#Curiosity Mars rover

[best-bot-tournament-2023]

Qualifying Poll - Round 2

They were narrowed down from over 100 candidates to make it to this stage but which TWO will make it to the tournament?

[merelygifted]

After 11 years on Mars, Curiosity continues to climb the slopes of Mount Sharp - NASASpaceFlight.com

[kuramirocket]

Rafael Navarro-Gonzalez (1959-2021): The Mexican Astrobiologist Who Shaped Our Understanding of The Planet Mars

Rafael Navarro-Gonzalez was a talented and internationally recognized chemist and astrobiologist who worked at NASA. Navarro-Gonzalez is known for his work with other researchers to study the planet Mars. He made fundamental contributions to several fields related to Astrobiology, the origin of life, and life in extreme environments. Among his many accomplishments, he helped lead the team that identified ancient organic compounds on Mars. He was a Co-I on the SAM instrument onboard NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory and on the HABIT instrument onboard ESA’s ExoMars mission. He was also on the Curiosity Mars rover team. His research blended laboratory simulations, fieldwork, and theoretical modeling in transdisciplines in chemistry, physics, and biology. This sort of dominance is unusual and requires a dynamic and intellectual curiosity beyond normal boundaries. He identified the role of volcanic lightning in the origin of life on Earth. He has established one of the very best laboratories in Latin-America.

He has published 137 papers, 4 edited books and over 225 abstracts. Among the most significant contributions are those that deal the detection of organics in Mars-like environments from cold (Antarctica), temperate (Atacama) and hot (Mojave and Libya) deserts on Earth.

Navarro-Gonzalez was born in Mexico City on April 25, 1959. He earned a bachelor’s in biology from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) where he became full professor in 2002, and a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Maryland at College Park. Dr. Navarro-González established the Laboratory of Plasma Chemistry and Planetary Studies of the Institute of Nuclear Science at UNAM. 

Rafael Navarro-Gonzalez was the first recipient of the Molina fellowship award. This prize recognizes outstanding scientific achievement. He was also the recipient of the 2009 Alexander von Humboldt Medal and the World Academy of Sciences Award in Earth Sciences.

He died on Jan. 28, 2021 due to Covid-19-related complications.

In honor of his service, NASA named a mountain on Mars after him. The mountain stretches 450 feet (120 meters) tall, “Rafael Navarro Mountain” is located on Mount Sharp in northwest Gale Crater.

Rafael Navarro Mountain

“Rafael was a good friend and dedicated scientist, and it has been a privilege and honor for our Mars exploration team to work with him over the years" said the principal investigator of Curiosity’s SAM experiment.

“We are truly honored to have a prominent hill named after our dad; it’s his and our dream come true to see this happen,” wrote Navarro-González’s children, Rafael and Karina Navarro Aceves, in a statement to NASA.

“Our dad was an accomplished scientist, but above all, a great human being who managed to balance work and family."

Sources: (x) (x) (x) (x) (x) (x)

[nature-godsgardenofeden]

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover captured these "sun rays" shining through clouds at sunset on Feb. 2, 2023, the 3,730th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. It was the first time that sun rays, also known as crepuscular rays, have been viewed so clearly on Mars. Crepuscular is taken from the Latin word for “twilight,” as these rays appear near sunset or sunrise. https://mars.nasa.gov/resources/27337/curiosity-views-first-martian-sun-rays/

[deep-space-netwerk]

Ask and you shall receive.

So do y'all know about Curiosity's wheels? They have these cool hole patterns!

The holes are ostensibly for tracking wheel slippage. The pattern is stamped in the Martian sand, and by taking a picture of the tracks and measuring the distance between the repeating hole marks, you can tell how much the wheels are slipping.

But the pattern isn't arbitrary! Curiosity (along with many many other NASA missions) was built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory - or "JPL". While JPL is entirely federally funded and almost exclusively works on NASA missions, it's technically operated by Caltech, not NASA. When JPL was assembling Curiosity, they added some "JPL" decals to it along with the cool "Curiosity" label on the arm.

