Marsbugs: The Electronic Astrobiology Newsletter Volume 11, Number 5, 26 January 2004 Editor/Publisher: David J. Thomas, Ph.D., Science Division, Lyon College, Batesville, Arkansas 72503-2317, USA. dthomas@lyon.edu Marsbugs is published on a weekly to monthly basis as warranted by the number of articles and announcements. Copyright of this compilation exists with the editor, except for specific articles, in which instance copyright exists with the author/authors. E-mail subscriptions are free, and may be obtained by contacting the editor. Information concerning the scope of this newsletter, subscription formats and availability of back- issues is available from the Marsbugs web page (http://www.lyon.edu/projects/marsbugs). The editor does not condone "spamming" of subscribers. Readers would appreciate it if others would not send unsolicited e-mail using the Marsbugs mailing lists. Persons who have information that may be of interest to subscribers of Marsbugs should send that information to the editor. __________________________________________________________________________ Articles and News 1) EX-ASTRONAUT TO LEAD MOON-MARS COMMISSION By Marcia Dunn 2) SURVIVING SPACE: RISKS TO HUMANS ON THE MOON AND MARS By Robert Roy Britt 3) NASA SATELLITES IMPROVE RESPONSE TO GLOBAL AGRICULTURAL CHANGE NASA release 04-025 4) MARS MICE By Karen Miller 5) BEST LAID PLANS, MEN AND MACHINES: INTERVIEW WITH JOHN LOGSDON From Astrobiology Magazine 6) "TIME NOT RIGHT" FOR RUSSIA TO LAUNCH MARS MISSION From Agence France-Presse and SpaceDaily 7) STATE OF THE UNION: SCIENCE ADDRESSING THE VIRTUAL PARADISE? From Astrobiology Magazine 8) INTERSTELLAR ESPIONAGE: WHILE WE'RE WATCHING MARS, COULD SOMEONE BE WATCHING US? By Seth Shostak 9) INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE ON HOLD NASA release 04-029 10) DESTINATION: MERIDIANI PLANUM By Karen Miller 11) BUSH SPEECH OPENS DOOR, THE FUTURE IS UP TO US Statement of the Steering Committee of the Mars Society Announcements 12) NEW ADDITIONS TO THE ASTROBIOLOGY INDEX By David J. Thomas Mission Reports 13) GROUND CONTROL INITIATES RADIO SILENCE TO TEMPT BEAGLE 2 FROM ITS HIDING PLACE Beagle 2 Team release 14) NEXT ATTEMPTS TO CONTACT BEAGLE 2 PLANNED FOR 24TH AND 25TH JANUARY Beagle 2 Team release 15) DISAPPOINTMENT IN BEAGLE 2 SEARCH Beagle 2 Team release 16) CASSINI SIGNIFICANT EVENTS NASA/JPL release 17) LAST TWO WEEKS TO MAKE A "DEEP IMPACT" ON A COMET NASA release 04-028 18) SPIRIT DRIVES TO A ROCK CALLED "ADIRONDACK" FOR CLOSE INSPECTION NASA/JPL release 2004-024 19) NASA MARS ROVER'S FIRST SOIL ANALYSIS YIELDS SURPRISES NASA/JPL release 2004-025 20) MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-027 21) MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-028 22) MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-29 23) UPDATED MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-30 24) ROVER TEAM READIES FOR SECOND LANDING WHILE TRYING TO MEND SPIRIT NASA/JPL release 2004-031 25) MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-033 26) SPIRIT CONDITION UPGRADED AS TWIN ROVER NEARS MARS NASA/JPL release 2004-034 27) NASA HEARS FROM OPPORTUNITY ROVER ON MARS NASA/JPL release 2004-035 28) FIRST IMAGES OF OPPORTUNITY SITE SHOW BIZARRE LANDSCAPE NASA/JPL release 2004-036 29) OPPORTUNITY SITS IN A SMALL CRATER, NEAR A BIGGER ONE NASA/JPL release 2004-037 30) MARS EXPRESS SEES ITS FIRST WATER--SCIENTIFIC RESULTS ESA release 06-2004 31) MARS EXPRESS COMMISSIONING AND EARLY RESULTS ESA release 32) MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR IMAGES NASA/JPL/MSSS release 33) MARS ODYSSEY THEMIS IMAGES NASA/JPL/ASU release __________________________________________________________________________ EX-ASTRONAUT TO LEAD MOON-MARS COMMISSION By Marcia Dunn From Associated Press and Space.com 19 January 2004 The man chosen to lead the way back to the Moon and on to Mars is a one- time astronaut trainee and former Defense Department hotshot who is almost giddy about outer space travel. "It's going to be fun," Pete Aldridge said in an interview. "My goodness, the president says this is what we're going to do." President Bush appointed Aldridge, 65, to head a commission charged with figuring out how to carry out the president's vision and bring in industry and other countries as partners. Read the full article at http://www.space.com/news/aldridge_040119.html. __________________________________________________________________________ SURVIVING SPACE: RISKS TO HUMANS ON THE MOON AND MARS By Robert Roy Britt From Space.com 20 January 2004 There is no "biggest danger" in setting up a permanent lunar presence or sending people to Mars, says John Charles, an enthusiastic proponent of both ideas and a NASA analyst of the costs and risks of human space flight: "There are several." Launch, landing and re-entry are perhaps the riskiest moments of any space venture, history shows. But on long missions, what would otherwise be minor threats could become at best serious limitations or at worst deadly disasters. Basking in the glow of President Bush's call for sending humans back to the Moon as early as 2015 and then eventually to the red planet, Charles, who works at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, offered up his danger list yesterday. * Lack of a medical facility could turn a mundane injury into a life- threatening situation; * "Psychosocial" pressure will be high in a small group isolated for months or years; * Zero or reduced gravity causes bone and muscle loss; * Dangerous radiation particles are abundant beyond Earth orbit. Read the full article at http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mars_dangers_040120.html. __________________________________________________________________________ NASA SATELLITES IMPROVE RESPONSE TO GLOBAL AGRICULTURAL CHANGE NASA release 04-025 20 January 2004 NASA's Earth satellite observing systems are helping the U.S. Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) improve the accuracy and timeliness of information they provide about important crops around the world. FAS information is crucial in decisions affecting U.S. agriculture, trade policy, and food aid. NASA and the University of Maryland are providing the FAS with observations and data products from instruments on NASA's Aqua and Terra satellites and from the TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason and Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellites. FAS analysts are using these products to regularly assess global agricultural conditions. "The partnership between NASA and FAS is an example of how we extend the benefits of Earth science missions to meet the needs of our operational partners," said Ed Sheffner of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise. NASA provides daily, high-quality, observations of the Earth. The timeliness and quality of these science data products are used to support decision support tools employed by FAS to assess crop productivity over large areas of the world. NASA products allow FAS analysts to distinguish between different crops such as wheat and rice and permit analysts to measure other features like surface temperature and snow cover. Analysts can gauge the health of agriculture by comparing recent and historic data. NASA satellites collect data twice daily, Terra in the morning and Aqua in the afternoon. Frequent satellite observations are important so analysts can assess how natural disasters such as fires, volcanic eruptions, floods, storms, or even extreme temperatures, affect crops. The information is often crucial to international food aid organizations. Earth Science products quickly demonstrated their utility as they helped analysts identify and monitor new areas of irrigated agriculture in the Middle East. NASA's Rapid Response System processes and delivers observations to FAS usually less than four hours after it is collected. Scientists at the University of Maryland are creating an archive and an interface that enables analysts to compare current and historical conditions. Altimetry data from the TOPEX/Poseidon and Jason satellites are used to monitor the water level of 100 lakes and reservoirs around the world. Innovative use of these data to measure lake and reservoir water levels in an operational manner has proven valuable. The information allows FAS analysts monitor the duration of droughts, assess how much water is available for irrigated farmland in arid regions and, as a result, how much of a crop the region is able to produce. The TRMM satellite provides near real-time observations about precipitation for mid-latitudes. Rainfall has a large impact on both rain-fed and irrigated crops. TRMM data helps analysts gauge planting and growing conditions and predict the size of the harvest with greater reliability. Applications of NASA's Earth Science research enable the use of observations, measurements and models to improve agency partners' decision-making capabilities. FAS has benefited from incorporating products from Earth observation systems into operational procedures. For more information and images on the Internet, visit http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/2004/0115agriculture.html. For information about FAS satellite data on the Internet, visit http://www.pecad.fas.usda.gov/cropexplorer/. For information about NASA's Earth Science Enterprise on the Internet, visit http://www.earth.nasa.gov. For more information about NASA on the Internet, visit http://www.nasa.gov. Contacts: David E. Steitz NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1730 Rob Gutro/Holli Riebeek NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD Phone: 301-286-4044/8724 Mary Rekas Foreign Agricultural Services, Washington, DC Phone: 202-720-3415 __________________________________________________________________________ MARS MICE By Karen Miller From NASA Science News 20 January 2004 Humans need gravity. Without it, as astronauts have vividly demonstrated, our bodies change strangely. Muscles lose mass, and bones lose density. Even the ability to balance deteriorates. From long experience on the space shuttle and various space stations, we have some knowledge of how mammals, especially people, respond to 0-g. We have even more experience with 1-g on Earth. But we still don't know what happens in between. What, for example, will happen to humans on Mars where the surface gravity is 0.38-g? Is that enough to keep human explorers functioning properly? And, importantly, how easily will they readapt to 1-g, once they return to Earth? A team of scientists and students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the University of Washington, and the University of Queensland, in Australia, plans to explore these questions. They're going to do it by launching mice into orbit. "What we're doing," explains Paul Wooster, of MIT, and program manager of the Mars Gravity Biosatellite project "is developing a spacecraft that is going to spin to create artificial gravity." The satellite will spin at the rate of about 34 times each minute, which will generate 0.38-g--the same as gravity on Mars. The team hopes to launch the Biosatellite in 2006. The mice will be exposed to Mars-gravity for about five weeks. Then, says Wooster, they'll return to Earth alive and well. The mice will descend by parachute and land near Woomera, Australia, inside a small capsule reminiscent of NASA's old Apollo capsules. The Biosatellite project is the first investigation conducted at this gravity level, says Wooster. Financed in part by NASA, the project is also unique "due to the heavy involvement of students in all aspects of the work, including planning the science, designing the spacecraft, raising the funds, and managing the overall effort," he adds. The research will focus on bone loss, changes in bone structure, on muscle atrophy, and on changes in the inner ear, which affects balance. "The main thing we're trying to do," says Wooster, "is to chart a data-point between zero-gravity and one-gravity." As they orbit the earth, the mice, each in its own tiny habitat, will be painstakingly observed. Each habitat will have a camera, so that the researchers can monitor mouse activity. Each will have its own pump- driven water supply, so that each mouse's water consumption can be tracked. Each mouse's wastes will be collected in a compartment beneath its habitat; the compartment will contain a urinalysis system checking for biomarkers that indicate bone loss. Each habitat will also be equipped with a body mass sensor, which will take frequent readings. This will also allow the researchers to track how the