Mars 2020, Perseverance rover and the Ingenuity helicopter drone, NASA, USA

[Administrator]

Ingenuity Helicopter completed 9th flight on Mars for 625 meters distance

Jul 5, 2021

On July 5, 2021 NASA’s Ingenuity Helicopter made 625 meters 9th flight on Mars and Perseverance Rover transmitted latest images from Ingenuity’s onboard camera. Ingenuity traveled ~2,041 ft (625 meters), fly time was ~167 seconds and took color images of the trip from onboard 13-MP camera. Speed was ~5 m/s. Mars Drone has received 2nd software update on Red PlanetNow Ingenuity ready to go ahead Perseverance Rover and send images of those areas where rovers is driving. Now Ingenuity and Perseverance work together to explore Mars for water presence in the past.

 

[Administrator]

Perseverance’s first sample location

Jul 22, 2021

NASA’s Perseverance rover is getting ready to collect its first sample of rock from an area of the Jezero Crater informally called the “Cratered Floor Fractured Rough.” Jennifer Trosper (Perseverance project manager, JPL) explains what the team and the rover have achieved so far. The stones that appear light-colored and flat in this image are informally referred to as the “paver rocks” and will be the first type from which Perseverance will collect a sample for planned return to Earth by subsequent missions.

 

[Administrator]

NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover finds a changing landscape

Aug 17, 2021

NASA’s Curiosity rover explores Mount Sharp, a 5-mile-tall (8-kilometer-tall) mountain within the basin of Gale Crater on Mars.

 

[Administrator]

Perseverance’s first sample of Mars

Sep 5, 2021

NASA’s Perseverance rover successfully drilled and collected its first sample of Mars, from a rock nicknamed “Rochette”, on 1 September 2021. Perseverance will now seal the tube no. 266 and store the sample. The first sample attempt failed on 6 August 2021 because, according to NASA, the rock was “too crumbly”. Perseverance is exploring an area of the Jezero Crater informally called the “Cratered Floor Fractured Rough.”

 

[Administrator]

RI Seminar: Andrew E. Johnson : The Search for Ancient Life on Mars Began with a Safe Landing

Sep 11, 2021

Abstract: Prior mars rover missions have all landed in flat and smooth regions, but for the Mars 2020 mission, which is seeking signs of ancient life, this was no longer acceptable. To maximize the variety of rock samples that will eventually be returned to earth for analysis, the Perseverance rover needed to land in a geologically diverse region with exposed layers. Terrain relief that is ideal for the science obviously poses significant risks for landing, so a new landing capability called Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN) was added to the mission. TRN takes images of the ground during parachute descent and matches them to a map of the landing area made from orbital imagery. These matches provide a position fix, like GPS, that tells the lander where it is relative to a map of known landing hazards. Given its position relative to the hazards the spacecraft can identify a safe and reachable landing site to target during the final rocket powered phase of landing. This talk will describe the scientific goals of the mission, the Terrain Relative Navigation system design and the successful results from landing on February 18th, 2021.

BioSketch: Dr. Andrew E. Johnson is a Principal Robotics Systems Engineer in the Guidance and Control Section of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Since joining JPL in 1997, he has been developing technologies and flight systems for autonomous navigation and mapping during descent to planets moons, comets and asteroids. For the Mars Exploration Rovers, he was lead developer for the Descent Image Motion Estimation System, and on Mars 2020 he led the development of the Lander Vision System that provided surface relative position estimates for Terrain Relative Navigation. He was also the manager of the Mars 2020 Guidance Navigation and Control subsystem which included cruise, EDL and surface mission functions. Andrew received undergraduate degrees in Mathematics and Engineering Physics from the University of Kansas and a Ph.D in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon University.

 

[Administrator]

Article "A NASA spacecraft orbiting Mars snapped a photo of the Perseverance rover in the crater below"

by Lily Katzman
October 7, 2021

 

[Administrator]

Mars Sample Return conceptual animation

Oct 12, 2021

Collecting samples from Mars and bringing them back to Earth will be a historic undertaking that started with the launch of NASA’s Perseverance rover on July 30, 2020. Perseverance collected its first rock core samples in September 2021. The rover will leave them on Mars for a future mission to retrieve and return to Earth. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are solidifying concepts for this proposed Mars Sample Return campaign. The current concept includes a lander, a fetch rover, an ascent vehicle to launch the sample container to Martian orbit, and a retrieval spacecraft with a payload for capturing and containing the samples and then sending them back to Earth to land in an unpopulated area.

jpl.nasa.gov/missions/mars-sample-return-msr

 

[Administrator]

NASA's Perseverance Rover captures the sounds of Mars

Oct 18, 2021

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover carries two microphones which are directly recording sounds on the Red Planet, including the Ingenuity helicopter and the rover itself at work. For the very first time, these audio recordings offer a new way to experience the planet.

