 Photo credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Texas A&M University  This image shows bluish-white frost seen on the Martian surface near NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander. The image was taken by the lander's Surface Stereo Imager on the 131st Martian day, or sol, of the mission (Oct. 7, 2008). Frost is expected to continue to appear in images as fall, then winter approach Mars' northern plains. Phoenix Lander Digs And Analyzes Soil As Darkness GathersOctober 08, 2008 As fall approaches Mars’ northern plains, NASA’s Phoenix Lander is busy digging into the Red Planet’s soil and scooping it into its onboard science laboratories for analysis.Over the past two weeks, Phoenix’s nearly 2.4-meter-long (8 feet) arm moved a rock, nicknamed “Headless,” about 0.4 meters (16 inches), and snapped an image of the rock with its camera. Then, the robotic arm scraped the soil underneath the rock and delivered a few teaspoonfuls of soil onto the lander’s optical and atomic-force microscopes. These microscopes are part of Phoenix’s Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA). Scientists are conducting preliminary analysis of this soil, nicknamed “Galloping Hessian.” The soil piqued their interest because it may contain a high concentration of salts, said Diana Blaney, a scientist on the Phoenix mission with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Read More       Martian Danceby Patrick WoidaSeptember 30, 2008 -After giving us some 23,000 images, we finally have a picture of the Stereo Surface Imager (SSI) on Mars. Two cameras, the SSI and Robotic Arm Camera (RAC) twisted around in a coordinated dance to take ... Read More Final Blog: Sept 30th Farewellby Patrick WoidaSeptember 26, 2008 - Well the best years of my professional life come to a close. Aside from the Phoenix pushing on with her work on Mars, the last week has been filled with some wonderful events. The University hosted a ...Read More |
  Media UpdatePlease check the Phoenix Mars Mission web sites for mission updates this week. |
The Phoenix Mission is led by Principal Investigator Peter H. Smith of The University of Arizona, supported by a science team of CO-Is, with project management at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and development partnership with Lockheed Martin Space Systems. International contributions are provided by the Canadian Space Agency; the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the universities of Copenhagen and Aarhus Denmark; the Max Planck Institute, Germany; and the Finnish Meteorological Institute. Additional information on Phoenix is online at here and here. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages Mars Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Additional information on NASA's Mars program is online at here.
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In remembrance of Diane Michelangeli
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