What's New

Mars rover Spirit will mark six years of unprecedented science exploration and inspiration for the American public on Sunday.
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Researchers are receiving new science data from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter after the spacecraft's six science instruments resumed observations today.
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Results of diagnostic tests on Spirit's right-rear wheel on Sol 2109 (Dec. 8, 2009) continue to indicate a troubled wheel, which may leave the rover with only four operable wheels.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter today has been taken out of the precautionary "safe mode" it had been in since August.
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A series of diagnostic tests on Spirit's right-rear wheel on sols 2104 and 2105 (Dec. 3 and 4) investigated stalls that occurred on Sol 2099 (Nov. 28) and earlier.
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Homer's Iliad tells the story of Troy, a city besieged by the Greeks in the Trojan War. Today, a lone robot sits besieged in the sands of Troy while engineers and scientists plot its escape.
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Spirit's right-rear wheel stalled again on Sol 2099 (Nov. 28, 2009) during the first step of a two-step extrication maneuver. This stall is different in some characteristics from the stall on Sol 2092 (Nov. 21).
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NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter put itself into a safe standby mode on Saturday, Nov. 28, and the team operating the spacecraft has begun implementing careful steps designed to resume Odyssey's science and relay operations within about a week.
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On Sol 2095 (Tuesday, Nov. 24), Spirit performed a set of diagnostic actions related to a stall of the right-rear wheel on the previous drive, three days earlier.
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The team operating NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter plans to uplink protective files to the spacecraft next week as one step toward resuming the orbiter's research and relay activities.
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Spirit experienced a wheel stall with the right-rear wheel during the second step of a two-step drive on Sol 2092 (Saturday, Nov. 21). This is not the same wheel that stalled on Sol 1899 (May 6), the left-middle wheel.
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Spirit successfully completed the first step of its planned two-step motion on Sol 2090 (Nov. 19).
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Another drive is planned for Spirit on Sol 2092 (Saturday, Nov. 21).
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The plan for an extrication drive on Sol 2090 (Nov. 19) will essentially be a repeat of the first drive plan, but with improved rover attitude knowledge.
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The preliminary results from the first extrication drive for Spirit on Sol 2088 (Nov. 17, 2009) indicate the rover stopped less than 1 second after it began, sensing more vehicle lateral tilt than permitted.
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NASA and Microsoft Corp. of Redmond, Wash., have collaborated to create a Web site where Internet users can have fun while advancing their knowledge of Mars.
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Driving commands are being prepared to instruct Spirit to attempt to drive forward. These are the first driving commands since Spirit became embedded in a Martian sandtrap approximately six months ago.
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NASA will begin transmitting commands to its Mars exploration rover Spirit on Monday as part of an escape plan to free the venerable robot from its Martian sand trap.
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Students in fourth through seventh grade will work to create the ultimate baseball experience "on Mars," even designing the rules for how to play a game on the Red Planet. NASA and JPL have partnered with the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum to host a workshop for kids on Sat., Nov. 7, in Cooperstown, N.Y.
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Winter images of NASA's Phoenix Lander showing the lander shrouded in dry-ice frost on Mars have been captured with the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, or HiRISE camera, aboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
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Until Oct. 24, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover had gone more than six months without an episode of amnesia-like symptoms like those that appeared on four occasions earlier this year.
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NASA's next Mars rover, a super-capable robot named "Curiosity," will push Mars exploration to a new level.
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Engineers using test rovers on Earth to prepare for extracting the sand-trapped Spirit rover on Mars have added a new challenge to their preparations.
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Thousands of image products from 233 recent telescopic observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show a diversity of surface shapes and textures on Mars.
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The principal investigator of the Mars Exploration Rovers is honored for excellence in communicating the mission to the public.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed frozen water hiding just below the surface of mid-latitude Mars. The spacecraft's observations were obtained from orbit after meteorites excavated fresh craters on the Red Planet.
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New, three-dimensional imaging of Martian north-polar ice layers by a radar instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is consistent with theoretical models of Martian climate swings during the past few million years.
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Tests on Earth simulating Spirit's predicament on Mars have reinforced understanding that getting Spirit to rove again will be very difficult.
