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By NASA
Mars: Perseverance (Mars 2020) Perseverance Home Mission Overview Rover Components Mars Rock Samples Where is Perseverance? Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Mission Updates Science Overview Objectives Instruments Highlights Exploration Goals News and Features Multimedia Perseverance Raw Images Images Videos Audio More Resources Mars Missions Mars Sample Return Mars Perseverance Rover Mars Curiosity Rover MAVEN Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Odyssey More Mars Missions The Solar System The Sun Mercury Venus Earth The Moon Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto & Dwarf Planets Asteroids, Comets & Meteors The Kuiper Belt The Oort Cloud 2 min read
Just Keep Roving
Image from Perseverance’s Right Navigation Camera, looking back towards rover tracks from past drives, into Jezero crater. The camera is located high on the rover mast, and here the rover is looking back in the direction of the Jezero crater floor. This image was acquired on October 4th, 2024 (Sol 1288) at the local mean solar time of 12:51:26. NASA/JPL-Caltech Throughout the past week, Perseverancehas continued marching up the Jezero crater rim. This steep ascent through the Martian regolith (soil) can prove to be slow driving for the rover, as the wheels can slip on the steepest areas. This is like trying to run up a hill of sand on a beach – with every step forward, you also slip back a little way down the hill! This just means the Science and Engineering teams work together closely to plan slow and steady drives through this tricky terrain.
Driving through the Mount Ranier quadrangle, the team identified a relatively obstacle-free path to reach the crater rim which they designated Summerland Trail, aptly named from a very popular hiking trail that ascends Mount Ranier. Perseverance is trekking to the next waypoint near an outcrop of rocks called Pico Turquino, where the science team hopes to perform its next proximity science investigations with its instruments PIXL and back-online SHERLOC.
While roving along Summerland Trail, Perseverance is constantly observing the surrounding terrain. SuperCam and Mastcam-Z have been observing rocks on the ground and on a distant hill, called Crystal Creek. In addition, during this time Perseverance can put its eyes to the sky to make observations of the sun and atmosphere. Last week, the Mastcam-Z camera captured images of Phobos (one of Mars’ two moons) transiting in front of the sun!
This image, showing Phobos transiting in front of the sun, was acquired using Perseverance’s Left Mastcam-Z camera. Acquired on September 30th, 2024 (Sol 1285) at the local mean solar time of 11:10:04. NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU While the Mars2020 team is itching to reach the ancient stratigraphy exposed in the crater rim, for now, the focus is on documenting our surroundings while navigating the ascent.
Written by Eleanor Moreland, Ph.D. Student Collaborator at Rice University
Reference Links
Rover Tracks Image: Mars Perseverance Sol 1288: Right Navigation Camera (Navcam) Quadrangles: NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover Mission Honors Navajo Language Hiking Trail: Summerland Trailhead (U.S. National Park Services) SHERLOC: Perseverance Matters – NASA Science Mars Moons – NASA Science Phobos Transit Image: Mars Perseverance Sol 1285 – Left Mastcam-Z Camera Crater Rim: Reaching New Heights to Unravel Deep Martian History! Share
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Last Updated Oct 17, 2024 Related Terms
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By NASA
Tiny satellites, also known as CubeSats, are pictured after being deployed into Earth orbit from a small satellite orbital deployer on the outside of the International Space Station’s Kibo laboratory module. The CubeSats were delivered aboard the Northrop Grumman Cygnus space freighter and will serve a variety of educational and research purposes for public and private organizations around the world.
Image Credit: NASA/Tracy Dyson
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By NASA
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Hubble Traces Star Formation in a Nearby Nebula
NASA, ESA, and L. C. Johnson (Northwestern University); Image Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) NGC 261 blooms a brilliant ruby red against a myriad of stars in this new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Discovered on Sept. 5, 1826 by Scottish astronomer James Dunlop, this nebula is located in one of the Milky Way’s closest galactic companions, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). The ionized gas blazing from within this diffuse region marks NGC 261 as an emission nebula. It is home to numerous stars hot enough to irradiate surrounding hydrogen gas, causing the cloud to emit a pinkish-red glow.
This inset image shows the location of NGC 261 within the Small Magellanic Cloud. NASA, ESA, L. C. Johnson (Northwestern University), and ESO/VISTA VMC; Image Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America) Hubble turned its keen eye toward NGC 261 to investigate how efficiently stars form in molecular clouds, which are extremely dense and compact regions of gas and dust. These clouds often consist of large amounts of molecular hydrogen — cold areas where most stars form. However, measuring this raw fuel of star formation in stellar nurseries is a challenge because molecular hydrogen doesn’t radiate easily. Since it is difficult to detect, scientists instead trace other molecules present in the molecular clouds.
The SMC hosts a gas-rich environment of young stars along with trace amounts of carbon monoxide (CO), a chemical correlated with hydrogen and often used to identify the presence of such clouds. Using the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) and Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), Hubble imaged these stars in the southwest portion of the SMC where NGC 261 resides. The combined power of ACS and WFC3 allowed scientists to closely examine the nebula’s star-forming properties through its CO content at optical and near-infrared wavelengths. This research helps astronomers better understand how stars form in our home galaxy and others in our galactic neighborhood.
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Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Aug 28, 2024 Editor Michelle Belleville Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
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Hubble Space Telescope
Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe.
