Tucson AZ (SPX) Jul 17, 2008 - A powered rasp on the back of the robotic arm scoop of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander successfully drilled into the frozen soil and loosened material that was collected in the lander's scoop.
Tucson AZ (SPX) Jul 16, 2008 - NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander is using its Robotic Arm to enlarge an exposure of hard subsurface material expected to yield a sample of ice-rich soil for analysis in one of the lander's ovens.
Tucson AZ (SPX) Jul 16, 2008 - A powered rasp on the back of the robotic arm scoop of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander is being tested for the first time on Mars in gathering sample shavings of ice.
Pasadena CA (JPL) Jul 15, 2008 - Opportunity has begun work on the much anticipated panorama of the layered promontory known as Cape Verde inside Victoria Crater. The panorama will take several Martian days, or sols, to complete and will be made up of a mosaic of panoramic-camera images. The Cape Verde panorama is expected to be spectacular, one for the textbooks.
Pasadena CA (JPL) Jul 15, 2008 - Spirit's battery is recharging nicely now that rover planners have reduced the frequency of communications to and from the rover during the darkest days of Martian winter. Most measures of battery health are showing an increase of about 2 amp-hours in the battery state of charge (an amp-hour is equivalent to the amount of charge flowing for one hour from a current of 1 amp).
Moscow (RIA Novosti) Jul 15, 2008 - On July 7 and July 12, 1988, the Soviet Union launched two space probes, Phobos-1 and Phobos-2, to study the surface and atmosphere of Mars and its moons, Phobos, named after the Greek word for Fear, and Deimos, Terror.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Jul 14, 2008 - Spirit continues to ride out the Martian winter by doing minimal activities to conserve power. The rover conducts very light science activities every three to four Martian days, or sols, and relays data to NASA's Odyssey orbiter for transmission to Earth every 4 sols. The rest of the time, Spirit mostly sleeps.
Opportunity has completed work on the stand-off portion of the full-color panorama of the layered cliff known as "Cape Verde." It may take a couple…
Tucson AZ (SPX) Jul 11, 2008 - NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander's science and engineering teams are testing methods to get an icy sample into the Robotic Arm scoop for delivery to the Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer, or TEGA.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Jul 11, 2008 - NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has touched Martian soil with a fork-like probe for the first time and begun using a microscope that examines shapes of tiny particles by touching them.
Moffett Field CA (SPX) Jul 11, 2008 - Signs of life on Mars may be hiding under its rocks, or perhaps hiding inside those rocks. A new study offers a simplified technique for detecting biological and pre-biotic molecules that become trapped inside minerals.
Pasadena CA (SPX) Jul 10, 2008 - Scientists running the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, known as HiRISE, on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have processed more details in an amazing image their camera captured as the Phoenix spacecraft descended through Mars' atmosphere during its landing on May 25, 2008.
Paris (AFP) July 9, 2008 - Space experts on Wednesday set a date of 2018 for launching the Mars Sample Return mission, billed as the most complex and costliest exploration of the Red Planet ever planned.
Tucson, AZ (SPX) Jul 09, 2008 - NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander's science and engineering teams are testing methods to get an icy sample into the Robotic Arm scoop for delivery to the Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer (TEGA). Ray Arvidson of Washington University in St. Louis, Phoenix's dig czar, said the hard Martian surface that Phoenix has reached proved to be a difficult target, comparing the process to scraping a sidewalk.
Moscow (RIA Novosti) Jul 07, 2008 - The title of this article could be continued: Will we be able to come back? It may take years to find an answer, but the search has already been launched.
The next sample delivered to NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander's Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA) will be ice-rich.
