Getting To Mars: What It’ll Take

China's colossal radio telescope begins testing - BBC News

The world's largest radio telescope has received its first signals from space and is now entering an intensive testing phase.

Fantastic success story for the astronomy community of China, congratulations!

Even after dozens of spacecraft have been sent to Mars, much remains unknown about that world. Here we have 7 fascinating yet unanswered questions about Mars.

Elon Musk wants to put people on Mars in less than a decade

Musk has already said he wants SpaceX to start sending unmanned missions to Mars in 2018. He has even planned out the details of the future expeditions.

Follow @the-future-now​

Pitted Cones in Melas Chasma

HUGE ANNOUNCEMENT!

Elon Musk is set to announce his plans for Mars colonization in an hour, at 2:30 Eastern Time. 

Please watch it because this could be history in the making.

Solar System: Things to Know This Week

In addition to the Mercury transit of the sun today, there are a few other things you should know about our solar system this week:

1. Mars, Ready for its Close-Up

Mars will soon be closer to Earth than it has been for 11 years, presenting a great opportunity for backyard sky watchers.

2. Fire and Ice

Our spacecraft have an even closer view of Mars, and that fact regularly leads to some intriguing discoveries. The latest: volcanoes may have erupted beneath an ice sheet there billions of years ago. The above image is a mineral map of part of the Martian surface.

3. Icy Hydra

Meanwhile, our New Horizons spacecraft has sent home the first compositional data about Pluto’s four small moons. The new data show the surface of Hydra is dominated by nearly pristine water ice–confirming hints that scientists picked up in images showing Hydra’s highly reflective surface.

4. Ceres, Ever Sharper

The mission director for our Dawn mission writes, “Ceres, which only last year was hardly more than a fuzzy blob against the stars, is now a richly detailed world, and our portrait grows more elaborate every day.”

5. Join us at Jupiter

Our Juno mission arrives at the giant planet on Jul. 4. Meanwhile, all amateur astronomers are invited to take part in a worldwide effort to identify potential observations for the spacecraft to make once it’s in orbit. Find out how to join HERE.

Want to learn more? Read our full list of the 10 things to know this week about the solar system HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

SpaceX Sends Super Science to Space Station!

SpaceX is scheduled to launch its Dragon spacecraft PACKED with super cool research and technology to the International Space Station June 1 from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. New solar panels, investigations that study neutron stars and even fruit flies are on the cargo list. Let’s take a look at what other bits of science are making their way to the orbiting laboratory 250 miles above the Earth…

New solar panels to test concept for more efficient power source

Solar panels generate power well, but they can be delicate and large when used to power a spacecraft or satellites. This technology demonstration is a solar panel concept that is lighter and stores more compactly for launch than the solar panels currently in use. 

Roll-Out Solar Array (ROSA) has solar cells on a flexible blanket and a framework that rolls out like a tape measure and snap into place, and could be used to power future space vehicles.  

Investigation to Study Composition of Neutron Stars

Neutron stars, the glowing cinders left behind when massive stars explode as supernovas, contain exotic states of matter that are impossible to replicate in any lab. NICER studies the makeup of these stars, and could provide new insight into their nature and super weird behavior.

Neutron stars emit X-ray radiation, enabling the NICER technology to observe and record information about its structure, dynamics and energetics. 

Experiment to Study Effect of New Drug on Bone Loss

When people and animals spend lots of space, they experience bone density loss. In-flight exercise can prevent it from getting worse, but there isn’t a therapy on Earth or in space that can restore bone that is already lost.

The Systemic Therapy of NELL-1 for osteoporosis (Rodent Research-5) investigation tests a new drug that can both rebuild bone and block further bone loss, improving health for crew members.

Research to Understand Cardiovascular Changes

Exposure to reduced gravity environments can result in cardiovascular changes such as fluid shifts, changes in total blood volume, heartbeat and heart rhythm irregularities, and diminished aerobic capacity.

The Fruit Fly Lab-02 study will use the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) to better understand the underlying mechanisms responsible for the adverse effects of prolonged exposure to microgravity on the heart. Fruit flies are effective model organisms, and we don’t mean on the fashion runway. Want to see how 1,000 bottles of fruit flies were prepared to go to space? Check THIS out.

