Portal:Mars/Selected article
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NASA's Viking program consisted of two unmanned space missions to Mars, Viking 1 and Viking 2. Each mission had a satellite designed to photograph the surface of Mars from orbit, and to act as a communication relay for the Viking lander that each mission carried. It was the most expensive and ambitious mission ever sent to Mars. It was highly successful and formed most of the database of information about Mars until the late 1990's and early 2000's.
Viking 1 was launched on August 20, 1975, and the second craft, Viking 2, was launched on September 9, 1975, both riding atop Titan III-E rockets with Centaur upper stages. Each spacecraft consisted of an orbiter and a lander. After orbiting Mars and returning images used for landing site selection, the orbiter and lander detached and the lander entered the Martian atmosphere and soft-landed at the selected site. The orbiters continued imaging and other scientific operations from orbit while the landers deployed instruments on the surface.
Mars 96 (sometimes called Mars 8) was an orbiter launched in 1996 by Russia and not directly related to the Soviet Mars probe program of the same name. The orbiter's intended destination was Mars, but its actual destination was the Pacific Ocean, due to problems with the launch vehicle. The Mars 96 spacecraft was based on the Phobos vehicles launched to Mars in 1988. They were of a new design at the time and both ultimately failed. But for the Mars 96 probe the designers believed they had corrected the flaws of the Phobos vehicle. Alas, they did not get to find out if they had produced a successful design this time due to the launch vehicle failure.
It was, however, a very ambitious mission and the heaviest (intended) interplanetary probe ever launched. It included a large complement of instruments such as the Penetrator, many provided by France, Germany, and other European countries (some of which have since been re-flown on Mars Express, launched in 2003), and the United States. It was made up of the Orbiter, two Surface Stations, and two Penetrators.
As part of the wider Mariner program, in 1969 Mariner 6 and Mariner 7 (Mariner Mars 69A / 69B) completed the first dual mission to Mars, flying over the equator and south polar regions and analysing atmosphere and surface with remote sensors as well as recording and relaying hundreds of pictures. The mission's goals were to study the surface and atmosphere of Mars during close flybys to establish the basis for future investigations, particularly those relevant to the search for extraterrestrial life, and to demonstrate and develop technologies required for future Mars missions and other long-duration missions far from the Sun. Mariner 6 also had the objective of providing experience and data which would be useful in programming the Mariner 7 encounter 5 days later.
NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) is a multipurpose spacecraft designed to conduct reconnaissance and exploration of Mars from orbit. The $720 million USD spacecraft was built by Lockheed Martin under the supervision of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It was launched August 12, 2005, and attained Martian orbit on March 10, 2006. It finished aerobraking, entered its final science orbit and began its primary science phase in November 2006.
MRO contains a host of scientific instruments such as cameras, spectrometers, and radar, which are used to analyze the landforms, stratigraphy, minerals, and ice of Mars. It paves the way for future spacecraft by monitoring daily weather and surface conditions, studying potential landing sites, and testing a new telecommunications system. MRO's telecommunications system will transfer more data back to Earth than all previous interplanetary missions combined, and MRO will serve as a highly capable relay satellite for future missions.
Olympus Mons (Latin, "Mount Olympus") is the tallest known volcano and mountain in our solar system. It is located on the planet Mars at approximately . Before space probes confirmed its identity as a mountain, Olympus Mons was known to astronomers as the albedo feature, Nix Olympica ("Snows of Olympus"); since the late 19th century, however, it had been suspected that it was mountainous.
A transit of Phobos across the Sun as seen from Mars takes place when Phobos passes directly between the Sun and a point on the surface of Mars, obscuring a large part of the Sun's disc for an observer on Mars. During a transit, Phobos can be seen from Mars as a large black disc rapidly moving across the face of the Sun. At the same time, the shadow of Phobos moves across the Martian surface.
The event could also be referred to as a partial occultation (or, popularly but inaccurately, a partial eclipse) of the Sun by Phobos.
The Caves of Mars Project is a NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts funded program to assess the best place to situate the research and habitation modules that a manned mission to Mars would require.
Caves and other underground structures, including lava tubes, canyon overhangs, and other Martian cavities would be potentially useful for manned missions, for they would provide considerable shielding from both the elements and intense radiation that a Mars mission would expose astronauts to. They might also offer access to minerals, gases, ices, and any subterranean life that the crew of such a mission would probably be searching for.
The Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) is a visible-infrared spectrometer aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter that will search for mineralogic indications of past water on Mars. The CRISM instrument team is comprised of scientists from over ten universities and led by principal investigator Scott Murchie. CRISM was designed, built, and tested by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
Martian "spiders" are geological formations thus far unique to the south polar region of Mars. These structures have not been found in the north polar region or any other region of Mars to date. They appear as the carbon dioxide ice cap at the Martian south pole sublimates into carbon dioxide gas during the Martian spring and the surface below is revealed.
The formations, when viewed individually, form a round lobed structure reminiscent of a spider web. They generally radiate outward in lobes from a central point. The central point is sometimes, but not always, a crater. The formation is similar in its branching appearance to a diffusion-limited aggregation. Similar branching patterns are also seen in watershed erosion regimes as well as the branches, roots and leaf veins of plants.