Well, NASA HQ found out and got mad. "You can't put those JPL stickers all over our rover!" they said, and made JPL scrape them all off.

JPL reluctantly complied, but definitely got the last laugh. No decals allowed? Well fine - the holes in Curiosity's wheels say "JPL" in Morse code. So every few feet, the name of the real creator of the rover is stamped into the surface of Mars!

[imaginariumgeographica]

At the time of posting (5:17 UTC) Curiosity has been on Mars for 11 Earth years!

There's a post claiming that Curiosity sings itself happy birthday each year - it did it's first year, but it hasn't since. Power is an in-demand resource, especially this year when we're in the dead of winter with an aging battery and still trying to pack in science as we climb Mount Sharp!

This past earth year has been a great one for the decade-old rover. We crossed into the sulfate region, which contains more "salty" minerals which probably formed later in Mars' history when the planet was transitioning from its wet past to its dry present.

Despite this we still saw evidence of past water, which we thought we'd left behind lower down the mountain!

We're not just looking down with our robot geologist - the present climate is a treasure trove. It's the middle of the cloudy season on Mars, and earlier this year Curiosity saw some stunning twilight clouds lit by the just-set sun. This included seeing crepuscular rays for the first time on Mars, and a stunning, feather-like cloud.

Curiosity has faced challenging terrain from the hard rocks of the marker band to the slippy slidy ridge it navigated quite recently, but 11 years after landing it's still going strong with a team back on earth helping it navigate the challenges it faces.

Happy Earth birthday, Curiosity 🥳

[blueiscoool]

New NASA images reveal giant hole in Curiosity rover's wheel after 12 years of 'abuse' on Mars

Images captured by Curiosity's onboard cameras show several large tears in the tire of one of the rover's wheels. However, the damage does not appear to be slowing the roaming robot down.

Curiosity first touched down on Mars on Aug. 5, 2012 and was initially only expected to last for two years. But the hardy rover has defied expectations and has lasted 4,323 Martian days, or Sols, on the Red Planet, traveling more than 20 miles (32 kilometers) around the Gale Crater, where it originally landed.

However, new photos taken by Curiosity's Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) and released by NASA on Sept. 24 reveal that the rover's epic journey has taken a toll on the robot's middle right wheel. The images show several large tears in the wheel's heavily scratched tire, including one particularly large hole that reveals the wheel’s inner mechanisms. It is currently unclear when these holes first emerged or if any of the rover's other wheels have suffered similar damage.

The damage may look bad but Curiosity "is still holding up well despite taking some of the worst abuse from Mars," mission operations engineer Ashley Stroupe wrote in the statement.

By Harry Baker.

[cosmonautroger]

Mars Planet by Curiosity Rover, 2024

[theofficialastronomy101]

A 1500 Kilometer long lonely clouds spotted on Mars.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

[best-bot-tournament-2023]

Best Robot Tournament

Round 1 - Momo versus Curiosity Mars Rover

[martian-clouds]

This Zenith Movie was taken on Sol 1222 (2016-01-13) at approximately 9:52 LTST and a solar longitude of 94.64°. (What is this?)

[swdefcult]

martian sunset by the curiosity rover

[whereserpentswalk]

I don't have a logical reason for it but the quotes "Tell the emperor that my hall has fallen. Apollo no longer has his house, nor his mantic bay, nor his prophetic spring; the water has gone quite." And "My battery is low and it's getting dark" have the same energy to them. Perhaps on occasion, the machine and divine can speak the same poetry.

[mindblowingscience]

Currently in the twelfth year of its mission, NASA's Curiosity rover continues to press on while treading the world of Mars, delving into areas no rover has gone before. The latest phase of Curiosity's adventure has brought it to what some scientists believe is the desiccated bed of an ancient river.  As Curiosity prepares to follow Gediz Vallis, as scientists call this winding and boulder-choked channel, it will try to give scientists a look back through time so they can discover how the landform came to be in the first place

Continue Reading.

[tilbageidanmark]

A hole drilled on Mars by Curiosity Rover, one of 36 holes drilled.