Earth and Mars have different atmospheres, which affects the way sound is heard. Justin Maki, a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Nina Lanza, a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, explain some of the notable audio recorded on Mars in this video.

 

[Administrator]

NASA's Perseverance Mars Rover milestones - 2021 Year in review

Dec 28, 2021

What has NASA's Perseverance rover accomplished since landing on the surface of Mars in February 2021? Surface Operations Mission Manager Jessica Samuels reflects on a year filled with groundbreaking discoveries at Jezero Crater and counts up the rover's achievements:

● More than 1.8 miles (2.9 kilometers) driven
● A new record for the longest drive in a Martian day
● Six samples and counting of Martian rock and atmosphere that could eventually be brought to Earth for further study
● More than 50 gigabytes of science data
● More than 100,000 images returned, including two "selfies"
● 18 flights by NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, which hitched a ride and coordinates flights with the Perseverance rover

Samuels also explains the next phase of Perseverance’s mission: to explore the delta that formed in Jezero Crater billions of years ago from sediment that an ancient river carried into the lake that once existed in the crater.

A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover is characterizing the planet's geology and past climate and paving the way for human exploration of the Red Planet. Perseverance is the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust).

 

[Administrator]

"Flying on Mars” presentation

Feb 18, 2022

AeroVironment’s team of innovative engineers discuss our collaboration with NASA/JPL to design and develop the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter.

AeroVironment Inc.

avinc.com/about/mars-helicopter

 

[Administrator]

NASA’s Mars rovers are on the move and bringing the public along (NASA Mars Report March 15, 2022)

Mar 15, 2022

NASA’s rovers are putting their gears in drive on Mars, making discoveries along the way. NASA's Curiosity rover captured some interesting images on Mount Sharp while heading toward an area called Greenheugh Pediment. Over in Jezero Crater, NASA's Perseverance rover and Ingenuity Mars Helicopter are both gearing up for a new destination. Perseverance is wrapping up its first science campaign on the floor of Jezero Crater and, with the help of sophisticated self-driving abilities, will head toward the remnants of a fan-shaped deposit of river sediments known as a delta to collect more samples. Ingenuity is planning updates to its software to improve operational safety.

You can make your own discoveries by visiting the raw image pages for the Curiosity rover mars.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw-images/ and Perseverance rover mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/multimedia/raw-images/, which feature unprocessed images coming straight down from the rovers.

 

[Administrator]

NASA’s self-driving Perseverance Mars Rover is breaking records

Apr 8, 2022

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover is using its self-driving capabilities as it treks across Jezero Crater seeking signs of ancient life and gathering rock and soil samples for planned return to Earth.

With the help of special 3D glasses, rover drivers on Earth plan routes with specific stops, but
increasingly allow the rover to "take the wheel" and choose how it gets to those stops. Perseverance's auto-navigation system, known as AutoNav, makes 3D maps of the terrain ahead, identifies hazards, and plans a route around any obstacles without additional direction from controllers back on Earth.

Now the rover can drive through these more complex terrains, which helps Perseverance achieve its science goals and break driving records. The rover is traversing from an area near its landing site, "Octavia E. Butler Landing," to an area where an ancient river flowed into a body of water and deposited sediments (known as a delta).

 

[Administrator]

Perseverance observes Solar Eclipse on Mars

Apr 21, 2022

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used its Mastcam-Z camera system to observe Phobos, one of Mars’ two moons, eclipsing the Sun, on 2 April 2022. The eclipse lasted a little over 40 seconds, much shorter than a typical solar eclipse on Earth, as Phobos is about 157 times smaller than Earth’s Moon.

 

[Administrator]

NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter captures record flight

May 27, 2022

NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter made a record-breaking 25th flight on April 18, 2022. The navigation camera aboard the rotorcraft captured its longest and fastest flight to date on the Red Planet. The helicopter covered 2,310 feet (704 meters) at a max speed of 12 mph (5.5 meters per second).

