The Mars 2020 mission is on track for launch next year, and nesting inside the high-tech new rover heading that direction is a high-tech helicopter designed to fly in the planet’s nearly non-existent atmosphere. The actual aircraft that will fly on the Martian surface just took its first flight and its engineers are over the moon.
View More Mars helicopter bound for the Red Planet takes to the air for the first timeCategory: Jpl
Opportunity’s last Mars panorama is a showstopper
The Opportunity Mars Rover may be officially offline for good, but its legacy of science and imagery is ongoing — and NASA just shared the last (nearly) complete panorama the robot sent back before it was blanketed in dust.
View More Opportunity’s last Mars panorama is a showstopperOpportunity Mars Rover goes to its last rest after extraordinary 14-year mission
Opportunity, one of two rovers sent to Mars in 2004, is officially offline for good, NASA and JPL officials announced today at a special press conference. “I declare the Opportunity mission as complete, and with it the Mars Exploration Rover mission as complete,” said NASA’s Thomas Zurbuchen.
View More Opportunity Mars Rover goes to its last rest after extraordinary 14-year missionNASA cubecraft WALL-E and EVE sign off after historic Mars flyby
A NASA mission that sent two tiny spacecraft farther out than any like them before appears to have come to an end: Cubesats MarCO-A and B (nicknamed WALL-E and EVE) are no longer communicating from their positions a million and two million miles from Earth respectively.
View More NASA cubecraft WALL-E and EVE sign off after historic Mars flybyMars Rover Curiosity is switching brains so it can fix itself
When you send something to space, it’s good to have redundancy. Sometimes you want to send two whole duplicate spacecraft just in case — as was the case with Voyager — but sometimes it’s good enough to have two of critical components. Mars Rover Curiosity is no exception, and it is now in the process of switching from one main “brain” to the other so it can do digital surgery on the first.
View More Mars Rover Curiosity is switching brains so it can fix itselfNASA’s Open Source Rover lets you build your own planetary exploration platform
Got some spare time this weekend? Why not build yourself a working rover from plans provided by NASA? The spaceniks at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have all the plans, code, and materials for you to peruse and use — just make sure you’ve got $2,500 and a bit of engineering know-how. This thing isn’t made out of Lincoln Logs.
View More NASA’s Open Source Rover lets you build your own planetary exploration platformFirst CubeSats to travel the solar system snap ‘Pale Blue Dot’ homage
The Insight launch earlier this month had a couple stowaways: a pair of tiny CubeSats that are already the farthest such tiny satellites have ever been from Earth by a long shot. And one of them got a chance to snap a picture of their home planet as an homage to the Voyager mission’s famous “Pale Blue Dot.”
View More First CubeSats to travel the solar system snap ‘Pale Blue Dot’ homageNASA’s InSight Mars lander will gaze (and drill) into the depths of the Red Planet
NASA’s latest mission to Mars, Insight, is set to launch early Saturday morning in pursuit of a number of historic firsts in space travel and planetology. The lander’s instruments will probe the surface of the planet and monitor its seismic activity with unprecedented precision, while a pair of diminutive cubesats riding shotgun will test the viability of tiny spacecraft for interplanetary travel.
View More NASA’s InSight Mars lander will gaze (and drill) into the depths of the Red PlanetNASA’s beautiful snowflake simulations could help predict inclement weather
There’s a lot about snow we don’t know. Where does it come from? Where does it go? What does it taste like? Admittedly there are tentative answers to these questions. But there are yet more complex ones like how exactly, on a microscopic level, snow melts in mid-air. That’s the focus of one project at NASA, the results of which are both practical and beautiful.
View More NASA’s beautiful snowflake simulations could help predict inclement weatherRocket blast from the past: Voyager 1 fires thrusters last used in 1980
While some spacecraft get the chance to go out in a blaze of glory, others are in it for the long haul – Voyager 1 more so than any other. The mission celebrated its 40th anniversary this year, but it’s not just a lump of metal floating through interstellar space: that baby still runs. Thrusts, rather. Read More
NASA’s jack-o’-lanterns are next level
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Watching the annual NASA Jet Propulsion Lab pumpkin-carving contest is a great way to feel insecure in your own skills.
The scientists pulled out all the stops and created science-inspired masterpieces out of the seasonal gourd. The video above shows the seventh annual contest in action. Other notable entries were posted on social media.
There was a Mars Curiosity rover pumpkin, a War of the Worlds fighting machine, and a take on the InSight spacecraft.
Happy Halloween! 🎃 Le concours de citrouilles de JPL a fait fort à nouveau cette année! Europa Clipper et Mars rovers à l’honneur! pic.twitter.com/QIzNhbszTA
— Gregory Dubos (@astroptere) October 31, 2017 Read more…
More about Nasa, Halloween, Jpl, Science, and Space
NASA’s jack-o’-lanterns are next level
Watching the annual NASA Jet Propulsion Lab pumpkin-carving contest is a great way to feel insecure in your own skills.
The scientists pulled out all the stops and created science-inspired masterpieces out of the seasonal gourd. The video above shows the seventh annual contest in action. Other notable entries were posted on social media.
There was a Mars Curiosity rover pumpkin, a War of the Worlds fighting machine, and a take on the InSight spacecraft.
Happy Halloween! 🎃 Le concours de citrouilles de JPL a fait fort à nouveau cette année! Europa Clipper et Mars rovers à l’honneur! pic.twitter.com/QIzNhbszTA
— Gregory Dubos (@astroptere) October 31, 2017 Read more…
More about Nasa, Halloween, Jpl, Science, and Space