NASA’s Perseverance rover just notched another first on Mars, one that may help pave the way for astronauts to explore the Red Planet someday.
The rover successfully used its MOXIE instrument to generate oxygen from the thin, carbon dioxide-dominated Martian atmosphere for the first time, demonstrating technology that could both help astronauts breathe and help propel the rockets that get them back home to Earth.
The MOXIE milestone occurred on Tuesday (April 20), just one day after Perseverance watched over another epic Martian first—the first Mars flight of NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter , which rode to the Red Planeton the rover’s belly.
Netflix launches new Mars mission thriller 'Stowaway.' But will the air last? | Space
Uninvited passengers and secret hitchhikers in sci-fi films (whether intentional or unintentional) is a well-worn trope in pop culture offerings, often witnessed in TV shows and films like "Lost in Space," "The Astronauts" or "Jurassic Park: The Lost World."
To its credit, this serious German-American production manages to detour around some of the more cliché plot contrivances in similar fare and instead infuses the story with genuine scenes of courage, heroism, and sacrifice under dire circumstances in an inhospitable environment.
Lift off! First flight on Mars launches new way to explore worlds
NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity took this shot of the Martian surface during its first flight, on 19 April. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA has pulled off the first powered flight on another world. Ingenuity, the robot rotorcraft that is part of the agency's Perseverance mission, lifted off from the surface of Mars on 19 April, in a 39.1-second flight that is a landmark in interplanetary aviation.
"We can now say that human beings have flown a rotorcraft on another planet," says MiMi Aung, the project's lead engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.
Strange crater suggests ancient Mars may have been frigid with occasional snowmelt | Space
In a new study, scientists at Brown University took a look at the peculiar ridges and geological features of this crater that were visible in imagery from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter .
According to their paper , published March 12 in the Planetary Science Journal, the team noticed that these formations are different from those found in other craters. While all the craters in the scope of their comparative analysis had signs that water once flowed within them, the unnamed crater showed no signs that water breached the wall of the crater to get inside. There was also no evidence that groundwater was the source of the ridges inside the crater, they found.
Mars' changing habitability recorded by ancient dune fields in Gale crater | EurekAlert!
Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert system.
Elon Musk Talks Mars While Announcing $100 Million XPrize Contest
The competition is asking people to develop large-scale CO2 removal projects to help stow away and extract CO2 and rebalance the Earth's dangerously high carbon emission trends.
"No, it is not," he said, laughing. Musk did caution that "a bunch of people will probably die" at the start of Mars ventures, but likened it to any prior danger associated with exploration.
Mars Express and the case of the large, mysterious Martian volcano cloud - NASASpaceFlight.com
Throughout the southern Martian hemisphere’s spring and summer seasons, a large, expansive cloud emerges daily from the volcano Arsia Mons. Why this cloud only forms at this location on Mars, what kind of cloud it is, and other puzzles to this phenomenon have plagued researchers for years — as observing Martian weather usually only happens by accident during other investigations.
Now, a team of researchers primarily using the Mars Express orbiter from the European Space Agency (ESA) — as well as data from past and present NASA and ISRO spacecraft — have pieced together the mystery surrounding this cloud.
NASA's Ingenuity helicopter takes off and lands on Mars
Manned Mars mission drama 'Stowaway' | National | pdclarion.com
Anna Kendrick leads the cast of the space travel drama about a Mars mission with an unexpected extra crew member. Rick Damigella reports.
Happening on Twitter
Another huge first: converting CO2 into oxygen on Mars. Working off the land with what's already here, my MOXIE ins… https://t.co/zR8FOwbNTI NASAPersevere (from Jezero Crater, Mars) Wed Apr 21 19:43:41 +0000 2021
NASA's Perseverance rover makes oxygen on Mars for 1st time https://t.co/VZ0SaZGdvk https://t.co/ihb6AK1Unw SPACEdotcom (from NYC) Wed Apr 21 23:54:35 +0000 2021
Future astronauts: breathe easier. The MOXIE technology demonstration aboard @NASAPersevere successfully extracted… https://t.co/zvYAmJNsaz NASAJPL (from Pasadena, Calif.) Wed Apr 21 19:46:08 +0000 2021
In yet another first, @NASAPersevere has extracted oxygen from the Martian atmosphere – a critical step toward futu… https://t.co/m6xXIzyc3X NASA_Technology (from Washington, DC) Wed Apr 21 19:43:37 +0000 2021
No comments:
Post a Comment