weight of the mice changes over the course of the five weeks. Each mouse will also have toys to keep it busy. "We may give them a wooden block to chew on," says Wooster. That'll keep them happy, and will also prevent them from chewing on the habitat. They might have a small tube to run through. No wheels, though, says Wooster, because NASA has learned that exercise can counteract some of the effects of low-gravity on astronauts. A mouse with a wheel in its cage can actually run several miles a day. "We don't want to give the mice a countermeasure in terms of exercise." The students will be using only female mice, says Wooster. That's partly because female mice eat slightly less than male mice, decreasing the mass that must leave Earth. But more importantly, some studies suggest that females are affected more strongly by lowered gravity than the males. Those studies, though, weren't conducted in true partial gravity. Rather, they were done by suspending the hind legs of the animals, so that the mice are only able to feel part of their weight on the ground. The simulated Mars gravity inside the Biosatellite will be much more realistic. Through the three participating universities, more than 250 students have been involved in the Biosatellite project. The project is being led and coordinated by MIT, which is also managing the animal habitats and life support systems. The University of Washington is in charge of providing electrical power, propulsion, attitude control, thermal control, and all the communications to the ground. The University of Queensland is in charge of the entry, descent, and landing systems, including the heat shields and parachutes. "I think that one of the big contributions of the Biosatellite," says Wooster, "is the educational benefit for the students involved." So many people, he says, have been inspired by this project, and have learned from it. "Plus we're going to be getting back information that nobody's ever had before, data that have been missing in the planning of human missions to Mars." How might humans respond to gravity on Mars? With the successful landing of NASA's rover Spirit, that question seems closer and closer to one we'll need to solve. Read the original article at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2004/20jan_marsmice.htm. Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mars_mice_040120.html http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-general-04c.html __________________________________________________________________________ BEST LAID PLANS, MEN AND MACHINES: INTERVIEW WITH JOHN LOGSDON From Astrobiology Magazine 21 January 2004 "History is the science of what never happens twice." --Paul Valery If museums preserve a civilization's contributions to the future, then what will future generations remember about this half-century? Compared to the five million people who annually visit the Louvre in Paris, nearly double that number flock to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC--making it the most visited museum in the world. Among its forty thousand artifacts, visitors view the largest collection of aircraft and space exhibits in the world--home to the Wright flyer, Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis, the Apollo 11 command module that made the trip to lunar orbit and back to Earth, and the only lunar rock sample accessible to the public. The first Chair of Space History at the National Air and Space Museum (1982-1983) was Dr. John Logsdon--author, educator, and policy-analyst with an interest in space exploration. Dr. Logsdon is the author of The Decision to Go to the Moon: Project Apollo and the National Interest, and is general editor of the eight-volume series, Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in the History of the U.S. Civil Space Program. Astrobiology Magazine had the opportunity to talk with John Logsdon about astrobiology, space policy, and how the public perceives progress and goals in exploration. In addition to his contributions to space history, Dr. Logsdon is active in shaping how policy is crafted today. He is a former member of the NASA Advisory Council and a current member of the Commercial Space Transportation Advisory Committee of the Department of Transportation. He recently served on the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. Astrobiology Magazine (AM): On the twenty-fifth anniversary of the first manned moon-landing, you commented that the 1994 policy debate focused on whether the public was prepared for large undertakings, or any grand-scale science. Do you still believe that public projects like space missions are able to draw on that wider motivation today? John Logsdon (JL): My 1994 statement was skeptical about the public's willingness to support expensive, long-range space goals. Perhaps the "post-Columbia" realization that the alternative is a space program that moves forward basically on momentum, without any clear, politically- sanctioned statement of purpose, will modify that reality. But unfortunately I see no compelling argument for major investments in space that could be offered as a rationale for public support. Compared to other government activities, space remains a discretionary activity, and for the past thirty years top decision makers have not seen a major reason to invest heavily in space exploration. AM: How would you weigh the relative importance of cost-effective research versus adventure (or discovery of the unknown) as a goal or national priority in itself for space missions? JL: Research in space is a goal that appeals to only a few. It is not the reason either the general public or political leaders support the space program. For the general public, the primary purpose is indeed exploration--seeing or doing something new. But most of the public will support space exploration like they do symphony orchestras or public radio--something worth having, but not at high cost. For government leaders, I think that the space program continues to be a useful source of creating national pride and demonstrating national power--as long as it is successful. When things go wrong, the program becomes a policy and political problem. AM: In contrasting the public case that has been made for the International Space Station as a kind of terrestrial payoff, how do policy-makers evaluate, by comparison, the three international Mars missions happening now? JL: I doubt that this comparison is made at high levels of government. To leaders, to quote a phrase out of the 1961 memorandum from NASA Administrator Webb and Secretary of Defense McNamara that recommended setting a lunar landing goal to President Kennedy, "It is men, not machines, that captures the imagination of the world." The International Space Station is supported politically as a demonstration of U.S. leadership in a complex international venture, not as a research laboratory. That said, if the Mars Exploration Rovers are successful, I am sure they will attract a lot of attention for their complex, "human-like" capabilities to explore. AM: As hindrances to taking on projects that may span decades, much attention has been paid to the short election cycle and media-fueled public fickleness with long-term planning. Do you personally see these short-term issues as defining the science policy landscape? JL: The political system can and does make long-term commitments to objectives perceived as worthwhile. The problem with the space program is that it has not often offered value that would justify such commitments, at least commitments to highly visible and expensive projects. However, political support for the ISS has not really been threatened for a decade. Even with all its troubles, the United States appears committed to seeing ISS through to completion. If we can sustain a commitment to that program, we certainly can sustain a commitment to a well-justified program of human exploration. AM: One of the most prominent examples of large-scale science offered in recent years has been biological, namely the completion of the Human Genome project. This DNA mapping is often compared with the moon landing, both in setting out a challenging but attainable goal, and then meeting it with international collaboration. Are there things to learn--both positive and negative--from the experience of how this kind of grand-scale science is made relevant and focused, compared to say the Mars landings? JL: First of all, Project Apollo was a unilateral U.S. undertaking. So the question is a bit off-base in its reference to international collaboration. But certainly such cooperation and division of labor has been since Apollo the preferred approach to large-scale space ventures. Sustaining international cooperation is hard. The United States has often been accused of being a poor partner in international ventures. But in Mars exploration, it is primarily other partners that have not honored their part of the bargain. AM: As a guess, do you think the present round-the-clock news coverage devoted to things like crime cases could be sustained if NASA had the same or similar kinds of continuous commentary or intrigue going on surrounding a robotic Mars landing? JL: Not at all--and I think that hoping for such coverage is a bit of a fool's errand. The space program cannot be sustained as public entertainment. It must be perceived as having real payoffs to important users. Sure, occasional intense coverage of publicly exciting mission events is great, but public attention is notoriously fickle. AM: In your analysis, is China's recent manned orbital mission something that has been absorbed by policy makers as positive for exploration initiatives, or as a setback for peaceful uses of space? JL: Why should what China does as it begins its program of human space flight be any more "a setback for the peaceful exploration of space" than were U.S. flights during Project Mercury four decades ago? China has made a decision for its own motivations--national pride and national prestige, in my view--that parallel the motivations that were the underpinning of the initial U.S. human space flight ventures. Like the United States, Russia, Europe, Israel, India, and other countries, China is fully aware of the national security benefits of space capabilities. But I do not think the Chinese human space flight program is closely linked to that motivation. AM: One criticism to those framing science and technology goals in such a dramatic way as the space program has done historically, is that this approach inevitably leads to more build-up and less follow-through. For instance, examples like air travel itself had humble beginnings but quickly took on a glamour that became practical. Is this a fair analogy in your opinion to compare aviation and astronautics historically, in the way the life-cycle of any broad idea might shape a civilization's science goals? JL: One big difference. The development of aviation was stimulated by a mixture of government, commercial, and personal motivations. "Science goals" did not figure highly in those motivations, by the way. Because of the high cost of access to space, government has dominated space development to date. Even the commercial communications satellite sector would not have been possible without government funding of launch vehicle development. So I think the comparison of the history to date is flawed. Whether the comparison will become more valid in the 21st century is an interesting question. In my view, public space travel may well be the next big area of commercial space activity. AM: At a time that accurate star positions had only marginal military or economic benefits, the Danish treasury gave almost a third of its resources to Tycho Brahe's first observatory. How do policy makers today view such investments by comparison? In your work, does science progress hinge greatly on the kinds of national rivalries today that shaped the initial decision to go to the moon? JL: No. I think most major governments, and certainly that of this country, have accepted the notion that investing in fundamental research is necessary for both practical and intangible reasons. Practical in the sense that fundamental research is seen as the source of valuable public good, economic, and security benefits for society. Intangible in the sense that learning more about nature is something a civilized society invests in. Rivalries help stimulate investment, but no longer are its basic rationale. AM: Based on your historical work, is the search for life elsewhere a viable motivation for grand-scale science? Are there precedents historically that might lead you