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Phobos is the larger and closer of Mars' two moons (the other being Deimos), both discovered by Asaph Hall. It is named after the Greek god Phobos (which means "fear"), a son of Ares (Mars). Its surface is mostly composed of carbonaceous chondrites and is heavily cratered. Phobos is one of the smallest moons in the solar system, and orbits about 9377 km (5823 mi) above the surface of Mars, closer to its primary than any other planetary moon. Because of this close orbit, the moon will crash into Mars' surface in the future. Phobos can cast shadows onto the surface of Mars when it passes between the Sun and Mars. Phobos' origin is unclear, and has been identified as a captured asteriod or even the remains of a planetesimal. One debunked claim suggested that Phobos is of artificial origin and is hollow. Spacecraft have imaged Phobos while orbiting Mars. The Phobos spacecraft were meant to explore Phobos in greater detail, but both failed enroute. There are future plans to explore this moon.
Percival Lawrence Lowell (March 13, 1855–November 12, 1916) was a businessman, author, mathematician, and astronomer who fueled speculation that there were canals on Mars, founded the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, and formed the beginning of the effort that led to the discovery of Pluto 14 years after his death. The choice of the name Pluto and its symbol were partly influenced by his initials PL.
Lowell was the descendant of the Boston Lowell family and had a brother and sister. He graduated in 1872 from Noble and Greenough School and Harvard University in 1876. He traveled through the Far East, particularily Korea and Japan. He later became determined to study Mars and its famed canals. He moved to Flagstaff, Arizona, where he drew maps of the canals at Lowell Observatory. In the last eight years of his life, he searched for Planet X. He was buried on Mars Hill. After his death, Clyde Tombaugh would go on to discover Pluto at Lowell Observatory.
Eberswalde crater, formerly known as Holden NE crater, is a partially buried impact crater in Margaritifer Terra, Mars. The 65.3 km diameter crater, centered at 24°S, 33°W, is named after the German town of the same name, in accordance with the International Astronomical Union's rules for planetary nomenclature. It is a proposed landing site for the future Mars rover, Mars Science Laboratory. A delta located in the crater provides strong evidence of the prior existence of flowing water on Mars. It most likely was formed by flowing water. The delta was discovered by Michael Malin and Kenneth Edgett of Malin Space Science Systems through imagery taken by the Mars Global Surveyor in 2003. The delta likely formed some sedimentary rock. It suggests the climate on Mars during the Noachian epoch was made up of short, wet spells.
The terraforming (literally, "Earth-shaping") of a planet, moon, or other body is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying its atmosphere, temperature, surface topography or ecology to be similar to those of Earth in order to make it habitable by humans. The term is sometimes used broadly as a synonym for planetary engineering in general. The concepts of terraforming are rooted both in science fiction and actual science. The term was probably coined by Jack Williamson in a science-fiction story published in 1942 in Astounding Science Fiction, but the actual concept pre-dates this work. Olaf Stapledon's Last and First Men (1930) provides an example in fiction in which the planet Venus is modified after a long and destructive war with the original inhabitants of the planet.
Dr. Wernher von Braun (March 23, 1912 – June 16, 1977) was the second son of a German nobleman and high official in the Weimar government (who resigned when the Nazis took power). He became one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Germany and the United States. As a German scientist, still in his 20's and early 30's, von Braun was pivotal in Germany's pre-war rocket development program and was responsible for the design and realization of the V-2 combat rocket during World War II. After the war, he and some of his rocket team were brought to the United States through the then-secret Operation Overcast. In 1955, ten years after entering the country, von Braun became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Von Braun worked on the American Intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program before joining NASA, where he served as director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that propelled the United States to the Moon. He is generally regarded as the father of the United States space program, both for his technical and organizational skills, and for his public relations efforts on behalf of space flight. He received the 1975 National Medal of Science.
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Orion is a spacecraft design currently under development by NASA, the space agency of the United States. Each Orion spacecraft will carry a crew of four to six astronauts, and will be launched by the Ares I, a launch vehicle also currently under development. Both Orion and Ares I are elements of NASA's Project Constellation, which plans to send human explorers back to the Moon by 2020, and then onward to Mars and other destinations in the solar system. On August 31, 2006, NASA awarded Lockheed Martin (LM) the contract to design, develop, and build Orion. Orion will launch from Launch Complex 39 at Kennedy Space Center, the same launch complex that currently launches the Space Shuttle. NASA will use Orion spacecraft for its human spaceflight missions after the last Shuttle orbiter is retired in 2010. The first Orion flight is scheduled at the end of 2014 or beginning of 2015 with future flights to the Station. If commercial orbital transportation services are unavailable, Orion will handle logistic flights to the International Space Station. After that Orion is to become a key component of human missions to the Moon and Mars.
The apparent color of the Martian surface enabled humans to distinguish it from other planets early in human history and motivated them to weave fables of war in association with Mars. One of its earliest names, Har decher, literally meant "Red One" in Egyptian. Its color may have also contributed to a malignant association in Indian astrology, as it was given the names Angaraka and Lohitanga, both reflecting the distinctively red color of Mars as seen by the naked eye. Modern robotic explorers have shown that not only the surfaces, but also the skies above may appear red under sunlit conditions on Mars.
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