2001 Mars Odyssey is a robotic spacecraft orbiting the planet Mars. The project was developed by NASA, and contracted out to Lockheed Martin, with an expected cost for the entire mission of US$297 million. Its mission is to use spectrometers and a thermal imager to detect evidence of past or present water and ice, as well as study the planet's geology and radiation environment. It is hoped that the data Odyssey obtains will help answer the question of whether life existed on Mars and create a risk-assessment of the radiation that future astronauts on Mars might experience. It also acts as a relay for communications between the Curiosity rover, and previously the Mars Exploration Rovers and Phoenix lander, to Earth. The mission was named as a tribute to Arthur C. Clarke, evoking the name of his and Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey.
A Mars rover is a motor vehicle designed to travel on the surface of Mars. Rovers have several advantages over stationary landers: they examine more territory, they can be directed to interesting features, they can place themselves in sunny positions to weather winter months, and they can advance the knowledge of how to perform very remote robotic vehicle control. They serve a different purpose than orbital spacecraft like Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. A more recent development is the Mars helicopter.
Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is a robotic space probe mission to Mars launched by NASA on November 26, 2011, which successfully landed Curiosity, a Mars rover, in Gale Crater on August 6, 2012. The overall objectives include investigating Mars' habitability, studying its climate and geology, and collecting data for a human mission to Mars. The rover carries a variety of scientific instruments designed by an international team.
A gamma-ray spectrometer (GRS) is an instrument for measuring the distribution of the intensity of gamma radiation versus the energy of each photon. The study and analysis of gamma-ray spectra for scientific and technical use is called gamma spectroscopy, and gamma-ray spectrometers are the instruments which observe and collect such data. Because the energy of each photon of EM radiation is proportional to its frequency, gamma rays have sufficient energy that they are typically observed by counting individual photons.
Mawrth Vallis is a valley on Mars, located in the Oxia Palus quadrangle at 22.3°N, 343.5°E with an elevation approximately two kilometers below datum. Situated between the southern highlands and northern lowlands, the valley is a channel formed by massive flooding which occurred in Mars’ ancient past. It is an ancient water outflow channel with light-colored clay-rich rocks.
Martian soil is the fine regolith found on the surface of Mars. Its properties can differ significantly from those of terrestrial soil, including its toxicity due to the presence of perchlorates. The term Martian soil typically refers to the finer fraction of regolith. So far, no samples have been returned to Earth, the goal of a Mars sample-return mission, but the soil has been studied remotely with the use of Mars rovers and Mars orbiters.
The Aeolis quadrangle is one of a series of 30 quadrangle maps of Mars used by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Astrogeology Research Program. The Aeolis quadrangle is also referred to as MC-23 . The Aeolis quadrangle covers 180° to 225° W and 0° to 30° south on Mars, and contains parts of the regions Elysium Planitia and Terra Cimmeria. A small part of the Medusae Fossae Formation lies in this quadrangle.
Almost all water on Mars today exists as ice, though it also exists in small quantities as vapor in the atmosphere. What was thought to be low-volume liquid brines in shallow Martian soil, also called recurrent slope lineae, may be grains of flowing sand and dust slipping downhill to make dark streaks. The only place where water ice is visible at the surface is at the north polar ice cap. Abundant water ice is also present beneath the permanent carbon dioxide ice cap at the Martian south pole and in the shallow subsurface at more temperate conditions. More than 5 million km3 of ice have been detected at or near the surface of Mars, enough to cover the whole planet to a depth of 35 meters (115 ft). Even more ice is likely to be locked away in the deep subsurface.
The Mars Astrobiology Explorer-Cacher (MAX-C), also known as Mars 2018 mission was a NASA concept for a Mars rover mission, proposed to be launched in 2018 together with the European ExoMars rover. The MAX-C rover concept was cancelled in April 2011 due to budget cuts.
Seasonal flows on warm Martian slopes are thought to be salty water flows occurring during the warmest months on Mars, or alternatively, dry grains that "flow" downslope of at least 27 degrees.
The composition of Mars covers the branch of the geology of Mars that describes the make-up of the planet Mars.
Rosalind Franklin, previously known as the ExoMars rover, is a planned robotic Mars rover, part of the international ExoMars programme led by the European Space Agency and the Russian Roscosmos State Corporation. The mission was scheduled to launch in July 2020, but was postponed to 2022. The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine has caused the indefinite suspension of the programme, as the member states of the ESA voted to suspend the joint mission with Russia. As of May 2022, the launch of the rover is not expected to occur before 2028 due to the need for a new non-Russian landing platform.
Aeolis Palus is a plain between the northern wall of Gale crater and the northern foothills of Aeolis Mons on Mars. It is located at 4.47°S 137.42°E.
Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) is a suite of instruments on the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover. The SAM instrument suite will analyze organics and gases from both atmospheric and solid samples. It was developed by the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the Laboratoire des Atmosphères Milieux Observations Spatiales (LATMOS) associated to the Laboratoire Inter-Universitaire des Systèmes Atmosphériques (LISA), and Honeybee Robotics, along with many additional external partners.
Curiosity is a car-sized Mars rover designed to explore the Gale crater on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. Curiosity was launched from Cape Canaveral (CCAFS) on 26 November 2011, at 15:02:00 UTC and landed on Aeolis Palus inside Gale crater on Mars on 6 August 2012, 05:17:57 UTC. The Bradbury Landing site was less than 2.4 km (1.5 mi) from the center of the rover's touchdown target after a 560 million km (350 million mi) journey.
Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS) is a weather station on Mars for Curiosity rover contributed by Spain and Finland. REMS measures humidity, pressure, temperature, wind speeds, and ultraviolet radiation on Mars. This Spanish project is led by the Spanish Astrobiology Center and includes the Finnish Meteorological Institute as a partner, contributing pressure and humidity sensors.
The Mars Science Laboratory and its rover, Curiosity, were launched from Earth on November 26, 2011. As of June 21, 2022, Curiosity has been on the planet Mars for 3510 sols since landing on August 5, 2012. (See Current status.)
Rocknest is a sand patch on the surface of Aeolis Palus, between Peace Vallis and Aeolis Mons, in Gale crater on the planet Mars. The patch was encountered by the Curiosity rover on the way from Bradbury Landing to Glenelg Intrigue on September 28, 2012. The approximate site coordinates are: 4.59°S 137.44°E.
ADRON-RM is a neutron spectrometer to search for subsurface water ice and hydrated minerals. This analyser is part of the science payload on board the European Space Agency'sRosalind Franklin rover, tasked to search for biosignatures and biomarkers on Mars. The rover is planned to be launched in August–October 2022 and land on Mars in spring 2023.
The Fine-Resolution Epithermal Neutron Detector (FREND) is a neutron detector that is part of the instrument payload on board the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), launched to Mars in March 2016. This instrument is currently mapping hydrogen levels to a maximum depth of 1 m beneath the Martian surface, thus revealing shallow water ice distribution. This instrument has an improved resolution of 7.5 times over the one Russia contributed to NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey orbiter.