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During analysis of four safe-mode events this year, engineers for NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter project have identified a vulnerability to the effects of subsequent events. They are currently developing added protection to eliminate this vulnerability while they continue analysis of the string of incidents this year in which the spacecraft has spontaneously rebooted its computer or switched to a backup computer.
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Thousands of newly released images from more than 1,500 telescopic observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show a wide range of gullies, dunes, craters, geological layering and other features on the Red Planet.
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During analysis of four safe-mode events this year, engineers for NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter project have identified a vulnerability to the effects of subsequent events. They are currently developing added protection to eliminate this vulnerability while they continue analysis of the string of incidents this year in which the spacecraft has spontaneously rebooted its computer or switched to a backup computer.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter put itself into a safe mode Wednesday morning, Aug. 26, for the fourth time this year, while maintaining spacecraft health and communications. While in safe mode, the spacecraft has limited activities pending further instructions from ground controllers.
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The amount of electricity generated by the solar panels on Spirit has been declining for the past several Martian days, or sols, as a regional dust storm moved southward and blocked some of the sunshine at Spirit's location.
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A second, lighter-weight test rover has entered the testing setup at JPL where rover team members are assessing strategy for getting Spirit out of soft soil where it is embedded on Mars.
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Just as baseball players must train together before the season starts, the science team for "Curiosity" must be in top shape to operate the rover's 10 science instruments when it lands on Mars in 2012.
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Mars rover team members are planning a long-duration experiment with the test rover at JPL beginning next week.
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The high-resolution camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has returned a dramatic oblique view of the Martian crater that a rover explored for two years.
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If you’re like me, you may have received an e-mail this summer telling you go outside on August 27 and look up in the sky. The e-mail, most likely forwarded to you by a friend or relative, promises that Mars will look as big as the moon on that date, and that no one will ever see this view again.
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NASA's Mars Rover Opportunity is investigating a metallic meteorite the size of a large watermelon that is providing researchers more details about the Red Planet's environmental history.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been restored to full operations, making intensive science observations of Mars, four days after it unexpectedly switched to its backup computer.
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A review on Aug. 6 of test results to date yielded a decision to conduct further checkouts in an augmented testing set-up on Earth before beginning to send driving commands to Spirit.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is in safe mode, a precautionary standby status, and in communications with Earth after unexpectedly switching to its backup computer on Thurs. Aug. 6.
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The Opportunity rover has eyed an odd-shaped, dark rock, about 0.6 meters (2 feet) across on the surface of Mars, which may be a meteorite.
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Mars rover engineers at JPL are winding down testing of different escape maneuvers using a test rover in a sand box filled with soil to mimic the Martian surface.
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Mars rover team members have begun a new phase of testing at JPL -- using longer-duration experiments -- in their preparations for driving Spirit again on Mars.
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As the Mars rover team uses testing at JPL to evaluate possible ways to drive Spirit out of loose soil on Mars, the team is finishing tests of individual "building block" maneuvers and is about to begin stringing some of those together.
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The Mars rover team is using a test rover at JPL to assess various extraction techniques that might get Spirit out of the loose soil of "Troy" on Mars.
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Scientists have combined a trio of shots taken seconds apart through different colored filters to create a special-effects portrait of a moving dust devil on Mars.
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Engineers checking possible rover movements to get Spirit out of the "Troy" sand trap on Mars are evaluating how a comparable rover at JPL fares in a crablike backward drive, with all four corner wheels turned 60 degrees toward the right.
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On firm ground, NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers can make crablike moves by turning all four steerable wheels to the same side angle, then rotating the wheels either forward or backward.
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Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, has finished building and testing the heat shield for protecting the Curiosity rover of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory project. This heat shield is even larger than the ones used for protecting Apollo astronauts as they returned to Earth.
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Engineers used straight-backward driving of a test rover on Earth on Wednesday, July 8, as they evaluate maneuvers that might be useful for getting Spirit out of a sandtrap on Mars.