Footage of the 161.3-second flight was sped up approximately five times. In the video, Ingenuity first reaches an altitude of 33 feet (10 meters). The helicopter then moves southwest and accelerates to 12 mph (5.5 meters per second) in less than three seconds. Ingenuity flies over a group of sand ripples and then by several rock fields. Finally, the helicopter finds a landing spot when relatively flat terrain appears below.

Ingenuity became the first aircraft in history to make a powered, controlled flight on another planet on April 19, 2021, from Wright Brothers Field in Jezero Crater, Mars.

 

[Administrator]

New Mars panorama from Curiosity

Jun 22, 2022

NASA’s Curiosity rover captured 10 images with its Mast Camera, or Mastcam, on 2 May 2022, the 3,462nd Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The view shows a sulfate-bearing region ahead of its current location in the Gale Crater. Dark boulders near the center of the panorama are thought to have formed from sand deposited in ancient streams or ponds.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

 

[Administrator]

Curiosity – A decade on Mars (Live Public Talk)

Streamed live on Jul 22, 2022

Ten years and over 17 miles of driving has taught us there is more to Mars than we could ever imagine. We’ll take a look at highlights from the past decade of this extraordinary mission and see where it’s leading us next.

Speakers:
Dr. Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity Project Scientist, NASA JPL
Keri Bean, Curiosity Rover Planner Deputy Team Lead, NASA JPL

Host:
Nikki Wyrick, Public Services Office, NASA JPL

Co-Host:
Sarah Marcotte, Public Outreach Specialist, NASA JPL

(Original Air Date: July 21, 2022)

 

[Administrator]

NASA’s Curiosity rover turns 10: here’s what it’s learned

Aug 5, 2022

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover set out to answer a big question when it landed on the Red Planet 10 years ago: Could Mars have supported ancient life? Scientists have discovered the answer is yes and have been working to learn more about the planet’s past habitable environment.

In this Mars Report, Curiosity Deputy Project Scientist Abigail Fraeman provides an update on the rover’s capabilities a decade after landing in Gale Crater. Now, Curiosity is heading to an area that may help answer how long ancient life could have persisted on the Red Planet as Mars went through significant changes in the climate.

Read more about where Curiosity is currently exploring. Download a poster celebrating Curiosity’s 10 years on Mars here.

Some of the images in the video include color enhancement that exaggerate small changes in color from place to place in the Martian scene. This makes it easier for the science team to use their everyday experience to interpret the landscape. For instance, the sky on Mars would not actually look blue to a human explorer on the Red Planet, but pinkish.

 

[Administrator]

10 years on Mars: The Curiosity rover's journey

Aug 5, 2022

It has been 10 years since the Curiosity rover landed on the surface of Mars. Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists Nina Lanza (principal investigator for ChemCam) and Sam Clegg (co-principal investigator on ChemCam) talk about the purpose and accomplishments of the ongoing Curiosity mission.

'LA-UR-22-28138'

 

[Administrator]

NASA's Perseverance Mars Rover investigates geologically rich area (News briefing)

Sep 15, 2022

NASA will host a briefing to provide highlights from the first year-and-a-half of the Perseverance rover’s exploration of Mars.

The rover landed in Mars’ Jezero Crater in February 2021 and is collecting samples of rock and other materials from the Martian surface. Perseverance is investigating the sediment-rich ancient river delta in the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater.

Speakers:
• Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters
• Laurie Leshin, JPL director
• Rick Welch, Perseverance deputy project manager, JPL
• Ken Farley, Perseverance project scientist, Caltech
• Sunanda Sharma, Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC) scientist, JPL
• David Shuster, Perseverance returned sample scientist, University of California, Berkeley

 

[Administrator]

JPL and the Space Age: Landing on Mars

Premiered Dec 23, 2022

In the summer of 2003, two NASA rovers began their journeys to Mars at a time when the Red Planet and Earth were the nearest they had been to each other in 60,000 years. To capitalize on this alignment, the rovers had been built at breakneck speed by teams at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The mission came amid further pressures, from mounting international competition to increasing public scrutiny following the loss of the space shuttle Columbia and its crew of seven. NASA was in great need of a success.

“Landing on Mars” is the story of Opportunity and Spirit surviving a massive solar flare during cruise, the now well-known “six minutes of terror,” and what came close to being a mission-ending software error for the first rover once it was on the ground.

Documentary length: 60 minutes