to the conclusion that this search could be a kind of nugget for longer term planning? JL: The question, "Are we alone?" does touch almost everyone's emotions, and programs aimed at answering it will be supported as long as they appear well-designed and not flights of fancy. But I doubt that human desire to find an answer to that question will ever be the basis for "grand scale science," at least until "normal" science answers the question in the positive. If we discovered evidence of past (or present!) life on Mars or Jupiter's moons, then I suspect the public would support a major effort to learn more, sending both robotic spacecraft and ultimately people to explore. What's next? Twin NASA MER rovers and one European Space Agency probe are slated for early 2004. The first Mars Exploration Rover, or MER, arrived or Mars on January 4, 2004, the second, January 25. Read the original article at http://www.astrobio.net/news/article788.html. __________________________________________________________________________ "TIME NOT RIGHT" FOR RUSSIA TO LAUNCH MARS MISSION From Agence France-Presse and SpaceDaily 21 January 2004 Russia possesses the technology and skills to launch a manned mission to Mars but "the time is not right" for such a venture, a senior government official said Wednesday, dousing speculation that Russia might seek to match U.S. plans to explore space. "We have all the technology and scientific skills needed (for a flight to Mars), but from the rational point of view the time is not right for such a program," Deputy Prime Minister Boris Alyoshin told the Interfax news agency. "We too have big ambitions, but currently we are not planning concrete moves for the conquest of Mars," he said, describing as "mainly electorally motivated" a speech last week by US President George W. Bush unveiling plans to return to the Moon and maybe follow through to Mars. Read the full article at http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/040121152952.mma5ubts.html. __________________________________________________________________________ STATE OF THE UNION: SCIENCE ADDRESSING THE VIRTUAL PARADISE? From Astrobiology Magazine 21 January 2004 The latest National Science Foundation's Science and Engineering Indicators suggests that in the US that three out of every four citizens are probably unable to either fully understand a news piece on astrobiology or any other science. More than half the US public, for example, absolutely believes the universe is teeming with intelligent life--and they are visiting us on a regular basis. According to European surveys around 50% of the adult population suffers from science illiteracy. The survey found, for example, that more than 25% of the public believes the Sun goes around the Earth--so where does that leave attempts to convey astrobiology to broader audiences? Astrobiology Magazine had the opportunity to talk with one of the principal architects behind the Webby-award winning site, science.nasa.gov, Dr. John Horack, who addressed the challenges and rewards of opening astrobiology and space exploration to a wider scope of interested viewers. Astrobiology Magazine (AM): What is the audience interested in finding life elsewhere? Dr. John Horack (JH): I think the 10% of the population that is science- attentive (24 million) is at the core, for a few reasons. First, the "science attentive" audience tends to be characterized by information- seeking, and a desire to receive information through channels other than traditional mediated communications (e.g., TV). Thus their pro-activity helps them find things via the Internet, and their affinity for sources other than mass-media makes them inclined to seek out new findings in astrobiology. Second, this is the audience that governments and institutions do not see as being within a well-defined mission segment compared, for example, to "education" or "media relations." A science attentive will not simply absorb and be satisfied with a non-technical press release written for its "news hook" value rather than its content value. They tend to desire a deeper explanation and understanding, and are more concerned with the content rather than context. I believe that the initiation of high-quality science and technology communication must begin at the laboratory bench, with the scientists who are doing the research. It is not acceptable for scientists to simply "throw it over the wall" and hope that someone else will do the job. Scientists must make substantive efforts to initiate the communication that gives their work value. But they cannot do the job alone. Modern science communications must be more than just an "add-on" to the scientific research process, but instead an integral part of what it means to "do science." Science must be redefined as the integral of generating and communicating new knowledge and technology. AM: So what is the mission of communicating science to a wider audience? JH: Because the taxpayer pays for science research, they should demand that the loop be closed through being informed about what exactly they have financed. Communicating the product and process of science is an ongoing "annual report" to shareholders that chronicles how their investment has performed, and what has been accomplished. This differs markedly from "advocacy", which is designed to inculcate a positive response (e.g., writing your congressman for funding). Admittedly all hope that the response to science communications would be positive, but the first mission is accountability and articulation of accomplishment. I believe that this simply part of the cost of doing business within NASA or any other Federally funded research enterprise, just as shareholders expect the company to spend some money printing the and mailing the annual report to apprise them of performance. AM: Can this response be measured, say, to improve it? JH: I am admittedly pessimistic about the effectiveness of science communications in America, and disappointed that the Federal research enterprise seems unwilling to place meaningful emphasis upon what I perceive to be a critical function. But, I think it's accurate to say that the success is locally variable and very difficult to measure in several respects. The emergence over the past decade or so of private sector enterprises like Discovery Communications, the success of shows like Bill Nye the Science Guy, the abundance of Hands-On Science Centers, and polls that show a continued support for science, technology, and space research-- these all seem to indicate that there is some success in articulating the importance of science and being science literate, in communicating science effectively (perhaps even profitably), and that things are working well. Conversely, one could also point to flat-or-declining research budgets for more than a decade, a continued performance gap in science and mathematics test scores compared to other parts of the developed world, or the equally successful showing of pseudo-science television--psychics who talk to your dead grandmother, UFO conspiracy shows, and so forth--to argue that things are not going terribly well. Where it is successful, the "doing" of science communication--building web-pages, educational products, press releases, video files, etc.--is strongly informed by a focus on academic research in science communications. This research helps those institutions answer questions such as "How are people consuming science information?", "What do people do with it?", and "Can I effectively measure my process?" Part of the ambiguity in measurement of the success of science communications is also due to a general lack of consensus or understanding in what exactly science research is supposed to accomplish. NASA says one of its primary goals is "to inspire". To me, this is like saying Michael Jordan's primary objective was to sell shoes--a valuable byproduct, no doubt, but a derivative outcome of what was really trying to be accomplished at the core, namely to win basketball games. As another example, much of the success in science communications I noted earlier is tied to entertainment. But should entertainment really be a primary desired outcome of science research? I don't think we monitor the skies for intelligent radio transmissions or search for life in the soil of Mars primarily so that Hollywood can make more realistic movies for public consumption. I believe that in the Federal research area, the objective of spending public money is to perform research that generates positive social, educational, economic, and quality-of-life outcomes in our society. The generation and communication of new knowledge should make our Universities the strongest centers of learning in the world, our economy among the most competitive, our living standards ever-increasing, and should allow us to achieve these objectives in a socially, ethically, and ecologically responsible way. How we go about this business is a matter of debate and the subject of public policy. AM: And how does this influence policy, particularly space policy? JH: Time will tell. I think we're all awaiting a clear picture of exactly what the Administration's plans are for NASA after Columbia, through the Shuttle/Station era and beyond. Read the full article at http://www.astrobio.net/news/article793.html. __________________________________________________________________________ INTERSTELLAR ESPIONAGE: WHILE WE'RE WATCHING MARS, COULD SOMEONE BE WATCHING US? By Seth Shostak From Space.com 22 January 2004 Have aliens sent mechanical emissaries to our solar system--robotic probes on a snoopy mission to reconnoiter Earth? It's certainly an intriguing idea: sophisticated spy satellites from light-years away monitoring our planet, watching the slow evolution of life, and reporting back to their alien masters. Such a scenario has frequently appeared in the SETI literature, and Allen Tough, at the University of Toronto, has urged that we take the idea seriously enough to make a search for these alien "bugs." You might question whether interstellar spying makes sense. After all, there are several hundred billion star systems in the Galaxy, spread across a disk 100,000 light-years in diameter. Sending billions of probes over such daunting distances sounds like a project that no alien congress would ever approve. But the idea can't be dismissed that easily. Advanced societies--even those that are only modestly beyond our own--will have catalogs of planets known to support life. This inventory can be assembled by using large telescopes to collect and analyze the light reflected from the atmospheres of other worlds; looking for "biomarkers" such as oxygen and methane. Finding these gases on someone else's planet would be a clue that biology is present. Surprising as it may seem, microbes can be detected at light-years' distance using this technique. Read the full article at http://www.space.com/searchforlife/seti_alien_shostak_040122.html. __________________________________________________________________________ INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE ON HOLD NASA release 04-029 22 January 2004 NASA's plan to establish an International Space Station Research Institute (ISSRI) has been postponed. A draft Statement of Work was released in September 5, 2003, and a draft Request for Proposal was scheduled for release in winter 2004. The decision was made following the President's January 14 announcement of a new vision for NASA's space exploration program. A feature of the new plan is a re-focused research effort on the International Space Station to better understand and overcome the effects of human space flight on astronaut health, increasing the safety of future space missions. NASA will implement, as its priority for the International Space Station, research that specifically enables this human exploration vision. "Given a highly focused research agenda for the Station, NASA has reassessed its plan for an International Space Station Research Institute, and determined that the scope of and need for an ISSRI needs to be reevaluated," said Mary Kicza, NASA's Associate Administrator, Office of Biological and Physical Research. NASA will delay the procurement of the ISSRI for at least one year while the agency reconsiders establishing a new institute and potentially updating its plan. The agency may also choose to terminate the ISSRI procurement efforts. NASA had planned to contract a non-government organization to establish an institute to manage Space Station research. The objective of the planned institute was to promote research planning, coordination, and advocacy