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On June 29 and 30 the NASA Associate Administrator for Science (Ed Weiler) and ESA Director of Science and Robotic Exploration (David Southwood) met in Plymouth, England, to establish a way for a progressive program for exploration of the Red Planet. The outcome of the bilateral meeting was an agreement to create a Mars Exploration Joint Initiative (MEJI) that will provide a framework for the two agencies to define and implement their scientific, programmatic and technological goals at Mars.
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Using a test rover in a sandbox at JPL with special soil simulating Spirit's predicament on Mars, engineers are assessing possible maneuvers for getting Spirit out and onto firmer ground.
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Favorable chemistry and episodes with thin films of liquid water during ongoing, long-term climate cycles may sometimes make the area where NASA's Phoenix Mars mission landed last year a favorable environment for microbes.

All Phoenix press releases
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Engineers placed a rock underneath the test rover at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., on July 1, 2009, to more closely simulate Spirit's predicament on Mars.
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After several days of preparing a sloped area of soft, fine soil to simulate Spirit's current sandtrap on Mars, the rover team drove a test rover into the material on June 30, 2009.
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Rover team members mix materials to fill the testbed box. Once filled, the rover will be driven into the test area and set in place to mimic how the actual rover sits on Mars.
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Mars team members have rolled up their sleeves and will be shaping a few tons of diatomaceous Earth and clay into an exact replica of the area where the Spirit rover is embedded on Mars.
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The Mars Science Laboratory rover will sport the biggest, toughest robotic arm the red planet's ever seen! This super-limb must lift 34 kilograms (almost 75 pounds) of instruments to reach out and test martian rocks and soil, which may hold clues about whether Mars could have supported life.
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is examining Mars again with its scientific instruments after successfully transitioning out of a precautionary standby mode triggered by an unexpected June 3 rebooting of its computer.
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Twelve-year-old Clara Ma flew from Kansas to JPL to meet and sign the next rover that will zoom millions of miles to Mars. The trip is Clara's prize for winning an essay contest in which she named the rover "Curiosity."
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NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is in safe mode and in communications with Earth after an unexpected rebooting of its computer Wednesday evening, June 3.
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A new image of Spirit's underbelly is helping engineers assess the rover's current state and plan her escape from soft soil. The panoramic mosaic of multiple images was taken by the microscopic imager instrument at the end of Spirit's robotic arm--the first time that imager has been used to assess the underside and wheels of the rover.
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NASA scientists modeled freezing conditions on Mars to test whether liquid water could have been present to form the surface features of the Martian landscape.
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NASA's Mars Science Laboratory rover, scheduled for launch in 2011, has a new name, thanks to a sixth-grade student from Kansas. Twelve-year-old Clara Ma from the Sunflower Elementary school in Lenexa submitted the winning entry, "Curiosity."
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NASA's Mars Science Laboratory rover, scheduled for launch in 2011, has a new name, thanks to a sixth-grade student from Kansas. Twelve-year-old Clara Ma from the Sunflower Elementary school in Lenexa submitted the winning entry, "Curiosity."
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One of NASA's two Mars rovers has recorded a compelling saga of environmental changes that occurred over billions of years at a Martian crater.
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A theme of Mars exploration is "Follow the Water," since understanding the history of water on our planetary neighbor will help us understand if there were environments favorable for life to occur and how climate has changed over time.
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NASA's rover project team is using the Spirit rover and other spacecraft at Mars to begin developing the best maneuvers for extracting Spirit from the soft Martian ground where it has become embedded.
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The five wheels that still rotate on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit have been slipping severely in soft soil during recent attempts to drive, sinking the wheels about halfway into the ground.
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NASA released an interactive, 3-D photographic collection of internal and external views of the International Space Station and a model of the next Mars rover on Thursday, May 7.

View the Photosynth
Panorama Rovers in the JPL Mars Yard
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Images from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter are now being released faster than ever before.
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Testing during March and April 2009 inside the world's largest wind tunnel, at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., qualified the parachute for NASA's next Mars rover.

The parachute for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission, to be launched in 2011 and land on Mars in 2012, is the largest ever built to fly on an extraterrestrial mission.
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After three days of completing Earth-commanded activities without incident last week, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit had a bout of temporary amnesia Friday, April 17, and rebooted its computer Saturday, April 18, behavior similar to events about a week earlier.
