Mars Global Surveyor
''Mars Global Surveyor'' (MGS) was an American Robotic spacecraft, robotic space probe developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It launched November 1996 and collected data from 1997 to 2006. MGS was a global mapping mission that examined the entire planet, from the ionosphere down through the atmosphere to the surface. As part of the larger Mars Exploration Program, ''Mars Global Surveyor'' performed atmospheric monitoring for sister orbiters during aerobraking, and helped Mars rovers and lander missions by identifying potential landing sites and relaying surface telemetry. It completed its primary mission in January 2001 and was in its third extended mission phase when, on 2 November 2006, the spacecraft failed to respond to messages and commands. A faint signal was detected three days later which indicated that it had gone into Safe mode (spacecraft), safe mode. Attempts to recontact the spacecraft and resolve the problem failed, and NASA officially ended the mission in ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmospheric pressure is a few thousandths of Earth's, atmospheric temperature ranges from and cosmic radiation is high. Mars retains some water, in the ground as well as thinly in the atmosphere, forming cirrus clouds, frost, larger polar regions of permafrost and ice caps (with seasonal snow), but no liquid surface water. Its surface gravity is roughly a third of Earth's or double that of the Moon. It is half as wide as Earth or twice the Moon, with a diameter of , and has a surface area the size of all the dry land of Earth. Fine dust is prevalent across the surface and the atmosphere, being picked up and spread at the low Martian gravity even by the weak wind of the tenuous atmosphere. The terrain of Mars roughly follows a north-south ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Mars Rover
A Mars rover is a remote-controlled 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. , there have been six successful robotically operated Mars rovers; the first five, managed by the American NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, were (by date of Mars landing): '' Sojourner'' (1997), '' Spirit'' (2004–2010), '' Opportunity'' (2004–2018), ''Curiosity'' (2012–present), and '' Perseverance'' (2021–present). The sixth, managed by the China National Space Administration, is '' Zhurong'' (2021–2022). On January 24, 2016, NASA reported that th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Mars Exploration Rover
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission was a robotic space mission involving two Mars rovers, ''Spirit (rover), Spirit'' and ''Opportunity (rover), Opportunity'', exploring the planet Mars. It began in 2003 with the launch of the two rover (space exploration), rovers to explore the Martian surface and Geology of Mars, geology; both landed on Mars at separate locations in January 2004. Both rovers far outlived their planned missions of 90 Timekeeping on Mars#Sols, Martian solar days: MER-A ''Spirit'' was active until March 22, 2010, while MER-B ''Opportunity'' was active until June 10, 2018. Objectives The mission's scientific objective was to search for and characterize a wide range of rock (geology), rocks and soils that hold clues to past Water on Mars, water activity on Mars. The mission is part of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, which includes three previous successful landers: the two Viking program landers in 1976 and Mars Pathfinder probe in 1997. The scientific ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Cape Canaveral
Cape Canaveral () is a cape (geography), cape in Brevard County, Florida, in the United States, near the center of the state's Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast. Officially Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it lies east of Merritt Island, separated from it by the Banana River. It is part of a region known as the Space Coast, and is the site of the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Since many U.S. spacecraft have been launched from both the station and the Kennedy Space Center on adjacent Merritt Island, the two are sometimes conflation, conflated with each other. Other features of the cape include Port Canaveral, one of the busiest Maritime passenger terminal, cruise ports in the world, and the Cape Canaveral Lighthouse. The city of Cape Canaveral, Florida, Cape Canaveral lies just south of the Port Canaveral District. Mosquito Lagoon, the Indian River (Florida), Indian River, Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and Canaveral National Seashore are also features of this area. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Curiosity Rover
''Curiosity'' is a car-sized Mars rover Space exploration, exploring Gale (crater), Gale crater and Mount Sharp on Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission. ''Curiosity'' was launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Cape Canaveral (CCAFS) on November 26, 2011, at 15:02:00 Coordinated Universal Time, UTC and landed on Aeolis Palus inside Gale crater on Mars on August 6, 2012, 05:17:57 UTC. The Bradbury Landing site was less than from the center of the rover's touchdown target after a journey. Mission #Goals and objectives, goals include an investigation of the Martian climate of Mars, climate and geology of Mars, geology, an assessment of whether the selected field site inside Gale has ever offered environmental science, environmental conditions favorable for Life on Mars, microbial life (including investigation of the Water on Mars, role of water), and planetary habitability studies in preparation for Human mission to Mars, human exploration. In ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Phoenix (spacecraft)