for maximum use of the Station by U.S. science, technology and commercial communities. "This delay will give us the opportunity to determine the best approach to achieving the more focused research agenda for the Space Station, and to decide the extent to which it makes sense to procure an International Space Station Research Institute to further that agenda," Kicza said. For information about space research, visit http://spaceresearch.nasa.gov/. Contact: Dolores Beasley NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1753 An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.space.com/news/iss_institute_040122.html. __________________________________________________________________________ DESTINATION: MERIDIANI PLANUM By Karen Miller From NASA Science News 22 January 2004 On January 24, at about 9:05 PM Pacific Standard Time, NASA's second rover is scheduled to arrive on Mars. Opportunity will land near the equator, on a plain known as Meridiani Planum. It'll be halfway around the planet from Gusev Crater, where its twin, Spirit, is already feeding eager scientists as much data as it can transmit. Meridiani Planum interests scientists because it contains an ancient layer of hematite, an iron oxide that, on Earth, almost always forms in an environment containing liquid water. The site appears dry now. So how did the hematite get there? Was there once water in the area? If so, where did it go? "There are five or six hypotheses to explain the hematite on Mars, but none of them are a slam-dunk," says NASA's Mars Landing Site Science Coordinator John Grant. "We have to go there to find out which is correct." It's possible, for example, that the hematite was produced directly from iron-rich lavas, a process that would not require liquid water. But if water was involved--and that's considered most probable--then, most likely, the hematite either formed from the iron-rich waters of an ancient lake, or it formed when martian groundwater percolated though layers of volcanic ash. Opportunity's suite of spectrometers, cameras, microscopes, and sampling tools should allow scientists to figure out where the hematite came from. For instance, if a mineral called goethite is found among the hematite, that would mean that the hematite formed in watery conditions. On the other hand, if magnetite is found and goethite is not, a watery past is unlikely. Just being able to look at the way the hematite is distributed will provide some answers. If the hematite occurs as a thin layer within a pile of layers, then it's likely to have formed in a long-ago lake, says Grant. If, on the other hand, it occurs in more discrete veins, deposited between cracks in rocks, "then it's much more likely to have been associated with groundwater." If you look in the Earth, he says, in places where the groundwater percolates through the subsurface, "you see evidence for life all over the place." This mission, Grant emphasizes, is not seeking evidence of martian life. It's looking for environments that were favorable for life, and in which evidence of life may have been preserved. Knowing how the hematite formed will help determine if Meridiani Planum is that kind of environment. Meridiani Planum is unique on Mars because there's so much exposed hematite there, according to data gathered by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. "Localized deposits also exist in two other sites: the deep canyon Valles Marinaris and a place called called Aram Chaos," notes Grant, "but neither are accessible based on the current landing system." Meridiani Planum has more hematite and it's a safer place to land. Meridiani Planum is also attractive because the site appears to be eroding, with once-buried craters that are now half-revealed. Opportunity might be able to inspect layers of ground that would otherwise be hidden, affording a glimpse into the area's distant past. "There's so much we don't know about Mars," says Grant. "But I really think we're going to come out of this mission with a better understanding of what Mars has been like over time, and where we might go for our next step." Visit http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov for the latest information about Spirit and Opportunity. Read the original article at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2004/22jan_meridianiplanum.htm. __________________________________________________________________________ BUSH SPEECH OPENS DOOR, THE FUTURE IS UP TO US Statement of the Steering Committee of the Mars Society 23 January 2004 On January 23, 2004, the following statement concerning the new Bush space policy was ratified by the Steering Committee of the Mars Society. The vote was 19 in favor, 3 abstentions, none opposed, and 5 not voting. On January 14, President George Bush gave a speech at NASA headquarters outlining a new strategic orientation for the American space agency. While some of the initial ideas for implementing the new space policy can and should be substantially improved upon, the policy overall clearly represents a significant and long-overdue step in the right direction for the American space program. The Steering Committee of the Mars Society therefore welcomes the new policy as presented in Presidential Directive entitled "A Renewed Spirit of Discovery," and strongly urges Congress to provide the funds requested for the initial steps requested for the program over the next fiscal year. Our analysis of the important strengths and required areas for improvement of the new policy is presented below. Analysis As stated, the new Bush space policy offers both opportunities and pitfalls to those interested in furthering human exploration and expansion into space in general, and Mars in particular. While not representing the start of an actual Moon/Mars program, since nearly all serious spending for hardware systems other than the crew capsule is deferred to administrations coming into office in 2009 or beyond, it does in fact clear the ground for the initiation of such a program should the 2009 administration be so inclined. It also provides a certain amount of free energy that, if handled properly in the 2004-2008 period, could be used to help insure the emergence of a powerful human exploration initiative within the time frame of the 2009 administration. In his speech, Bush redefined the purpose of the American space program as the "establishment of a human presence throughout the solar system." This statement may seem to some like a mere rhetorical flourish, but it actually has important concrete programmatic significance, as it legitimizes NASA spending supporting technology development for human exploration of the Moon and Mars. Such spending was forbidden under the previous order of things, and for the past ten years technologists seeking funding for important human Moon/Mars exploration technologies had to justify them by arguing their value for other established programs, such as the JPL-led robotic exploration program or the ISS. This has made it impossible to obtain adequate funding for many technologies, such as planetary in situ resource utilization (ISRU), and has led to disasters such as the promising JSC-led Transhab inflatable habitation program, which was derailed when the discovery that planetary exploration technology work was being done under ISS cover led to cancellation by congressional staff. It is for this reason that the Mars Society has had since its Founding Convention in 1998 campaigned for the establishment of a NASA line item for the support of human exploration technology development, so that such activity could take place openly. Bush's initiative fully accomplishes this objective, with healthy initial program funding. For this reason, if no other, Bush's move must be seen as an extremely positive development. The new policy will also create a program organization at NASA headquarters, called Code T, which will significantly raise the level of NASA efforts to develop efficient plans for human planetary exploration. This is also a welcome development. In addition, the Bush policy also provides a basis for including human exploration research requirements within the design of robotic planetary missions. In the late nineties, representatives of the human exploration missions office at JSC attempted to utilize flight opportunities aboard the JPL-led robotic Mars exploration landers, but as the JSC researchers had neither a mandate nor money, they had neither force nor funds to back up their requests, and were dealt with accordingly. Under the new space policy, both a mandate and funds should be available to support human exploration related research and technology flight experiments aboard robotic lunar and planetary spacecraft. This could allow such payloads to either fly as paying customers aboard the JPL/Code S sponsored science spacecraft, or alternatively, support the funding of human exploration program-controlled robotic landers whose primary mission would be to provide engineering data for the human exploration program, with other science payloads carried on a space-available basis. The Bush policy also identifies where the funds required to support a true human exploration initiative will come from, to wit the redirection of the existing Space Shuttle and ISS budgets. Currently, the Shuttle budget runs about $4 billion per year, while the ISS budget is between one and two billion. This total of $5-$6 billion per year is more than sufficient to get humans to both the Moon and Mars within ten years of actual program start. Thus the initiative can be done within the existing NASA budget of about $16 billion per year in 2004 dollars, a level found supportable by presidents and congressional majorities of both political parties for the past four presidential terms. Thus the financial basis for the program is clear, and is not a budget buster or in any way fantastical. In his speech, the President invited all nations to join with the United States in pursuing the proposed program. We welcome this statement, as we fully agree that the exploration and settlement of the solar system is a great goal that can help bring humanity together, one that is worthy of, and requires, the mobilization of the best talents of all the peoples of the Earth. For various political and diplomatic reasons, the Bush policy delays the phase out of the Shuttle and ISS until 2010, thereby delaying substantial human exploration program start until about that time. Thus the choice on whether or not to really start a Moon or Mars human exploration program, and what its pace or objectives should be, is effectively being placed in the hands of the 2009 administration. The merit of this decision is debatable. A key point however, is that the 2009 administration will have a choice. By making clear that the fundamental purpose of the human spaceflight program is to allow humans to fly across space (the Apollo era vision) to explore other worlds, rather than to allow humans to experience space (the Shuttle era vision), the Bush policy (should it be sustained by either his reelection or the concurrence on this issue of an alternative 2005 administration) effectively precludes the commitment of NASA to a second generation Shuttle ("Shuttle 2") as its next major program. As recently as a few months ago, substantial factions within space policy circles in both congress and NASA projected such a Shuttle 2 program as the agency's next major project after ISS. Had that occurred the future would have looked like this: the present decade would be consumed with returning the Shuttle to flight and building ISS. The next decade would be devoted to extending the life of Shuttle and developing Shuttle 2. The 2020's would then be a repeat of the 1980's, attempting to make Shuttle 2 operational, leading to a decision in 2030 on the next major project, which probably would have been ISS-2. Thankfully, this "Groundhog Day" scenario for perpetual stagnation in space has now been foreclosed on. The decision to punt the responsibility for implementation, and thus the control, of the program to the 2009 administration promises to make the next five years an extremely interesting time for space advocates. In his speech, Mr. Bush defined human expansion into the solar system as NASA's goal, and posed the idea of a lunar base initiated by 2020 as the strategy by which this objective might be approached. That is one plan, but the next five years will see other plans put forward for consideration by the political class as efficient means by which the desired overall goal can be achieved with maximum speed, reliability, and at