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By NASA
A pair of CubeSats from NASA’s Pathfinder Technology Demonstrator series launched on SpaceX’s Transporter-11 rideshare mission at 11:56 a.m. PDT Friday, August 16, from Vandenburg Space Force Base in California. Photo credit: SpaceX A pair of CubeSats from NASA’s Pathfinder Technology Demonstrator, or PTD, series lifted off on SpaceX’s Transporter-11 rideshare mission at 11:56 a.m. PDT Friday, August 16, from Vandenburg Space Force Base in California. The two small satellites, PTD-4 and PTD-R, will help advance NASA’s efforts to validate novel technologies and increase small spacecraft capabilities in order to shape the future of space exploration and technology.
PTD-4 will demonstrate a high-power, low-volume deployable solar array with an integrated antenna, while PTD-R will focus on testing simultaneous ultraviolet and short-wave infrared optical sensing from space for the first time via two 85-mm aperture monolithic telescopes mounted side-by-side. The two CubeSats use a six-unit (6U) spacecraft, named Triumph, common to all PTD satellites.
L2 Solutions DBA SEOPS LLC secured the launch of the two CubeSats for NASA as part of an award on the agency’s VADR (Venture-class Acquisition of Dedicated and Rideshare) contract. This is part of an effort to embrace more commercial practices to achieve lower launch costs, which provide new opportunities for these small but highly capable small satellites to find a ride to space. These highly flexible contracts help broaden access to space through lower launch costs and serve as an ideal platform for contributing to NASA’s science research and technology development.
Learn more about the PTD missions at: https://www.nasa.gov/smallspacecraft/pathfinder-technology-demonstrator/
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By NASA
Teams with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems Program, in preparation for the agency’s Artemis II crewed mission to the Moon, begin installing the first of four emergency egress baskets on the mobile launcher at Launch Complex 39B at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2024. The baskets, similar to gondolas on ski lifts, are used in the case of a pad abort emergency to enable astronauts and other pad personnel a way to quickly escape away from the mobile launcher to the base of the pad and where waiting emergency transport vehicles will then drive them away.NASA/Isaac Watson Recently, teams with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems (EGS) Program at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center met with engineering teams at a central Florida amusement park to share knowledge on a new braking system NASA is using for its launch pad emergency egress system for Artemis missions.
“We have a new magnetic braking system for the Artemis emergency egress system and NASA hasn’t used this technology on the ground infrastructure side before to support launches,” said Jesse Berdis, mobile launcher 1 deputy project manager for EGS. “I realized we have neighbors 50 miles from us in Orlando that are essentially the world experts on magnetic braking systems.”
For Artemis, teams will use a track cable that connects the mobile launcher to the terminus site near the perimeter of NASA Kennedy’s Launch Pad 39B, where four baskets, similar to gondola lifts, can ride down. This is where the magnetic braking system operates to help control the acceleration of the baskets in multiple weight and environmental conditions. At the pad terminus site, armored emergency response vehicles are stationed to take personnel safely away from the launch pad to a designated safe site at Kennedy.
Many roller coaster manufacturers employ the use of an “eddy current braking system,” which involves using magnetics to help slow down a vehicle. Though the applications used on the roller coasters differ slightly from what the EGS teams are using for Artemis, the concept is the same, explained Amanda Arrieta, mobile launcher 1 senior element engineer.
However, unlike roller coasters which are typically in use daily for multiple hours on end, the Artemis emergency egress system is there for emergency situations only.
“We don’t plan to ever run our system unless we’re testing it or performing maintenance,” Berdis said.
Regardless of this, teams at Kennedy have ensured the system is able to function for years to come to support future Artemis missions.
“The maintenance crews [at the amusement park] were awesome because they showed us their nightly, monthly, and yearly inspections on what they were doing,” Berdis said. “That gave our operations teams a really good foundation and baseline knowledge of what to expect when they maintain and operate this system for the Artemis missions.”
Some of the conversations and suggestions teams shared include adding an acceleration sensor in the emergency egress baskets during testing. The sensor will help detect how fast the baskets are going when they ride down.
The emergency egress system is one of several new additions the EGS team is implementing to prepare for future crewed missions starting with Artemis II, and this system especially emphasizes the importance of safety.
“We have a mission, and a part of that mission is in case of an emergency, which we don’t expect, is to protect our astronauts and supporting teams at the launch pad,” Berdis said. “We want our teams to be safe and, for any scenario we put them in, especially on the ground infrastructure side, it’s important for us to do our due diligence. That includes talking to other groups that are the experts in their field to ensure we have looked at all possibilities across the board to ensure our mission is a safe one for our teams.”
During the Space Shuttle Program, teams used a similar system for the escape route astronauts and other personnel take in the event of an emergency during a launch countdown. However, instead of using a magnetic braking system for the baskets, teams used a mechanical braking system, which involved using a catch net and drag chain to slow and then halt the baskets sliding down the wire.
For the agency’s Commercial Crew Program, SpaceX also uses a catch net and drag chain for its slidewire cable at NASA Kennedy’s Launch Complex 39A pad and a deployable chute at Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Boeing and United Launch Alliance also use a slidewire, but instead of baskets, the team deploys seats, like riding down a zip line, that ride down the slide wires at Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
Under NASA’s Artemis campaign, the agency will establish the foundation for long-term scientific exploration at the Moon, land the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut on the lunar surface, and prepare for human expeditions to Mars for the benefit of all.
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