Space Life-Support Investigation

Currently, the life-support systems aboard the space station require special equipment to separate liquids and gases. This technology utilizes rotating and moving parts that, if broken or otherwise compromised, could cause contamination aboard the station. 

The Capillary Structures investigation studies a new method of water recycling and carbon dioxide removal using structures designed in specific shapes to manage fluid and gas mixtures. 

Earth-Observation Tools

Orbiting approximately 250 miles above the Earth’s surface, the space station provides pretty amazing views of the Earth. The Multiple User System for Earth Sensing (MUSES) facility hosts Earth-viewing instruments such as high-resolution digital cameras, hyperspectral imagers, and provides precision pointing and other accommodations.

This investigation can produce data that could be used for maritime domain awareness, agricultural awareness, food security, disaster response, air quality, oil and gas exploration and fire detection. 

Watch the launch live HERE! For all things space station science, follow @ISS_Research on Twitter.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

in 20-70 million years, Mars’ moon Phobos will get close enough to the surface of the planet that it will be ripped apart by the tidal forces. The resulting debris will most likely give Mars a planetary ring.

POTENTIAL HABITATS FOR EARLY LIFE ON MARS

Recently discovered evidence of carbonates beneath the surface of Mars points to a warmer and wetter environment in that planet’s past. The presence of liquid water could have fostered the emergence of life.

A new study by James Wray at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Janice Bishop of the SETI Institute, as well as other collaborators, has found evidence for widespread buried deposits of iron- and calcium-rich Martian carbonates, which suggests a wetter past for the Red Planet.

“Identification of these ancient carbonates and clays on Mars represents a window into history when the climate on Mars was very different from the cold and dry desert of today,” notes Bishop.

The fate of water on Mars has been energetically debated by scientists because the planet is currently dry and cold, in contrast to the widespread fluvial features that etch much of its surface. Scientists believe that if water did once flow on the surface of Mars, the planet’s bedrock should be full of carbonates and clays, which would be evidence that Mars once hosted habitable environments with liquid water. Researchers have struggled to find physical evidence for carbonate-rich bedrock, which may have formed when carbon dioxide in the planet’s early atmosphere was trapped in ancient surface waters. They have focused their search on Mars’ Huygens basin.

This feature is an ideal site to investigate carbonates because multiple impact craters and troughs have exposed ancient, subsurface materials where carbonates can be detected across a broad region. And according to study led James Wray, “outcrops in the 450-km wide Huygens basin contain both clay minerals and iron- or calcium-rich carbonate-bearing rocks.”

The study has highlighted evidence of carbonate-bearing rocks in multiple sites across Mars, including Lucaya crater, where carbonates and clays 3.8 billion years old were buried by as much as 5 km of lava and caprock.

The researchers, supported by the SETI Institute’s NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) team, identified carbonates on the planet using data from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM), which is on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. This instrument collects the spectral fingerprints of carbonates and other minerals through vibrational transitions of the molecules in their crystal structure that produce infrared emission. The team paired CRISM data with images from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) and Context Camera (CTX) on the orbiter, as well as the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) on the Mars Global Surveyor, to gain insights into the geologic features associated with carbonate-bearing rocks.

The extent of the global distribution of martian carbonates is not yet fully resolved and the early climate on the Red Planet is still subject of debate. However, this study is a forward step in understanding the potential habitability of ancient Mars.

Preview of paper: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2015JE004972/abstract

TOP IMAGE….Ancient layered clay-bearing bedrock (top left) and carbonate bedrock (bottom right) are exposed in the central uplift of an unnamed crater approximately 42 kilometers in diameter in eastern Hesperia Planum, Mars. The image was taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) instrument aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

LOWER IMAGE….Aeolian bed forms overlie ancient layered, ridged carbonate-rich outcrop exposed in the central pit of Lucaya crater, northwest Huygens basin, Mars. The image was taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) instrument aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

lol omfg yes

First flower ever grown in space bloomed today!