minimum cost. The great debate on what our strategy for reaching the Moon and the planets should be has thus not been closed by Bush's speech, but opened. The victory in this healthy battle of ideas will go to those people who convince the players, not merely of today, but of 2009 and beyond, of the merit of their concepts. The Mars Society welcomes this challenge, and will seek to actively participate in this discussion to contribute its technical expertise and to convey an understanding to the political class, the technical community, the press, and the public that within the context of the new space policy, that the near-term human exploration of Mars is feasible, affordable, and truly worthy of the efforts and risks required. In transitioning from one kind of space program to another, every effort should be made to prevent unnecessary collateral damage to valuable parts of the old program. The decision announced by NASA headquarters late last week to abandon the planned Shuttle mission to upgrade and reboost the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is an example of the kind of mistake that needs to be avoided. The Cosmic Origins Spectrograph and Widefield Camera 3 designed to bring the HST to its full potential have already been built and tested, and promise an enormous scientific return upon delivery to orbit. If the Bush plan were to stand down the Shuttle immediately, and save the $24 billion required to operate it through 2010 so as to initiate the Moon/Mars program with substantial funding immediately, that would be one thing. But given the decision to return the Shuttle to flight, canceling the Hubble upgrade would only save about $200 million, or 1% of the Shuttle program's budget, while destroying about 90% of its scientific value. This is extremely foolish. Safety arguments won't wash either; if the Shuttle is safe enough to fly to the ISS, its safe enough to perform its mission to Hubble. Indeed, while Shuttle missions to the Hubble may lack the on-orbit safe-haven of the ISS, the low-inclination of Hubble flights enables launch aborts to warm tropical waters, where crew survival chances are much better than in the frigid north Atlantic abort sites required by ISS launches. Moreover, it is difficult to understand how an agency which is too risk adverse to undertake a Shuttle mission to Hubble could possibly be serious in considering a mission to the Moon or Mars. The cancellation of the Hubble mission can thus only be described as a serious mistake, apparently committed in the name of the desire to appear "decisive" in breaking from the old paradigm in favor of the new. In addition to the harm done to astronomy, it would be a very bad thing for the infant new space policy to begin its life with a such a distasteful record. Under no circumstances should the alleged impending availability of the James Webb Space Telescope be accepted as a rationale for abandoning Hubble, either. That would be to repeat the mistake NASA made in abandoning the Saturn V for the supposedly superior Shuttle, or Skylab for the ISS--errors which set back the space program by decades of time of tens of billions of dollars. If NASA's leadership will not see reason on this issue, Congress should take forceful action to reverse this very bad decision. Technological issues The right way to do a program whose objectives encompass both a permanent lunar base and the human exploration of Mars is to design a set of transportation hardware that can accomplish human Mars missions, a modified modular subset of which can be used to support lunar activities. Approaching the problem in this way can save a great deal of time and money, as only one hardware set needs to be developed instead of two. It also maximizes the value of the Moon as a testing ground for Mars, since under this approach to Moon missions will be done using the Mars hardware, and serve directly to shake it out. Provided this is the approach adopted, a program initiated in 2009 could easily achieve piloted lunar landing by 2015 and launch the first human Mars expedition by 2018. The build up of a permanent lunar base and continued Mars missions could then occur simultaneously. Since it is only possible to launch to Mars every other year in any case, the implications of a running concurrent programs are simply that the lunar program launch rate would be reduced somewhat during Mars launch years. Concurrent launch programs would also serve to minimize launch costs by maximizing the rate of production of the booster production lines, as the cost of running a launch vehicle manufacturing facility increases only marginally with a higher production rate. To use a mundane analogy, it takes very little extra labor to cook two steaks instead of one, provided you cook them both at the same time. In the production of launch vehicles this kitchen parable holds even more force, as labor costs overwhelmingly dominate those of materials. Within the context of such a well-planned Moon/Mars program, there are certain technologies that are essential. We address only two of the most critical, heavy lift boosters and ISRU. Heavy lift boosters The key technical instrumentality required to make lunar bases and Mars missions feasible is a heavy lift vehicle with a hydrogen/oxygen upper stage capable of throwing payloads in the 50-tonne class on trans-lunar or trans-Mars injection. This is the capability demonstrated during the 1960's by the Saturn V. Once such a vehicle is available, roundtrip Lunar missions or one-way delivery of habitations and other heavy payloads to the lunar surface can be readily accomplished with a single launch. Piloted Mars missions can also be accomplished using multiple discrete trans-Mars launches of such a system, with no on-orbit assembly, as shown by the Mars Direct plan (Zubrin and Baker, 1990), the Stanford Mission plan (Lusignian, et al 1992), or the JSC Design Reference Mission 3 (Weaver et al, 1994). Such Saturn V class launch systems can be readily created at this point either by converting the Shuttle launch stack through elimination of the orbiter and its replacement with a O2/H2 upper stage, or the creation of new, all-liquid propulsion booster systems. The Mars Society was recently shown plans by one major aerospace company for evolving its existing line of medium lift boosters to create a family of modular heavy lift boosters with payloads ranging through quarter, half, and full Saturn V capabilities. Based on this company's experience with previous successful launch vehicle developments, the entire development program to create the whole family of boosters could be accomplished in five years with a development cost of about $4 billion. The recurring launch cost for the Saturn V class system design was $300 million per launch, or less than $1000/lb for payload delivery to LEO. The methods of creating such booster families are obvious to experienced launch vehicle engineers, and we have no doubt that this company's competitors have plans for creating similar hardware sets with comparable development costs and schedules. The claims by certain pundits opposed to any exploration initiative that a new heavy lift booster would cost tens of billions to develop can thus readily be shown to have no basis in fact. Such heavy lift vehicles would also have many applications outside of the human exploration program. ISRU Both lunar bases and Mars expeditions are strongly benefited through the use of in situ resource utilization (ISRU) techniques for the production of return propellant, human consumables, and vehicle fuels and oxygen for use in extended missions on a planetary surface. The mission mass savings for either lunar bases or Mars missions resulting from ISRU has been demonstrated in numerous studies, and significantly exceeds that offered by advanced propulsion concepts with much higher development and recurring system costs. Effective ISRU require both chemical processing systems and reliable sources of power, for which space nuclear systems offer the greatest promise. We therefore strongly commend the administration for its Prometheus project to create such space nuclear systems. However we note that up until now, the sole applications considered by NASA for its space nuclear power systems have been spacecraft power and nuclear electric propulsion (NEP). Without dismissing the important value of NEP for outer solar system robotic missions and other missions involving large velocity changes undertaken across extended time frames, we note that the size of NEP units required to supply propulsion for human exploration missions are on the order of 10,000 kilowatts. In contrast, when used to produce chemical propellants on planetary surfaces, the required reactor size to support human exploration is reduced to about 100 kilowatts. This is because a much smaller reactor stationed on a planetary surface making propellant can emit energy over a long period of time prior to flight, store it as chemical propellant, which then can release the energy as fast as it is needed under flight conditions. The mission mass leverages achieved by such ISRU supported chemical propulsion options are greater than those offered by NEP, while for inner solar system missions, the flight times are less (two orders of magnitude less for lunar applications). In addition, the ISRU-supported chemical systems can be used not only for orbital transfer, but for planetary ascent. Thus while space nuclear power is enabling for ISRU, it is ISRU that greatly reduces the cost, and increases the value of space nuclear power in supporting human exploration. The two technologies should thus be pursued in parallel, and an appropriate fraction of the Prometheus budget applied towards bringing ISRU applications of space nuclear power to flight status, and to support robotic missions demonstrating such technology on the Moon and Mars. Furthermore, requirements should be written into the Prometheus program to insure that the power systems developed are compatible for operation on the surface of the Moon and Mars, since their use on the planetary surface to produce propellants and consumables represents by far the most advantageous method of employing them to support near-term human space exploration, and their power is needed on the surface to support base operations in any case. Both ISRU technology and heavy lift booster development should thus be central priorities of the Code T effort over the immediate period. Other systems should be developed with similar concern for maximum commonality of hardware and technology across lunar and Mars mission applications. Political implications The train of events set in motion by the new space policy will create a decision point circa 2009 that will offer three alternatives for future action. 1) The 2009 administration could choose to abort the Moon/Mars program altogether, and simply use the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) as a capsule launched atop expendables as a way of continuing to visit the ISS. This would lead to a Mir-type extended ISS program, conducted at lower cost than possible using Shuttle launches, but with no discernable purpose. This would result in stagnation in space for however long such a programmatic decision prevailed, and probable retrogression on heavy lift, ISRU, and other programs necessary for human exploration. 2) The 2009 administration could decide to proceed in accordance with idea of building a lunar base, starting 2020, without concern for the Mars mission except to make claims that lunar experience will no doubt be useful later when others contemplate going to Mars. This would result in the development of mostly incompatible lunar program hardware (except the booster), making it necessary to start developing an entire new hardware set circa 2030, or possibly 2040, given the budgetary entanglements such a stand-alone lunar program would create, making it likely that the first Mars landing would not occur before the middle of the 21st Century. Alternatively, given the limited interest provided by repeated dead-end lunar expeditions, the program could simply expire. 