The European Space Agency has shared a new image of Mars captured using the camera on its Mars Express spacecraft. In the photo, we see Mars' north pole covered with large sheets of snowy white ice surrounded by otherwise reddish and dusty landscape. The image is surprisingly clear and smooth, resembling something one may capture with a 4K drone camera or DSLR.
NASA's new Mars 2020 rover has trundled for the first time, with the autonomous space explorer destined for the Martian surface acing its driving test closer to home, in California. Having been under assembly for the past few months, the rover was ready to demonstrate that it could not only operate under its own weight, but do so with less involvement from NASA specialists back on Earth.
The European Space Agency's Mars Express mission recently wrapped up its tracking of Phobos, the innermost moon orbiting Mars. Using the spacecraft's camera, the mission captured images of the oddly shaped moon from many angles, the collection of which have been assembled together into a video. Visible in the images are a number of the moon's features, including large craters and other marks.
One of the biggest challenges for sending humans on missions into deep space or to another planet is in taking enough water to support human life and for fuel. This is why it's so important to find water on other planets that humans can access and use. NASA is planning to send humans to Mars in 2024, and ahead of that trip, it has unveiled a map that shows where the easiest to access water ice is on the surface of Mars.
NASA's rovers were able to observe the global dust storm on Mars last year that ultimately brought Opportunity rover's mission to an end. Though they're known to scientists, these global dust storms are relatively rare, happening only once every decade or so. Last year's global storm gave NASA scientists the chance to study the weather, shedding light on the formation of massive dust spires that NASA calls 'dust towers.'
The European Space Agency has published two concept images that show the hibernation pods and crew cabin that may be used as part of future long-term space missions involving human astronauts. The work comes from the ESA's Concurrent Design Facility, which was tasked with evaluating the use of hibernation in trips to other nearby planets including Mars.
Earlier this week, an entomologist from Ohio University called William Romoser, came forward with claims that had a lot of people scratching their heads. Romoser said he had been pouring through images of the surface of Mars taken over the years and had found evidence in them that insects were living on the planet.
Humanity has been searching for life on other planets and celestial bodies for many years. NASA currently has rovers and orbiters in space around Mars in part to search for life or evidence of past life. An entomologist from Ohio University claims that multiple photos taken by various Mars rovers have shown various insect-like and reptile-like forms.
NASA will use the suite of instruments on the Mars 2020 rover to hunt for microscopic fossils, the space agency has announced. Experts have selected an ideal location at the Red Planet's Jezero Crater where the fossils -- if they exist -- may be located. The hunt is part of NASA's mission to determine whether life ever existed on Mars.
Something is causing oxygen levels on Mars to spike, and despite the best efforts of the Curiosity rover and NASA's team sifting its data back down on Earth, right now scientists don't know what's causing it. Though it's commonly known that the red planet doesn't support human life in its current state, that doesn't mean there isn't any oxygen at all in its atmosphere.
NASA's 2020 Rover for the Mission to Mars may be standing on its own six wheels these days, but that doesn't mean it's quite ready to blast off to the red planet. Having celebrated the milestone of being fully-assembled last month, the 2020 Rover has now headed into a Mars Simulation Chamber to see how it might handle conditions there.
NASA's Curiosity rover may not be on Mars primarily to act as a roving photographer, but that hasn't stopped it from sending back some seriously atmospheric shots of the red planet. The latest batch of images from Curiosity arrived over the weekend, and they show a haunting vista of the Martian terrain the rover plans to explore.