Curiouser and Curiouser

The Curiosity rover takes a "selfie"

When you're a resident of Mars, anniversaries work a bit differently.

For our cosmic next-door neighbor, a Martian year -- one complete orbit around the sun -- takes 687 days. So it's an all-more-impressive milestone to hear from NASA that the latest Mars rover, Curiosity, celebrated the end of its first Martian year just this past June.

Curiosity joins the ranks of such other NASA robot rovers as Sojourner, Spirit, and Opportunity; their missions are to boldly go where we humans just can't (at least not yet).

So in celebration of Curiosity's first Martian anniversary, let's take a look at one of our closest planetary neighbors:

-- How far is it from Earth to Mars?  It's tricky. Mars has an elliptical orbit, which means it is closer or farther away from Earth depending on the time of year. The distance varies from 39 million to about 240 million miles.

-- Mars is roughly double the size of our moon ... and half the size of Earth. (As measured by each sphere's radius.)

-- Though a Martian year is nearly twice the length of a year on Earth, a Martian day is much closer to a day on Earth: about 1.03 Earth days (or about forty minutes longer).

-- Mars has two moons, Phobos and Deimos (named after the sons of an Italian god of war).

-- There's no oxygen on the surface of Mars, but there is also, essentially, no air at all. With only a scant bit of atmosphere on the planet, most gases simply float into outer space.

A Curiosity photo of the Martian landscape

-- There's plenty of water on Mars, which is one reason scientists think the planet may have once harbored life. It is, however, frozen into the ice caps at the northern and southern ends of the planet. The ice does occasionally melt during the "summer" seasons.

-- The first satellite to capture a picture of the surface of Mars was Mariner 4. In 1965, Mariner 4 captured 22 photographs from just over 6,000 miles away, revealing a crater-covered landscape.

-- Olympus Mons, the biggest volcano ever discovered in our solar system, is nearly the size of Texas. Its primary crater is 40 miles across.

-- There have been four American rovers sent to Mars (Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity), and all four were successfully landed and communicated back to Earth (although Sojourner lasted a scant two months).

-- The USA isn't the only country to get spacecraft to Mars. Russia was the first country to get a manmade craft to Mars, landing two rovers (Mars 2 and Mars 3) in 1971. The probes sent back 60 pictures of the surface, taken while orbiting the planet. A British rover known as Beagle 2 was also launched in 2003, though it was lost upon landing on Christmas Day.

An earlier picture from the Opportunity rover

For More:

-- Happy Anniversary! On Mars, Curiosity Rover Has Done a Lot in a Long Year - from CNN.com. Check out this overview of Curiosity's accomplishments in its first Martian year.

-- Mars Rovers [video] - from National Geographic. Some mini-documentary videos looking into the difficulties of landing on and navigating the Martian terrain.

-- How Big is Space? - from the BBC. An interactive (and rather scaled-down) look at how far our nearest neighbors truly are.

-- How Far is it to Mars - Another interactive look at the distance from Earth to Mars.

-- Mars on NPR - Articles on the science and discovery of the Red Planet.

-- NASA's Mars Page


News from the Red Planet:

-- Mystery Light on Mars Spotted by Curiosity - from Discovery News.

-- NASA Rover on Mars Sees Mercury Cross the Sun's Face - from Space.com.

-- Software Bug Found on Mars Curiosity Rover - from the Telegraph. A surprising development (though it's yet to prove a threat to the mission).

-- China Bound for Mars in 2020 - Curiosity may gain a new friend, as China moves ahead with plans to expand their own space program with a rover to Mars.

From the Catalog:

Non-fiction:

-- Mars by Linda T. Elkins-Tanton

-- The Smithsonian Book of Mars by Joseph M. Boyce

-- Managing Martians by Donna Shirley, with Danelle Morton

-- Ultimate Mars Challenge [DVD] - PBS documentary on Curiosity

-- Mars Rising [DVD] - documentary on the challenges of a manned mission to Mars


Fiction:

-- The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury

-- War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

-- A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

-- Mars, Inc.: The Billionaire's Club by Ben Bova

-- Red Planet Blues by Robert J. Sawyer



-- Post by Ms. B

[GUEST POST] The Space Shuttle: Thirty Years of Space Exploration

This week, "New @ MPL" is proud to showcase the writings of local teens from MPL's very own Teen Writing Group. (Our Teen Writing Group meets every Monday afternoon at the Library.)

Today, enjoy this entry from Allen H., sharing some of his in-depth knowledge about the history of the Space Shuttle, and its role in our space program:

One-hundred thirty-five missions.  One-hundred thirty-three successes, two failures.  These are just a small number of the many statistics that the five space shuttle orbiters -- Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour -- have played a part in.

First launched in 1981, the space shuttle was the first reusable spacecraft.  Prior to this launch, however, there were approach and landing tests.  A sixth shuttle, a prototype called Enterprise, flew these tests.  It was carried on the back of a modified Boeing 747 and jettisoned off the back to test the landing feature of the space shuttle.  At an altitude of 300 feet, the shuttle would lower its landing gears and gently touchdown on a runway.  There were a number of runways the shuttle could land at: Kennedy Space Center Shuttle Landing Facility, Edwards Air Force Base, and White Sands Space Harbor, just to name a few.

During the thirty-year campaign, the shuttle has seen many great accomplishments.  One of the most notable was the deployment, and subsequent repair of, the Hubble Space Telescope.  After the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope, it was discovered that the main mirror was ground to the wrong specifications, making the pictures blurry.  NASA was faced with two options: leave the telescope in its state, or send a space shuttle to repair it.

