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Editorial Team

Mars Daily Editorial Team

Editorial Team

The Mars Daily Editorial Team produces Mars Daily's coverage of Mars exploration and science. We report on rovers and orbiters, sample-return and human-Mars planning, and the geology, atmosphere and astrobiology of the Red Planet. Articles reflect our team's collective editorial process, source verification, drafting, technical review, and editing, rather than a single writer's work. Mars Daily takes editorial responsibility for content under this byline. For more on how we work, see our editorial policy.

Spirit In A Catch-22: Stay Awake Or Sleep

Pasadena CA (SPX) May 06, 2008 - Spirit's Tau measurements of atmospheric dust have remained steady, but solar array input has dropped a bit to 235 watt-hours per sol. Spirit still has enough energy to squeeze in Moessbauer studies of iron-bearing minerals at a time of year when the rover's handlers expected Spirit to be concerned only with survival. At present, the rover's target of scientific interest is a soil exposure nicknamed after Arthur C. Harmon, a former Tuskegee airman.

May 6, 2008

Andrews Space Wins NASA Exploration Contract

Seattle WA (SPX) Apr 30, 2008 - Andrews Space has announced that it has signed a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to analyze design solutions related to NASA's Vision for Space Exploration. The specific efforts are focused on the Mars Entry, Descent, and Landing technologies and techniques.

Apr 30, 2008

Artificial Intelligence Boosts Science From Mars

Paris, France (ESA) Apr 30, 2008 - Artificial intelligence (AI) being used at the European Space Operations Centre is giving a powerful boost to ESA's Mars Express as it searches for signs of past or present life on the Red Planet. Since January 2005, Mars Express has been using its sophisticated instruments to study the atmosphere, surface and subsurface of Mars, confirming the presence of water and looking for other signatures of life on and below the Red Planet's rocky terrain.

Apr 30, 2008

Glaciers Reveal Martian Climate Has Been Recently Active

Providence RI (SPX) Apr 30, 2008 - The prevailing thinking is that Mars is a planet whose active climate has been confined to the distant past. About 3.5 billion years ago, the Red Planet had extensive flowing water and then fell quiet -- deadly quiet. It didn't seem the climate had changed much since.

Apr 30, 2008

New Online Map Reveals Evidence Of The Forces That Once Shaped Mars

Laurel MD (SPX) Apr 30, 2008 - A new online map lets visitors explore Mars' past through a collection of high-resolution observations from one of the most powerful spectrometers ever sent to the Red Planet. Evidence of ancient bodies of water, flowing rivers and groundwater peeks out from beneath layers of hardened magma and dust -- testaments to Mars' progression through wet, volcanic and dry eras.

Apr 30, 2008

Icy Active Mars

Moffett Field CA (SPX) Apr 28, 2008 - The prevailing thinking is that Mars is a planet whose active climate has been confined to the distant past. About 3.5 billion years ago, the Red Planet had extensive flowing water and then fell quiet - deadly quiet. It didn't seem the climate had changed much since.

Apr 28, 2008

Second test satellite for Galileo launched

Baikonur, Kazakhstan (AFP) April 27, 2008 - A second experimental Giove-B satellite for the EU's Galileo satellite navigation project was launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan early Sunday.

Apr 27, 2008

Microsoft takeover deadline looms for Yahoo

San Francisco (AFP) April 26, 2008 - Neither Microsoft nor Yahoo blinked Saturday hours before a deadline for the internet services company to respond to the software giant's 44.6-billion-dollar offer to be bought or face a hostile takeover.

Apr 26, 2008

More Trouble For Opportunity’s Robotic Arm

Pasadena CA (SPX) Apr 25, 2008 - A small motor in the robotic arm of NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity that began stalling occasionally more than two years ago has become more troublesome recently. Rover engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., are diagnosing why the motor, one of five in the robotic arm, stalled on April 14 after much less motion that day than in the case of several earlier stalls.

Apr 25, 2008

Spirit Still Sitting Pretty For This Time Of Year

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 23, 2008 - Despite a slight increase in atmospheric opacity caused by dust, Spirit is still enjoying higher-than-expected energy levels for this time of year. Solar array input has been approximately 240 watt-hours per Martian day, or sol (100 watt-hours is the amount of energy needed to light a 100-watt bulb for one hour).

Apr 23, 2008

Driving on Mars Is Hard

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 23, 2008 - This week Opportunity demonstrated the challenges of operating a vehicle on the surface of another planet. The rover is en route to Cape Verde to acquire high-resolution images of the layering in the rocks. To get there, Opportunity must cross some sandy stretches. Before entering the sandy areas, Opportunity will need to stop and take a toe dip'' -- that is, drive forward a short distance and back out again -- to characterize the terrain.

Apr 23, 2008

Mars Radar Opens Up A Planet’s Third Dimension

Paris, France (SPX) Apr 18, 2008 - ESA's Mars Express radar sounder, MARSIS, has looked beneath the martian surface and opened up the third dimension for planetary exploration. The technique's success is prompting scientists to think of all the other places in the Solar System where they would like to use radar sounders.

Apr 18, 2008

Russia Continues Flight Simulation Experiments For Mars-500

Moscow (RIA Novosti) Apr 16, 2008 - Four volunteers will spend ten days in a compression chamber with a reduced oxygen level as preparation for Mars-500, a Russian ground-based experiment to simulate a flight to Mars. A spokesman for the Moscow-based Russian Institute of Medical and Biological Issues, which runs the project, said that four healthy men will be held in a chamber with the pressure equivalent to being five meters underwater.

Apr 16, 2008

Missions To Mars

Paris, France (SPX) Apr 15, 2008 - The European Space Agency (ESA) has chosen the GSI accelerator facility to assess radiation risks that astronauts will be exposed to on a Mars mission. GSI was selected because its accelerator is the only one in Europe able to create ion beams similar to those found in space. To determine possible health risks of manned space flights, scientists from all over Europe have been asked to investigate the effects of ion beams in human cells and organs.

Apr 15, 2008

Opportunity Continues Reading The Story In The Rocks

Pasadena CA (SPX) Apr 14, 2008 - Opportunity has finished grinding into the surface and acquiring microscopic images of a rock target informally named Gilbert, at the bottom of the alcove inside Victoria Crater known as Duck Bay. The rover is in the middle of a campaign to study the composition of the exposed interior of the rock using both the Mossbauer and alpha-particle X-ray spectrometers.

Apr 14, 2008

NASA Spacecraft Fine Tunes Course For Mars Landing

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 11, 2008 - NASA engineers have adjusted the flight path of the Phoenix Mars Lander, setting the spacecraft on course for its May 25th landing on the Red Planet.

Apr 11, 2008