* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: The Phoenix lander

Blobrana · L

According to the first findings from the Phoenix Mars Lander mission (published in this week's edition of Science), snow and water-ice clouds play a crucial role in the exchange of water between the atmosphere and surface of Mars, which suggests that the Red Planet is even more like Earth than previously thought.
The surprise discovery of Martian snow in 2008 by the Canadian-built weather station on NASA's Phoenix Mars lander helps explain how the water cycle on Mars behaves, especially the seasonal increase of the Martian polar caps in winter and their consequent shrinking in summer. The Canadian science team's paper, entitled "Mars Water-Ice Clouds and Precipitation," describes how water vapour is lofted upwards during the daytime, forming clouds of ice-crystals low in the atmosphere that resemble cirrus clouds on Earth. Water then precipitates through the atmosphere at night in the form of snow.

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Blobrana · L

Four papers in the journal Science this week offer new details about the history of water on Mars, gleaned from the 2008 NASA Phoenix Mars Mission that was operated from The University of Arizona.
Peter H. Smith, a scientist with the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory and the mission's principal investigator, is the first author of "H2O at the Phoenix Landing Site" in Science. There are 35 co-authors from six countries on the paper. Smith and his group of scientists and students used the lander to investigate the role of water and ice on Mars, as well as the changing weather patterns.

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Blobrana · L

NASA Phoenix Results Point to Martian Climate Cycles
Favourable chemistry and episodes with thin films of liquid water during ongoing, long-term climate cycles may sometimes make the area where NASA's Phoenix Mars mission landed last year a favourable environment for microbes.
Interpretations of data that Phoenix returned during its five months of operation on a Martian arctic plain fill four papers in this week's edition of the journal Science, the first major peer-reviewed reports on the mission's findings. Phoenix ended communications in November 2008 as the approach of Martian winter depleted energy from the lander's solar panels.

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Blobrana · L

NASA's Phoenix lander may have captured the first images of liquid water on Mars - droplets that apparently splashed onto the spacecraft's leg during landing, according to some members of the Phoenix team.
The controversial observation could be explained by the mission's previous discovery of perchlorate salts in the soil, since the salts can keep water liquid at sub-zero temperatures. Researchers say this antifreeze effect makes it possible for liquid water to be widespread just below the surface of Mars, but point out that even if it is there, it may be too salty to support life as we know it.

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Blobrana · L

Phoenix Site on Mars May be in Dry Climate Cycle Phase
The Martian arctic soil that NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander dug into this year is very cold and very dry. However, when long-term climate cycles make the site warmer, the soil may get moist enough to modify the chemistry, producing effects that persist through the colder times.
Phoenix found clues increasing scientists' confidence in predictive models about water vapour moving through the soil between the atmosphere and subsurface water-ice. The models predict the vapour flow can wet the soil when the tilt of Mars' axis, the obliquity, is greater than it is now.
The robot worked on Mars for three months of prime mission, plus two months of overtime, after landing on May 25. The Phoenix science team will be analysing data and running comparison experiments for months to come. With some key questions still open, team members at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union today reported on their progress.

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Blobrana · L

After nearly a month of daily checks to determine whether Martian NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander would be able to communicate again, the agency has stopped using its Mars orbiters to hail the lander and listen for its beep.
As expected, reduced daily sunshine eventually left the solar-powered Phoenix craft without enough energy to keep its batteries charged.

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Blobrana · L

Mars Phoenix Lander Finishes Successful Work
NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has ceased communications after operating for more than five months. As anticipated, seasonal decline in sunshine at the robot's arctic landing site is not providing enough sunlight for the solar arrays to collect the power necessary to charge batteries that operate the lander's instruments.
Mission engineers last received a signal from the lander on Nov. 2. Phoenix, in addition to shorter daylight, has encountered a dustier sky, more clouds and colder temperatures as the northern Mars summer approaches autumn. The mission exceeded its planned operational life of three months to conduct and return science data.

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Blobrana · L

NASA's Phoenix Mars spacecraft regained contact with Earth more than a day after falling silent, but its days operating on the red planet are still numbered, mission managers said Thursday.

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Blobrana · L

NASA'S Phoenix Mars Lander entered safe mode late yesterday in response to a low-power fault brought on by deteriorating weather conditions. While engineers anticipated that a fault could occur due to the diminishing power supply, the lander also unexpectedly switched to the "B" side of its redundant electronics and shut down one of its two batteries.

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