''Phoenix'' was an uncrewed space probe that landed on the surface of Mars on May 25, 2008, and operated until November 2, 2008. ''Phoenix'' was operational on Mars for sols ( days). Its instruments were used to assess the local habitability and to research the history of water on Mars. The mission was part of the Mars Scout Program; its total cost was $420 million, including the cost of launch. The multi-agency program was led by the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at the University of Arizona, with project management by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Academic and industrial partners included universities in the United States, Canada, Switzerland, Denmark, Germany, the United Kingdom, NASA, the Canadian Space Agency, the Finnish Meteorological Institute, Lockheed Martin Space Systems, MacDonald Dettwiler & Associates (MDA) in partnership with Optech Incorporated ( Optech) and other aerospace companies. It was the first NASA mission to Mars led by a public university. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
The ''Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter'' (''MRO'') is a spacecraft designed to search for the existence of water on Mars and provide support for missions to Mars, as part of NASA's Mars Exploration Program. It was launched from Cape Canaveral on August 12, 2005, at 11:43 UTC and reached Mars on March 10, 2006, at 21:24 UTC. In November 2006, after six months of aerobraking, it entered its final science orbit and began its primary science phase. Mission objectives include observing the climate of Mars, investigating geologic forces, providing reconnaissance of future landing sites, and relaying data from surface missions back to Earth. To support these objectives, the ''MRO'' carries different scientific instruments, including three cameras, two spectrometers and a subsurface radar. As of July 29, 2023, the ''MRO'' has returned over 450 terabits of data, helped choose safe landing sites for NASA's Mars landers, discovered pure water ice in new craters and further evidence that ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Martian Polar Ice Caps
The planet Mars has two permanent polar ice caps of water ice and some dry ice (frozen carbon dioxide, CO2). Above kilometer-thick layers of water ice permafrost, slabs of dry ice are deposited during a pole's winter, lying in continuous darkness, causing 25–30% of the atmosphere being deposited annually at either of the poles. When the poles are again exposed to sunlight, the frozen CO2 sublimes. These seasonal actions transport large amounts of dust and water vapor, giving rise to Earth-like frost and large cirrus clouds. The caps at both poles consist primarily of water ice. Frozen carbon dioxide accumulates as a comparatively thin layer about one metre thick on the north cap in the northern winter, while the south cap has a permanent dry ice cover about 8 m thick. The northern polar cap has a diameter of about 1000 km during the northern Mars summer, and contains about 1.6 million cubic km of ice, which if spread evenly on the cap would be 2 km thick. (This ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Atmosphere Of Mars
The atmosphere of Mars is the layer of gases surrounding Mars. It is primarily composed of carbon dioxide (95%), molecular nitrogen (2.85%), and argon (2%). It also contains trace levels of water vapor, oxygen, carbon monoxide, hydrogen, and noble gases. The atmosphere of Mars is much thinner and colder than Atmosphere of Earth, Earth's having a max density 20 g/m3 (about 2% of Earth’s value) with a temperature generally below zero down to –60 °C. The average Atmospheric pressure, surface pressure is about which is 0.6% of the Earth's value. The currently thin Martian atmosphere prohibits the existence of liquid water on the surface of Mars, but many studies suggest that the Martian atmosphere was much thicker in the past. The higher density during spring and fall is reduced by 25% during the winter when carbon dioxide partly freezes at the pole caps. The highest atmospheric density on Mars is equal to the density found above the Earth's surface and is ≈0.020 kg/m3 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Climate Of Mars
The climate of Mars has been a topic of scientific curiosity for centuries, in part because it is the only terrestrial planet whose surface can be easily directly observed in detail from Earth with help from a telescope. Although Mars is smaller than Earth with only one tenth of Earth's mass, and 50% farther from the Sun than Earth, its climate has important similarities, such as the presence of polar ice caps, seasonal changes and observable weather patterns. It has attracted sustained study from planetologists and climatologists. While Mars's climate has similarities to Earth's, including periodic ice ages, there are also important differences, such as much lower thermal inertia. Mars's atmosphere has a scale height of approximately , 60% greater than that on Earth. The climate is of considerable relevance to the question of whether life is or ever has been present on the planet. Mars has been studied by Earth-based instruments since the 17th century, but it is only since ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |
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Magnetic Field
A magnetic field (sometimes called B-field) is a physical field that describes the magnetic influence on moving electric charges, electric currents, and magnetic materials. A moving charge in a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to its own velocity and to the magnetic field. A permanent magnet's magnetic field pulls on ferromagnetic materials such as iron, and attracts or repels other magnets. In addition, a nonuniform magnetic field exerts minuscule forces on "nonmagnetic" materials by three other magnetic effects: paramagnetism, diamagnetism, and antiferromagnetism, although these forces are usually so small they can only be detected by laboratory equipment. Magnetic fields surround magnetized materials, electric currents, and electric fields varying in time. Since both strength and direction of a magnetic field may vary with location, it is described mathematically by a function (mathematics), function assigning a Euclidean vector, vector to each point of space, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   [Amazon] |