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This nearly global mosaic of observations made by the Mars Color Imager on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on April 2, 2009, shows billowing clouds of dust being lifted into the atmosphere by a storm near the edge of the seasonal polar cap of southern Mars.
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Heading into a period of the Martian year prone to major dust storms, the team operating NASA's twin Mars rovers is taking advantage of eye-in-the-sky weather reports.
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The parachute for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory passed flight-qualification testing in March and April 2009 inside the world's largest wind tunnel, at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
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Trust--it's vital for each step of the Mars Science Laboratory mission. Engineers must trust each other and all the tests they've done while building the rover.
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The High Resolution Imaging Experiment, or HiRISE, run from The University of Arizona, is seeing signs of spring on Mars.
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NASA will post online nine names that are finalists for the agency's Mars Science Laboratory mission and invite the public to vote for its favorite.
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On a plain that stretches for miles in every direction, the panoramic camera on NASA's Mars rover Opportunity has caught a first glimpse on the horizon of the uplifted rim of the big crater that has been Opportunity's long-term destination for six months.
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Antique maps, latest streaming satellite images now viewable with Mars in Google Earth
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Congress passed a resolution Wednesday recognizing scientific contributions of NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers, and commending the JPL and Cornell University teams.
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NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter properly followed commands today to shut down and restart, a strategy by its engineers to clear any memory flaws accumulated in more than five years since Odyssey's last reboot.
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The team operating NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter postponed a planned rebooting of the spacecraft this morning after seeing an unexpected rise in the temperature of a star camera that is part of the navigation system.
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HiRISE captured these enhanced-color images of Deimos, the smaller of the two moons of Mars, on 21 February 2009.
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Loose soil piled against the northern edge of a low plateau called "Home Plate" has blocked NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit from taking the shortest route toward its southward destinations for the upcoming Martian summer and following winter.
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The team operating NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter plans a procedure next week to address a long-known, potential vulnerability of accumulated memory corruption.
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Unique fractures in lavas on ancient Mars suggest water occasionally flooded portions of the planet's surface. The fractures, known as "columnar joints", are the first that have been observed on a planet other than Earth.
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Before leaving Earth, Mars Science Laboratory is really put to the test to make sure it can survive the trip to the red planet.
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This near-infrared image from the framing camera on NASA's Dawn spacecraft was taken near the point of closest approach to Mars on Feb. 17, 2009, during Dawn's gravity assist flyby. The image, taken for calibration purposes, shows a portion of the fretted and cratered northwest margin of Tempe Terra, Mars.
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The team that developed and operated NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander mission will receive the 2009 John L. "Jack" Swigert Award for Space Exploration from the Space Foundation.
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A small but important uptick in electrical output from the solar panels on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit this month indicates a beneficial Martian wind has blown away some of the dust that has accumulated on the panels.
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Scientists at the Tucson-based Planetary Science Institute (PSI) have found further evidence for the large role that water has likely played in shaping the Martian landscape.
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NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit resumed driving Saturday after engineers gained confidence from diagnostic activities earlier in the week evaluating how well the rover senses its orientation.
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The team operating NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit plans diagnostic tests this week after Spirit did not report some of its weekend activities, including a request to determine its orientation after an incomplete drive.
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NASA is issuing a last call to the nation's youth for entries in a contest to name the agency's next Mars rover.
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Five years after landing on Mars in January 2004, the twin rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, are still studying the Red Planet. They were originally planned as three-month missions.
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Mars today is a world of cold and lonely deserts, apparently without life of any kind, at least on the surface. Worse still, it looks like Mars has been cold and dry for billions of years, with an atmosphere so thin, any liquid water on the surface quickly boils away while the sun's ultraviolet radiation scorches the ground.
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NASA Ames Research Center invites news reporters to participate in a NASA science update at 11 a.m. PST, Thursday, Jan. 15. The briefing will take place in the James E. Webb Memorial Auditorium at NASA Headquarters in Washington and air live on NASA Television.
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Summer turned to autumn for the Phoenix Mars Lander on December 26, 2008. This image, taken on December 21 by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows the lander during the last waning days of northern hemisphere summer.
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