JPL's flight log shows this record-setting sortie was one of the longer flights undertaken by the robot. From lift-off to landing, Ingenuity was in the air for 142.6 seconds. The image below was captured during that flight, showing the helicopter's shadow on the Martian terrain. The previous 18-meter altitude record was set back in April of this year when Ingenuity flew 322 meters (1,056 feet) between Airfield Lambda and Airfield Mu.

https://www.extremetech.com/science/ing ... est-flight

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NASA's Perseverance rover sets record for longest Mars drive on autopilot
By Sharmila Kuthunur published about 13 hours ago

The rover's autopilot even guided it through boulders not seen by orbiting spacecraft.

NASA's Perseverance rover, along with its automatic navigation system, just set a record on Mars by maneuvering right through a particularly hazardous patch of Martian land. In turn, this impressive trip saved scientists weeks of precious time during which they can now do more science.

Although the mission team usually charts out the Mars rover's course manually, the automatic navigation system named AutoNav proved remarkable in this case as it safely guided the Perseverance rover around rocks hidden from orbiter images typically used for planning, scientists say.

"It was much denser than anything Perseverance has encountered before — just absolutely littered with these big rocks," Del Sesto, the deputy rover planner lead for Perseverance at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, said in a statement published Thursday (Sept. 21). "We didn't want to go around it because it would have taken us weeks. More time driving means less time for science, so we just dove right in."

In late June, Perseverance entered the boulder field named "Snowdrift Peak" from the east. It first paused to inspect two rocks, then, guided by AutoNav, trudged right through the field. By the time the rover exited Snowdrift Peak in late July, it had logged 759 meters (0.8 kilometers), according to the statement.

More:
https://www.space.com/perserverance-mar ... -maneuvers

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