What's New

NASA's durable twin Mars rovers have successfully explored the surface of the mysterious red planet for a full Martian year (687 Earth days). Opportunity starts its second Martian year Dec. 12; Spirit started its new year three weeks ago. The rovers' original mission was scheduled for only three months.
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Life may have had a tough time getting started in the ancient environment that left its mark in the Martian rock layers examined by NASA's Opportunity rover. The most thorough analysis yet of the rover's discoveries reveals the challenges life may have faced in the harsh Martian environment.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter successfully fired six engines for about 20 seconds today to adjust its flight path in advance of its March 10, 2006, arrival at the red planet.
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NASA scientists have discovered additional evidence that Mars once underwent plate tectonics, slow movement of the planet's crust, like the present-day Earth. A new map of Mars' magnetic field made by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft reveals a world whose history was shaped by great crustal plates being pulled apart or smashed together.
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As NASA prepares for the future exploration of Mars, students on Earth can now let their imagination and curiosity soar though the canyons of Valles Marineris and over the top of Olympus Mons on the red planet.
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NASA will showcase two intelligent robots on Monday, October 3, in the outdoor 'Marscape' at NASA Ames Research Center, located in California's Silicon Valley.
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New gullies that did not exist in mid-2002 have appeared on a Martian sand dune.
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Three cameras on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter worked as expected in a test pointing them at the moon and stars on Sept. 8.
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Working atop a range of Martian hills, NASA's Spirit rover is rewarding researchers with tempting scenes filled with evidence of past planet environments.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter successfully tested its main engines by making a successful trajectory adjustment for reaching the red planet on March 10, 2006.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, launched on Aug. 12, has completed one of the first tasks of its seven-month cruise to Mars, a calibration activity for the spacecraft's Mars Color Imager instrument.
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A seven-month flight to Mars began this morning for NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The mission will inspect the red planet in fine detail and assist future landers.
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The launch of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has been postponed 24 hours. The new launch window is Thursday, August 11 from 7:50 to 9:35 a.m. EDT.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) is ready for a morning launch on Wednesday, Aug. 10. The MRO will arrive at Mars in March 2006 for a mission to understand the planet's water riddles and to advance the exploration of the mysterious red planet.
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Launch of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) spacecraft is scheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 10, at 7:54 a.m. EDT from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. The launch window extends until 9:39 a.m., a duration of 105 minutes. Liftoff will occur aboard a Lockheed Martin Atlas V-401 rocket from Launch Complex 41. Should launch be postponed for 24 hours for any reason, the next launch time will be 7:50 a.m. on Aug. 11.
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As NASA turns its attention to preparing for human travel to the Moon and Mars, there are many hurdles to overcome. This fall, the NASA Exploration Systems Mission Directorate and NASA Quest will open the school year with a challenge to students, primarily in grades 5-8, to work with NASA scientists to design solutions to these obstacles.
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NASA's next mission to Mars will examine the red planet in unprecedented detail from low orbit and provide more data about the intriguing planet than all previous missions combined. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and its launch vehicle are nearing final stages of preparation at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Fla., for a launch opportunity that begins Aug. 10.
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Engineers and mission managers for NASA's Mars Exploration Rover mission cheered when images from the Martian surface confirmed Opportunity had successfully escaped from a sand trap.
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NASA has given the green light to a project to put a long-armed lander onto the icy ground of the far-northern martian plains. NASA's Phoenix lander is designed to examine the site for potential habitats for water ice and to look for possible indicators of life, past or present.
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NASA's Mars rover Opportunity is trying to escape from a sand trap, while its twin, Spirit, has been busy finding new clues to a wet and violent early Martian history.
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Photographs from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft released today are the first pictures of any spacecraft orbiting Mars ever taken by another spacecraft orbiting Mars.
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Two free public programs in Pasadena this week will offer a mission leader's account of the continuing Mars adventures of the rovers Spirit and Opportunity.
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Take the cold tolerance of bacteria that thrive in arctic ice, add the ultraviolet resistance of tomato plants growing high in the Andes mountains, and combine with an ordinary plant. What do you get? A tough plant "pioneer" that can grow in Martian soil.
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NASA scientists have solved an age-old mystery by finding that Mars' southern polar cap is offset from its geographical south pole because of two different polar climates.
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Mars rover engineers are using a testing laboratory to simulate specific Mars surface conditions where NASA's rover Opportunity has spun its wheels in a small dune. Careful testing is preceding any commands for Opportunity to resume moving to get out of the dune and continue exploring.
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Human missions to Mars will be much more difficult than missions to the moon. Round trip human missions to Mars will require about two years to complete, compared with the eight-day Apollo missions to the moon.
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The European Space Agency's Mars Express orbiter will soon deploy its radar instrument for the first time. The instrument is designed to look below the surface of Mars for different layers of material, most notably water.
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A large spacecraft destined to be Earth's next robotic emissary to Mars has completed the first leg of its journey, a cargo-plane ride from Colorado to Florida in preparation for an August launch. NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is an important next step in fulfilling NASA's vision of space exploration and ultimately sending human explorers to Mars and beyond.
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From a ridgeline vantage point overlooking slopes, valleys and plains, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit has returned its latest color panorama of the martian landscape.
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NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit is taking movies of dust devils -- whirlwinds carrying dust -- scooting across a plain on Mars.
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NASA has approved up to 18 more months of operations for Spirit and Opportunity, the twin Mars rovers that have already surprised engineers and scientists by continuing active exploration for more than 14 months.
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A group of scientists announced today that they identified habitats and microbial life using a rover in Chile's arid Atacama desert, one of the harshest environments on Earth, and that their findings may bode well for future missions to Mars.
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NASA has suspended use of one of the mineral-identifying tools on the Opportunity Mars rover while experts troubleshoot a problem with getting data from the instrument, the robot's miniature thermal emission spectrometer.
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On three consecutive days, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity accomplished unprecedented feats of martian motion, covering more total ground in that period than either Opportunity or its twin, Spirit, did in their first 70 days on Mars.
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Dr. Firouz M. Naderi, manager of NASA's Mars Exploration Program since April 2000, will broaden his oversight of endeavors to study other parts of the universe, from Earth to distant galaxies, in a new leadership position at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
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News reports on February 16, 2005, that NASA scientists from Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., have found strong evidence that life may exist on Mars are incorrect.
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NASA's Spirit rover found a new class of water-affected rock, while its twin, Opportunity, finished inspecting its own heat shield and set a new martian driving record. The rovers successfully completed their three-month primary missions in April 2004 and are working on extended exploration missions.
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NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity has found an iron meteorite, the first meteorite of any type ever identified on another planet.
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Even as the Spirit and Opportunity rovers complete a year of successful operation on Mars, the next major step in Mars Exploration is taking shape with preparation of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for launch in just seven months.
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NASA lit a birthday candle today for its twin Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. The Spirit rover begins its second year on Mars investigating puzzling rocks unlike any found earlier.
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