Latest Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Stories

WASHINGTON - After studying Mars four times as long as originally planned, NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter appears to have succumbed to battery failure caused by a complex sequence of events involving the onboard computer memory and ground commands. The causes were released today in a preliminary report by an internal review board. The board was formed to look more in-depth into why NASA's Mars Global Surveyor went silent in November 2006 and recommend any processes or procedures that...

Liquid or gas flowed through cracks penetrating underground rock on ancient Mars, according to a report based on some of the first observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. These fluids may have produced conditions to support possible habitats for microbial life. These ancient patterns were revealed when the most powerful telescopic camera ever sent to Mars began examining the planet last year. The camera showed features as small as approximately 3 feet across. Mineralization took...

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft this month is set to surpass the record for the most science data returned by any Mars spacecraft. While the mission continues to produce data at record levels, engineers are examining why two instruments are intermittently not performing entirely as planned. All other spacecraft instruments are operating normally and continue to return science data. Since beginning its primary science phase in November 2006, the orbiter has returned enough data...

The HiRISE camera is the most powerful telescope to have left Earth orbit. As such, it is capable of some interesting astronomical observations.This image of Jupiter and its major satellites (10 MB) was acquired to calibrate the pointing and color response of the camera. An oversight in planning this unusual observation put the focus mechanism in the wrong location, blurring the image. This does not detract from the calibration objectives, but makes the raw image less esthetic.To compensate,...

The high-resolution camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has imaged the 1997 landing site of NASA's Mars Pathfinder, revealing new details of hardware on the surface and the geology of the region. The new image from the orbiter's High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment is available on the Internet at http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/MRO/multimedia/pia09105.html and at links from http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu . The Pathfinder mission's small rover, Sojourner, appears to have moved...

SAN FRANCISCO -- Layers on Mars are yielding history lessons revealed by instruments flying overhead and rolling across the surface. Some of the first radar and imaging results from NASA's newest Mars spacecraft, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, show details in layers of ice-rich deposits near the poles. Observed variations in the layers' thickness and composition will yield information about recent climate cycles on the red planet. NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity has photographed...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- NASA photographs have revealed bright new deposits seen in two gullies on Mars that suggest water carried sediment through them sometime during the past seven years. "These observations give the strongest evidence to date that water still flows occasionally on the surface of Mars," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program, Washington. Liquid water, as opposed to the water ice and water vapor known to exist at Mars, is...

NASA photographs have revealed bright new deposits seen in two gullies on Mars that suggest water carried sediment through them sometime during the past seven years. "These observations give the strongest evidence to date that water still flows occasionally on the surface of Mars," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program, Washington.Liquid water, as opposed to the water ice and water vapor known to exist at Mars, is considered necessary for life. The...

New images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show three additional NASA spacecraft that have landed on Mars: the Spirit rover active on the surface since January 2004 and the two Viking landers that successfully reached the surface in 1976. The orbiter's high-resolution camera took a dramatic photograph of Spirit's twin rover, Opportunity, at the edge of a Martian crater two months ago. Besides providing new portraits of these robotic emissaries, the images provide scientists valuable...

The University of Arizona-based team that operates the high-resolution camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, in conjunction with NASA, is releasing the first of what will be a non-stop flood of incredibly detailed Mars images taken during the spacecraft's two-year primary science mission. The High Resolution Science Imaging Experiment (HiRISE) camera took almost 100 images during the first two weeks of its main science mission, which began Nov. 7. "There's no Earth analog for...