Tag Archives: DLR

InSight: Sunrise and sunset on Mars

NASA’s InSight lander captured a series of sunrise and sunset images. A camera on the spacecraft’s robotic arm snapped the photos on April 24 and 25, the 145th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. In local Mars time, the … Continue reading

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InSight: First likely marsquake detected

NASA’s Mars InSight lander has measured and recorded for the first time ever a likely “marsquake.” The faint seismic signal, detected by the lander’s Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument, was recorded on April 6, the lander’s 128th Martian … Continue reading

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InSight: More testing for the ‘mole’

Updated at 5 p.m. PDT (8 p.m. EDT) on April 11: InSight’s Heat and Physical Properties Package (HP3) instrument completed a new round of diagnostic hammering into the Martian surface on March 26, 2019, while the spacecraft’s seismometer listened in. … Continue reading

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Mars Express: Dark dust devil tracks

The winds of Mars are responsible for myriad features across the planet’s surface – including the dark dunes and wispy, filament-like streaks seen in this image from ESA’s Mars Express. The intriguing features shown here are ‘dust devil’ tracks: as … Continue reading

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Can organisms survive on Mars, and can we identify them?

Earth is a very special planet. It is the only celestial body in the Solar System on which we know life exists. Could there be life on other planets or moons? Mars is always the first to be mentioned in … Continue reading

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InSight: Lander’s ‘mole’ pauses digging

NASA’s Mars InSight lander has a probe designed to dig up to 16 feet (5 meters) below the surface and measure heat coming from inside the planet. After beginning to hammer itself into the soil on Thursday, Feb. 28, the … Continue reading

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InSight update, Sol 92, by Emily Lakdawalla, The Planetary Society

The mole did hit a rock. Mars could’ve given us a break, but it didn’t. The HP3 mole started hammering itself today, and almost immediately (after just 5 minutes) appears to have encountered a rock. After four hours of hammering, it … Continue reading

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Mars Express: Signs of ancient flowing water

These images from ESA’s Mars Express satellite show a branching, desiccated system of trenches and valleys, signs of ancient water flow that hint at a warmer, wetter past for the Red Planet. We see Mars as a cold, dry world, … Continue reading

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InSight deploys heat flow package

NASA’s InSight lander has placed its second instrument on the Martian surface. New images confirm that the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package, or HP3, was successfully deployed on Feb. 12 about 3 feet (1 meter) from InSight’s seismometer, which … Continue reading

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Mars Express: 15 years imaging the Red Planet

On 25 December 2003, ESA’s Mars Express entered orbit around the Red Planet. The spacecraft began returning the first images from orbit using its High Resolution Stereo Camera just a couple of weeks later, and over the course of its … Continue reading

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