The Hubble telescope in orbit

Finally clearing a shuttle mission to fix it, NASA put together an elite crew, who had all been to space.  They conducted multiple spacewalks and even did back-to-back spacewalks.  After the repairs, Hubble started to fulfill its promise of peering into the past and uncovering the origins on the universe.  This mission proved that NASA could use the space shuttle to its full potential.

After the initial repair, Hubble has been serviced several times -- the most recent, and final, in 2009, when Space Shuttle Atlantis flew the STS-125 mission.

After the success of the repairs, NASA got involved in an international project: the International Space Station.  Partnering with the Russian Space Agency, European Space Agency, and countless others, construction was started on the space station.  The orbiting outpost was constructed on opposite sides of the world and then put together for the first time in space.  Crews are rotated by Russian Soyuz, and, at times, the space shuttle.  The space shuttle also carried most of the heavy cargo to the station, being the only space vehicle that could lift enormous payloads.  Having been completed in 2011, the space shuttle was retired at the conclusion of the last flight.

A spacewalk outside the International Space Station

Success was not met without failure, however.  During the thirty-year career, two space shuttle missions ended in tragedy.  On January 28th, 1985, space shuttle Challenger broke up 73 seconds after liftoff.  The accident resulted in the death of all seven astronauts, including the first teacher in space, Christa McAuliffe.  Space shuttle Discovery would fly the return-to-flight mission in 1988.

The second failure happened on February 1st, 2003.  Space shuttle Columbia was returning from a science mission.  Sixteen minutes before landing, the space shuttle broke apart, killing all seven astronauts.  The subsequent investigation showed that a piece of foam struck the orbiter during the ascent that made a hole in the underside of the shuttle.  This caused it to lose the thermal protection and break apart during the high temperatures of reentry.  Space shuttle Discovery again flew the return-to-flight mission in 2005.

Even with these failures, NASA continued to move forward.  Eileen Collins said it best: “We want to explore. We're curious people ... We believe in what we're doing. Now it's time to go.”  NASA has made major security improvements, including requiring the shuttle to perform heat shield inspections (which include flipping 360 degrees on flights to the Space Station), as well has having a secondary method of returning the astronauts from space.  After these requirements, NASA has not experienced any major problems with a spacecraft.

In July of 2011, the space shuttle was retired from flight, with these words from Chris Ferguson at the final landing: “Mission complete, Houston. After serving the world for over 30 years, the space shuttle found its place in history. It's come to a final stop.”  The International Space Station is complete, the space shuttle retired; now it is time to move on.  Back to the moon, and then -- to Mars.

The space shuttle Endeavour

-- Post by teen volunteer Allen H.

(For more on the history of the space shuttle, check out Space Shuttle: The First 20 Years - detailing the astronauts' experiences in their own words.)

On a Magic Carpet Ride

An artist's depiction of the Curiosity rover touching down on Mars. 

The Olympics might be the biggest news story on the planet right now -- but offworld, things are proving to be just as interesting. The new NASA rover, the Curiosity, touched down on Mars early Monday morning, to the cheers of NASA technicians and scientists.

It's not the first time a rover has been sent to Mars. Opportunity, originally sent to Mars in 2004 for a planned three months of operational time, has been working ever since. Another rover sent in 2004, Spirit, only ceased working in 2010. 

What sets the Curiosity apart from its fellow rovers is, in part, its mission goal. Curiosity is equipped with scientific tools designed to explore the surface of Mars for clues as to whether or not the planet was ever capable of sustaining microscopic organisms of life. 

With a successful landing down pat, Curiosity is poised to pull NASA into a new era of discovery. Check out the links below to find out more about this amazing mission -- and about other journeys we've taken into the stars.

From the Apollo 11 moon landing.

A Look at Another World:

-- "Greeley Panorama" from Opportunity's Fifth Martian Winter: Moving Panorama -- 817 images were taken by the panoramic camera on NASA's Mars rover Opportunity, and then artificially colored. The images were then converted by artist Hans Nyberg into a moving panorama of the surface of Mars that must be seen to be believed. If you click on one link, make it this one! (You can see the original NASA photograph here.)

The Curiosity:

-- NASA Spacecraft, Curiosity Rover, Land Safely on Mars -- from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The Curiosity cost $2.5 billion, took eight months to complete a 352-million mile journey ... and it all came down to the landing. Read the details here.

-- Mars Science Laboratory -- from NASA. This trip isn't just about the photos. Stay up-to-date on NASA's findings by following this link!  (You can also use this link to check out the latest photos coming back from the Curiosity, too -- including ones in color.)

-- Mars Rover Landing "Miracle of Engineering," Scientists Say -- from Reuters. Check out the first photos to be returned by the Curiosity!

-- An Inside Look at the Mars Curiosity Rover -- from Time Magazine. All about the making of the Curiosity, complete with photos of the rover "in progress."

Other space-links:

-- Voyager 1 Zooming Ever Closer to Edge of Our Solar System -- from NBC News. Curiosity isn't the only man-made spacecraft currently exploring the stars. Voyager 1 and 2, launched in 1977, are still going strong ... and Voyager 1 seems to be on the verge of leaving our solar system entirely.

-- The Great Moon Hoax -- from NASA. Some still claim that the 1969 moon landing was all a hoax, designed to ensure that the USA would appear to beat Russia in the space race. Here, NASA uses the evidence to dispute that theory.

Two Travelers:

-- Sally Ride -- NASA's biography about the first American woman in space.

-- Neil Armstrong -- Currently in the news for recovering from bypass surgery (soon after his 82nd birthday on August 5), Neil Armstrong is the first person to ever stand on the Moon. Watch the historical footage here:

-- Post by Ms. B