Opportunity on Mars

[Brian G Turner]

Glad to see the second one taking up the flank on this one.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3427045.stm

excerpt:

Opportunity, the second of two Nasa rovers, has successfully landed on the Martian surface where it will search for signs of water on the planet.


The new rover touched down at 0505 GMT, halfway around the red planet from where Spirit rover landed on 4 January. Opportunity landed on a smooth, flat plain, in the highest altitude landing ever attempted by Nasa.

 

[nemogbr]

Wondered why they named the probes "Spirit" and "Opportunity"

Is opportunity to make big money if they discover water and the possibility of colonising Mars?

Should have been done a decade ago.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Think they were supposed to have been named by a schoolgirl.

And while we're on topic:

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994609

excerpt:

New images transmitted from the Mars rover Opportunity have revealed tantalising signs of sedimentary rocks, the very thing mission geologists are most hoping to find.

A long outcrop of light coloured bedrock has riveted the science team's attention and now the new 180° segment of high-resolution imagery from the panoramic camera has revealed clear layers, many just a centimetre thick.

The whole outcrop is only a 50 cm thick or less, so the rover will be able to examine it up close without danger of getting stuck. Lava flows are the presumed source of most Martian rock but Steve Squyres, head of the science team, says these can be ruled out because they would form much thicker layers.

However, falling ash from volcanoes can form similar layered deposits, he cautions. Arguing against are hints of a geological feature called crossbedding, caused by ripples or dunes and a clear indication of sedimentary origin.

The quest for proof of sedimentation, which could prove that bodies of liquid water existed for some period of time in the history of Mars, is one of the primary goals of NASA's twin-rover mission. The two landing sites, halfway around the planet from one another, were specifically chosen to give the best chance of finding clear signs a watery past.

What's a shame is that in the New Scientist mag there's speculation mentioned that Opportunity has landed on Martian "mud" - but the feature isn't coverde online in the public section.

 

[Brian G Turner]

Just to keep updated: mysterious spheres in the Martian bedrock. I'm taking bets that it's volcanic in origin, rather than "yet-another-forced-emphasis-on-water" explanation.

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994658

excerpt:

The latest close-ups taken by the Mars rover Opportunity leave just two serious possibilities for the method of formation of the layered rocks it is examining, lead scientist Steve Squyres said on Monday.

The rocks are the first bedrock ever analysed on Mars - other rocks were only loose boulders. The strata are tantalising the science team as they might provide conclusive proof of water-lain sediments. This would show that Mars was once a much wetter place and increase the chance that life existed.

The images, including pictures from the craft's microscope, show the rock is made of extremely fine-grained material - too fine for it to have been sediments formed in standing water, or windblown sand, or any kind of lava flows. And it forms extremely thin layers embedded with spheres about the size of peppercorns, whose uniformity rules out the idea that they could be formed by wave erosion of pebbles.

The first of the remaining two explanations is that the rocks are layers of volcanic ash, interspersed with droplets of molten rock spewed out by volcanoes or meteorite impacts and then frozen into glassy beads.

The second scenario involves layers of ash or fine windblown dust that later were penetrated by mineral-rich water, which deposited successive layers of material onto the grains, building them up into spheres.