3) The 2009 administration could decide to launch a humans to Mars program, with the objective of reaching Mars within ten years, with expeditions to the Moon using a modified subset of the Mars flight hardware beginning around program year 7. Because only one hardware set would need to be developed instead of two, and because in aerospace cost equals people times time, this represents a much lower cost approach to achieving the goals set forth in the new space policy than alternative #2. Moreover, it is the only approach that will result in human explorers walking on Mars within the working lifetime of any adult today. It is therefore imperative that everyone who wishes to see the human exploration of Mars become a reality do everything he or she can to fight for the bold course represented by option #3. In the labs and engineering organizations, in the press, in the classroom and the committee room, in the Arctic and in the desert, in the halls of congress, and in every venue of public opinion ranging from books and technical papers to internet newsgroups and late night talk radio, each will need to play their part. A door has been opened, and a battle of ideas that will determine the shape of the human future for many years to come has now been truly joined. Where it will lead is up to us. Contending visions that two weeks ago were mere hypothetical debates among space activists have now entered the center of political discourse. We welcome the challenge. For as reason is our witness and courage is our guide, we shall prevail. For further information about the Mars Society, visit our web site at www.marssociety.org. __________________________________________________________________________ NEW ADDITIONS TO THE ASTROBIOLOGY INDEX By David J. Thomas http://www.lyon.edu/projects/marsbugs/astrobiology/ 26 January 2004 Astrobiology and planetary engineering articles http://www.lyon.edu/projects/marsbugs/astrobiology/online_articles1.html Agence France-Presse, 2004. Life on Mars? A timeline of the debate. SpaceDaily. Astrobiology Magazine, 2004. State of the Union: science addressing the virtual paradise? Astrobiology Magazine. National Research Council, 2003. New Frontiers in Solar System Exploration. National Academies Press, Washington, DC. Human space exploration articles http://www.lyon.edu/projects/marsbugs/astrobiology/online_articles3.html R. R. Britt, 2004. Surviving space: risks to humans on the Moon and Mars. Space.com. K. Miller, 2004. Mars mice. NASA Science News. K. Miller, 2004. Of Mars, mice and men: space rodents to test effects of low gravity. Space.com. SETI articles http://www.lyon.edu/projects/marsbugs/astrobiology/online_articles4.html S. Shostak, 2004. Interstellar espionage: while we're watching Mars, could someone be watching us? Space.com. __________________________________________________________________________ GROUND CONTROL INITIATES RADIO SILENCE TO TEMPT BEAGLE 2 FROM ITS HIDING PLACE Beagle 2 Team release 12 January 2004 Professor Colin Pillinger, Beagle 2 Lead Scientist, was present at ESOC when the data came through and although the news was disappointing, Professor Pillinger was encouraged by the continued support and determination of the team at ESA's mission control center to continue the search. The next phase will be to initiate a period of radio silence where no communication attempts will be made with Beagle 2 until the 22nd January. Adopting this approach will force Beagle 2 into communication search mode 2 [CSM2] where the probe will automatically transmit a signal throughout the martian day [power is still conserved during the night]. The results from future communication attempts will be posted on the Beagle 2 and PPARC web sites. __________________________________________________________________________ NEXT ATTEMPTS TO CONTACT BEAGLE 2 PLANNED FOR 24TH AND 25TH JANUARY Beagle 2 Team release 20 January 2004 The Team has made the following announcement regarding the strategy for communication with Beagle 2 over the next 5 days. "On 12 January we started a period when no attempts were made to contact Beagle 2. Maintaining radio silence for a period of ten days is intended to force Beagle 2 into a communication mode that should ensure that the transmitter is switched on for the majority of the daytime on Mars and thus will improve the chance of Mars Express making contact." "During this ten-day period, Mars Express has listened for Beagle 2 but only for very short periods when Beagle 2 may not be switched on. The ten-day radio silence period ends on 22 January, just before a fly-over by Mars Express, but the strategy of the team is not to hail the lander immediately. Rather we are erring on the side of caution as we cannot confidently predict the precise ending of the ten-day slot. This is because the absolute accuracy of the timer on Beagle 2 could have been affected by the temperature on Mars, making the clock run slightly faster or slower than predicted. We have therefore chosen a pair of opportunities when Mars Express flies over the Beagle 2 landing site, the nights of 24 and 25 January. These two flights cover the widest possible area where Beagle 2 should be, giving us the best chance of calling the lander and getting a response from the continuous transmission. There are several other chances of just listening for Beagle 2 without calling it." "The data will be analyzed, this can take many hours, and we intend to present a complete picture of this series of attempts to contact the lander on 26 January, early afternoon. We will, at that time, outline any future communications strategy." The results from future communication attempts will be posted on the Beagle 2 and PPARC web sites. An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.universetoday.com/am/publish/beagle_2_next_steps.html. __________________________________________________________________________ DISAPPOINTMENT IN BEAGLE 2 SEARCH Beagle 2 Team release 26 January 2004 At a press briefing in London this afternoon, members of the Beagle 2 team described the latest efforts to contact their missing lander. "We haven't found Beagle 2, despite three days of intensive searching," said Professor Colin Pillinger, lead scientist for Beagle 2. "Under those circumstances, we have to begin to accept that, if Beagle 2 is on the martian surface, it is not active. "That isn't to say that we are going to give up on Beagle. There is one more thing that we can do--however, it is very much a last resort. We will be asking the American Odyssey spacecraft (team) tomorrow whether they will send an embedded command--a hail to Beagle with a command inside it. If it gets through, it will tell Beagle to switch off and reload the software. We are now working on the basis that there is a corrupt system and the only way we might resurrect is to send that command." "We can also ask Mars Express to send that command. However, they cannot send it probably until the 2 or 3 February," he added. "We'll move with the next phase in the search for Beagle 2," said Professor Pillinger. "We have discussed on our side of the house what we intend to do in the future. We are dedicated to trying to re-fly Beagle 2 in some shape or form, therefore we need to know how far it got because we need know which parts of this mission we don't have to study in further detail." Detailing the efforts to contact Beagle 2 in recent days, Mark Sims, Beagle 2 Mission Manager from the University of Leicester, explained that the lander should have entered an emergency communication mode known as CSM2 no later than 22 January. In this mode, the spacecraft's receiver is switched on throughout daylight hours on Mars. The only possible explanation that no communication has been established during the last few days is that the lander's battery is in a low state of charge. Meanwhile, the academia-industry "Tiger Team" at the National Space Centre in Leicester is beginning to concentrate on detailed analysis of the possible causes for failure of the mission and the lessons that can be learned for future missions. The analysis of the mission now under way includes an assessment of the landing site ellipse from orbital images, reanalysis of atmospheric conditions during the entry into the martian atmosphere on 25 December, examination of the separation from Mars Express and of the cruise phase preceding arrival at Mars. One extremely useful piece of evidence could be provided by an image of the lander. The team is hoping that the High Resolution Stereo Camera on Mars Express or the camera on board Mars Global Surveyor may eventually be able to capture an image that reveals its location on the martian surface. __________________________________________________________________________ CASSINI SIGNIFICANT EVENTS NASA/JPL release 15-21 January 2004 The most recent spacecraft telemetry was acquired from the Goldstone tracking station on Tuesday, January 20. The Cassini spacecraft is in an excellent state of health and is operating normally. Information on the present position and speed of the Cassini spacecraft may be found on the "Present Position" web page located at http://jpl.convio.net/site/R?i=Vk6086qE3Z9O-3BCLCXxIg. The first Approach Science sequence, C42, continued this week with successful uplink and execution of a flight software check-out of the Cosmic Dust Analyzer flight software version 9.2. A real-time command was sent to re-synchronize the Cassini Plasma Spectrometer instrument, and the Ion and Neutral Mass Spectrometer instrument executed a baseline instrument checkout activity. A major milestone in the completion of the Cassini Science Operations Plan has been achieved this week, with the Target Working Teams (TWTs) and Orbiter Science Teams (OSTs) completing integration of the entire four- year tour of the Saturn system. This effort integrated and resolved conflicts for all the requested science and engineering activities, defined and integrated the detailed observation types or observing campaigns, and developed cooperative/synergistic observation sets and observing campaigns, including the durations, data volume estimates, and pointing requirements of all those activities. Kudos to all the science and flight team members that supported these integration teams over the two and a half year span of this activity. Special thanks were extended from the Science Planning Team Lead to the leads and co-leads of the Saturn, Magnetosphere, Rings, Cross-Discipline TWTs, the Titan Orbiter Science Team (TOST), and the Satellite Orbiter Science Team (SOST). The Spacecraft Operations Office (SCO) completed an initial run of the Probe Relay demo activities in the Integrated Test Laboratory (ITL) this week. This test-run walked through preliminary versions of files and procedures for the Probe Relay flight demo, "uplinking" those files to the ITL spacecraft simulator as they are planned in flight. Another test run is planned in the coming weeks, as the team continues to prepare and practice for the Probe Relay flight demo coming up in March. The C44 Science Planning Team activity concluded this week, making an early delivery of the plan for the C44 Approach Science sequence to the C44 Sequence Team. The Sequence Team kicked off their Science and Sequence Update Process (SSUP) activity for C44, which will produce the third and final Approach Science sequence. A Cassini Design Team meeting was held to discuss the impact of proposed changes to the SCO Inertial Vector Propagator (IVP) tool. The change to the IVP tool would potentially provide better target position modeling for pointing the Cassini S/C in tour. The meeting reviewed potential impacts of the change to IVP tool on the upcoming Mission Sequence Subsystem (MSS) D10.2 delivery, which was baselined to include the upcoming IVP tool delivery. The Instrument Operations Working Group met to review the baseline design of the Automated Sequence Processor (ASP). The ASP is planned to significantly benefit the instrument teams, allowing them access to an expedited process for building, delivering, and uplinking non-interactive files directly to their instruments. The ASP capability will be delivered as part of MSS D10.2. Delivery coordination meetings were held for the Cassini Information Management System (CIMS) 3.0.1 and RADAR Build 3 ground software sets, and both were accepted for operational use. The CIMS patch delivery was made to better implement a Spacecraft Activity Sequence File parsing capability. The RADAR Build 3 delivery included builds of both the RADAR Mapping Sequencing Software, a subsystem that builds RADAR Instrument Expanded Blocks (IEBs), and the Radar Analysis Software, the downlink analysis software subsystem. Two additional builds of the RADAR software are planned (April '04 and October '04). The Uplink Operations team received final review comments for their upcoming SSUP Ops Plan update. The SSUP Ops Plan defines the ten week sequencing process, which is used to build, uplink, and execute the activities laid out in the science planning processes that precede the SSUP. Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, CA, manages the Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. __________________________________________________________________________ LAST TWO WEEKS TO MAKE A "DEEP IMPACT" ON A COMET NASA release 04-028 20 January 2004 T-minus two weeks and counting till NASA closes their passenger list for a one-way trip to comet Tempel 1. On January 31 NASA's Deep Impact mission will end its campaign to launch the names of space enthusiasts who want to make a deep impact on a comet. On July 4, 2005, the Deep Impact spacecraft will impact a copper projectile about the size of a garbage can into the surface of a frozen ball of ice and rock, comet Temple 1, creating a crater about the size of a football stadium. A CD containing the names of those who signed on board for this one- way trip to a celestial snowball will be literally obliterated along with the 370-kilogram (816 pound) copper-tipped impactor. When the impactor reaches out and touches Temple 1 at about 37,000 kilometers (22,990 miles) per hour, Deep Impact's flyby spacecraft will collect pictures and data. The flyby spacecraft will send its data back to Earth in near real time through the antennas of the Deep Space Network. Simultaneously, professional and amateur astronomers on Earth will observe the ejecta flying from the comet's newly formed crater adding to the data and images collected by the Deep Impact spacecraft and other space telescopes. "This is an opportunity to become part of an extraordinary space mission," said Dr. Don Yeomans, an astronomer at JPL and a member of the Deep Impact science team. "When the craft is launched in December 2004, yours and the names of your loved- ones can hitch along for the ride and be part of what may be the best space fireworks show in history." Deep Impact is the first deep-space mission that will really reach out and touch a comet. Mission scientists are confident such an intimate glimpse beneath the surface of a comet, where material and debris from the formation of the solar system remain relatively unchanged, will answer basic questions about the formation of the solar system as well as getting a better look at the nature and composition of these celestial wanderers. "This campaign will allow people from around the world to become directly involved with the Deep Impact mission and through that, get them thinking about the scientific reasons for the mission," said University of Maryland astronomy professor, Dr. Michael A'Hearn, Deep Impact's principal investigator. "We particularly hope to capture the interest of young students, as they will become the explorers of the next generation." People may submit their names for this historic one-way mission by visiting NASA's Deep Impact Web site through January 31 at http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/. The University of Maryland in College Park is home to A'Hearn, who oversees the scientific investigations. Project manager, Rick Grammier, from JPL, manages and operates the Deep Impact mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington. JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corporation in Boulder, CO, manages the spacecraft development. Deep Impact was selected in 1999 as a NASA Discovery mission. The goal of the Discovery Program is to launch smaller, low cost capped missions studying new science questions. The main objective is to enhance understanding of the solar system by exploring the planets, their moons, and small bodies, such as comets and asteroids. Information about the Deep Impact mission is available on the Internet at http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/ or http://deepimpact.umd.edu. Contacts: Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1727 D.C. Agle Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-393-9011 Lee Tune University of Maryland, College Park, MD Phone: 301-405-4679 __________________________________________________________________________ SPIRIT DRIVES TO A ROCK CALLED "ADIRONDACK" FOR CLOSE INSPECTION NASA/JPL release 2004-024 19 January 2004 NASA's Spirit rover has successfully driven to its first target on Mars, a football-sized rock that scientists have dubbed Adirondack. The Mars Exploration Rover flight team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., plans to send commands to Spirit early Tuesday to examine Adirondack with a microscope and two instruments that reveal the composition of rocks, said JPL's Dr. Mark Adler, Spirit mission manager. The instruments are the Mössbauer spectrometer and the alpha particle X- ray spectrometer. Spirit successfully rolled off the lander and onto the martian surface last Thursday. To make the drive to Adirondack, the rover turned 40 degrees in short arcs totaling 95 centimeters (3.1 feet). It then turned in place to face the target rock and drove four short moves straight forward totaling 1.9 meters (6.2 feet). The moves covered a span of 30 minutes on Sunday, though most of that was sitting still and taking pictures between moves. The total amount of time when Spirit was actually moving was about two minutes. "These are the sorts of baby steps we're taking," said JPL's Dr. Eddie Tunstel, rover mobility engineer. "The drive was designed for two purposes, one of which was to get to the rock," Tunstel said. "From the mobility engineers' standpoint, this drive was geared to testing out how we do drives on this new surface." Gathering new information such as how much the wheels slip in the martian soil will give the team confidence for more ambitious drives in future weeks and months. "Adirondack is now about one foot (30 centimeters) in front of the front wheels," he said. Scientists chose Adirondack to be Spirit's first target rock rather than another rock, called Sashimi, that would have been a shorter, straight- ahead drive. Rocks are time capsules containing evidence of the environmental conditions of the past, said Dr. Dave Des Marais, a rover science-team member from NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA. "We needed to decide which of these time capsules to open." Sashimi appears dustier than Adirondack. The dust layer could obscure good observations of the rock's surface, which may give information about chemical changes and other weathering from environmental conditions affecting the rock since its surface was fresh. Also, Sashimi is more pitted than Adirondack. That makes it a poorer candidate for the rover's rock abrasion tool, which scrapes away a rock's surface for a view of the interior evidence about environmental conditions when the rock first formed. Adirondack has a "nice, flat surface" well suited to trying out the rover's tools on their first martian rock, Des Marais said. "The hypothesis is that this is a volcanic rock, but we'll test that hypothesis," he said. Spirit arrived at Mars January 3 (EST and PST; January 4 Universal Time) after a seven-month journey. In coming weeks and months, according to plans, it will be exploring for clues in rocks and soil to decipher whether the past environment in Gusev Crater was ever watery and possibly suitable to sustain life. Spirit's twin Mars Exploration Rover, Opportunity, will reach Mars on January 25 (EST and Universal Time, 9:05 PM January 24, PST) to begin a similar examination of a site on the opposite side of the planet from Gusev Crater. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.astrobio.net/news/article790.html http://www.space.com/news/mars_ps_040119.html http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/spirit_adirondack_040120.html http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/040120191945.npub5g4j.html http://www.universetoday.com/am/publish/spirit_reaches_out_adirondack.html __________________________________________________________________________ NASA MARS ROVER'S FIRST SOIL ANALYSIS YIELDS SURPRISES NASA/JPL release 2004-025 20 January 2004 The first use of the tools on the arm of NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit reveals puzzles about the soil it examined and raises anticipation about what the tool will find during its studies of a martian rock. Today and overnight tonight, Spirit is using its microscope and two up-close spectrometers on a football-sized rock called Adirondack, said Jennifer Trosper, mission manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. "We're really happy with the way the spacecraft continues to work for us," Trosper said. The large amount of data--nearly 100 megabits--transmitted from Spirit in a single relay session through NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft today "is like getting an upgrade to our Internet connection." Scientists today reported initial impressions from using Spirit's alpha particle X-ray spectrometer, Moessbauer spectrometer and microscopic imager on a patch of soil that was directly in front of the rover after Spirit drove off its lander January 15. "We're starting to put together a picture of what the soil at this particular place in Gusev Crater is like. There are some puzzles and there are surprises," said Dr. Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, principal investigator for the suite of instruments on Spirit and on Spirit's twin, Opportunity. One unexpected finding was the Moessbauer spectrometer's detection of a mineral called olivine, which does not survive weathering well. This spectrometer identifies different types of iron-containing minerals; scientists believe many of the minerals on Mars contain iron. "This soil contains a mixture of minerals, and each mineral has its own distinctive Moessbauer pattern, like a fingerprint," said Dr. Goestar Klingelhoefer of Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany, lead scientist for this instrument. The lack of weathering suggested by the presence of olivine might be evidence that the soil particles are finely ground volcanic material, Squyres said. Another possible explanation is that the soil layer where the measurements were taken is extremely thin, and the olivine is actually in a rock under the soil. Scientists were also surprised by how little the soil was disturbed when Spirit's robotic arm pressed the Moessbauer spectrometer's contact plate directly onto the patch being examined. Microscopic images from before and after that pressing showed almost no change. "I thought it would scrunch down the soil particles," Squyres said. "Nothing collapsed. What is holding these grains together?" Information from another instrument on the arm, an alpha particle X-ray spectrometer, may point to an answer. This instrument "measures X-ray radiation emitted by Mars samples, and from this data we can derive the elemental composition of martian soils and rocks," said Dr. Johannes Brueckner, rover science team member from the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany. The instrument found the most prevalent elements in the soil patch were silicon and iron. It also found significant levels of chlo previous martian landing sites but unlike soil composition on Earth. Squyres said, "There may be sulfates and chlorides binding the little particles together." Those types of salts could be left behind by evaporating water, or could come from volcanic eruptions, he said. The soil may not have even originated anywhere near Spirit's landing site, because Mars has dust storms that redistribute fine particles around the planet. The next target for use of the rover's full set of instruments is a rock, which is more likely to have originated nearby. Spirit landed in the Connecticut-sized Gusev Crater on January 3 (EST and PST; January 4 Universal Time). In coming weeks and months, according to plans, it will examine rocks and soil for clues about whether the past environment there was ever watery and possibly suitable to sustaining life. Spirit's twin Mars Exploration Rover, Opportunity, will reach Mars on January 25 (EST and Universal Time, 9:05 PM, January 24, PST) to begin a similar examination of a site on the opposite side of the planet. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-mers-04zh.html __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-027 21 January 2004 Ground controllers were able to send commands to the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit early Wednesday and received a simple signal acknowledging that the rover heard them, but they did not receive expected scientific and engineering data during scheduled communication passes during the rest of that martian day. Project managers have not yet determined the cause, but similar events occurred several times during the Mars Pathfinder mission. The team is examining a number of different scenarios, some of which would be resolved when the rover wakes up after powering down at the end of the martian day (around midday Pacific time Wednesday). The next opportunity to hear from the vehicle is when the rover may attempt to communicate with the Mars Global Surveyor orbiter at about 8:30 PM Pacific time tonight. A second communication opportunity may occur about two hours later during a relay pass via the Mars Odyssey orbiter. If necessary, the flight team will take additional recovery steps early Thursday morning (the morning of sol 19 on Mars) when the rover wakes up and can communicate directly with Earth. Full details on the rover's status will be described in the next daily news conference Thursday at 9:00 AM Pacific time at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which will be broadcast live on NASA Television. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/01/22/spirit.contact/index.html. __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-028 22 January 2004 Flight-team engineers for NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Mission were encouraged this morning when Spirit sent a simple radio signal acknowledging that the rover had received a transmission from Earth. However, the team is still trying to diagnose the cause of earlier communications difficulties that have prevented any data being returned from Spirit since early Wednesday. "We have a very serious situation," said Pete Theisinger of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, project manager for Spirit and its twin, Opportunity. Spirit did send a radio signal via NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter Wednesday evening, but the transmission did not carry any data. Spirit did not make radio contact with NASA's Mars Odyssey during a scheduled session two hours later or during another one Thursday morning. It also did not respond to the first two attempts Thursday to elicit an acknowledgment signal with direct communications between Earth and the rover, and it did not send a signal at a time pre-set for doing so when its computer recognizes certain communication problems. The successful attempt to get a response signal came shortly before 9:00 AM Pacific Standard Time. No single explanation considered so far fits all of the events observed, Theisinger said. When the team tried to replicate the situation in its testing facility at JPL, the testbed rover did not have any trouble communicating. Two of the possibilities under consideration are a corruption of flight software or corruption of computer memory, either of which could leave Spirit's power supply healthy and allow adequate time for recovering control of the rover. Engineers will continue efforts to understand the situation in preparation for scheduled communication relay sessions using Mars Global Surveyor at 7:10 PM PST and Mars Odyssey at 10:35 PM PST. Efforts to resume direct communications between Spirit and antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network will resume after the rover's expected wake-up at about 3:00 AM PST Friday. Meanwhile, mission leaders decided to skip an optional trajectory correction maneuver today for Opportunity, the other Mars Exploration Rover. Opportunity is on course to land halfway around Mars from Spirit, in a region called Meridiani Planum, on January 25 (Universal Time and EST, January 24 at 9:05 PM PST). JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-mers-04zh.html. __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-29 23 January 2004 NASA's Spirit rover communicated with Earth in a signal detected by NASA's Deep Space Network antenna complex near Madrid, Spain, at 12:34 Universal Time (4:34 AM PST) this morning. The transmissions came during a communication window about 90 minutes after Spirit woke up for the morning on Mars. The signal lasted for 10 minutes at a data rate of 10 bits per second. Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, plan to send commands to Spirit seeking additional data from the spacecraft during the subsequent few hours. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/spirit_talks_040123.html. __________________________________________________________________________ UPDATED MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-30 23 January 2004 The flight team for NASA's Spirit received data from the rover in a communication session that began at 13:26 Universal Time (5:26 AM PST) and lasted 20 minutes at a data rate of 120 bits per second. "The spacecraft sent limited data in a proper response to a ground command, and we're planning for commanding further communication sessions later today," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager Pete Theisinger at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. The flight team at JPL had sent a command to Spirit at 13:02 Universal Time (5:02 PST) via the NASA Deep Space Network antenna complex near Madrid, Spain, telling Spirit to begin transmitting. Meanwhile, the other Mars Exploration Rover, Opportunity, is on course to land halfway around Mars from Spirit, in a region called Meridiani Planum, on January 25 (Universal Time and EST, January 24 at 9:05 PM PST). JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-mers-04zk.html http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/040123205611.u1emdo6c.html __________________________________________________________________________ ROVER TEAM READIES FOR SECOND LANDING WHILE TRYING TO MEND SPIRIT NASA/JPL release 2004-031 23 January 2004 Some members of the flight team for NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers are preparing for this weekend's landing of the second rover, Opportunity, while others are focused on trying to restore the first rover, Spirit, to working order. "We should expect we will not be restoring functionality to Spirit for a significant amount of time--many days, perhaps two weeks--even in the best of circumstances," said Peter Theisinger, rover project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. Spirit transmitted data to Earth today for the first time since early Wednesday. The information about the rover's status arrived during three sessions lasting 10 minutes, 20 minutes and 15 minutes. Engineers will be examining it overnight and developing a plan for obtaining more on Saturday morning. Spirit's flight software is not functioning normally. It appears to have rebooted the rover's computer more than 60 times in the past three days. A motor that moves a mirror for the rover's infrared spectrometer was partway through an operation when the problem arose, so the possibility of a mechanical problem with that hardware will be one theory investigated. "We believe, based on everything we know now, we can sustain the current state of the spacecraft from a health standpoint for an indefinite amount of time," Theisinger said. That will give the team time to work on the problem. Meanwhile, Spirit's twin, Opportunity, will reach Mars at 05:05 Universal Time on January 25 (12:05 AM Sunday EST or 9:05 PM Saturday PST) at a landing site on the opposite side of the planet from Spirit. Opportunity's landing site is on plains called Meridiani Planum within an Oklahoma-sized outcropping of gray hematite, a mineral that usually forms in the presence of water. Scientists plan to use the research instruments on Opportunity to determine whether the gray hematite layer comes from sediments of a long-gone ocean, from volcanic deposits altered by hot water, or from other ancient environmental conditions. Analysis of Spirit's descent through Mars' atmosphere for its landing at Gusev has contributed to a decision by flight controllers to program Opportunity to open its parachute higher than had been planned earlier, said JPL's Dr. Wayne Lee, chief engineer for development of the rover's descent and landing systems. The Mars Orbiter Camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter has taken an image of Spirit's landing region that shows the spacecraft's lander platform on the ground. The jettisoned parachute, backshell and heat shield are also visible, noted Dr. Michael Malin of Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, lead investigator for the orbiter's camera and a member of the rover science team. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPLORATION ROVER MISSION STATUS NASA/JPL release 2004-033 23 January 2004 NASA's Spirit rover did not go to sleep today even after ground controllers sent commands twice for it to do so. Shortly before noon, controllers were surprised to receive a relay of data from Spirit via the Mars Odyssey orbiter. Spirit sent 73 megabits at a rate of 128 kilobits per second. The transmission included power subsystem engineering data, no science data, and several frames of "fill data." Fill data are sets of intentionally random numbers that do not provide information. Spirit had not communicated successfully through Odyssey since the rover's communications difficulties began on Wednesday. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 __________________________________________________________________________ SPIRIT CONDITION UPGRADED AS TWIN ROVER NEARS MARS NASA/JPL release 2004-034 24 January 2004 Hours before NASA's Opportunity rover will reach Mars, engineers have found a way to communicate reliably with its twin, Spirit, and to get Spirit's computer out of a cycle of rebooting many times a day. Spirit's responses to commands sent this morning confirm a theory developed overnight that the problem is related to the rover's two "flash" memories or software controlling those memories. "The rover has been upgraded from critical to serious," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager Peter Theisinger at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. Significant work is still ahead for restoring Spirit, he predicted. Opportunity is on course for landing in the Meridiani Planum region of Mars. The center of an ellipse covering the area where the spacecraft has a 99 percent chance of landing is just 11 kilometers (7 miles) from the target point. That point was selected months ago. Mission managers chose not to use an option for making a final adjustment to the flight path. Previously, the third and fifth out of five scheduled maneuvers were skipped as unnecessary. "We managed to target Opportunity to the desired atmospheric entry point, which will bring us to the target landing site, in only three maneuvers," said JPL's Dr. Louis D'Amario, navigation team chief for the rovers. Opportunity will reach Mars at 05:05 Sunday, Universal Time (12:05 AM Sunday EST or 9:05 PM Saturday PST). From the time Opportunity hits the top of Mars' atmosphere at about 5.4 kilometers per second (12,000 miles per hour) to the time it hits the surface 6 minutes later, then bounces, the rover will be going through the riskiest part of its mission. Based on analysis of Spirit's descent and on weather reports about the atmosphere above Meridiani Planum, mission controllers have decided to program Opportunity to open its parachute slightly earlier than Spirit did. Mars is more than 10 percent farther from Earth than it was when Spirit landed. That means radio signals from Opportunity during its descent and after rolling to a stop have a lower chance of being detected on Earth. About four hours after the landing, news from the spacecraft may arrive by relay from NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter. However, that will depend on Opportunity finishing critical activities, such as opening the lander petals and unfolding the rover's solar panels, before Odyssey flies overhead. Spirit has 256 megabytes of flash memory, a type commonly used on gear such as digital cameras for holding data even when the power is off. Engineers confirmed this morning that Spirit's recent symptoms are related to the flash memory when they commanded the rover to boot up and utilize its random-access memory instead of flash memory. The rover then obeyed commands about communicating and going into sleep mode. Spirit communicated successfully at 120 bits per second for nearly an hour. "We have a vehicle that is stable in power and thermal, and we have a working hypothesis we have confirmed," Theisinger said. By commanding Spirit each morning into a mode that avoids using flash memory, engineers plan to get it to communicate at a higher data rate, to diagnose the root cause of the problem and develop ways to restore as much functioning as possible. The work on restoring Spirit is not expected to slow the steps in getting Opportunity ready to roll off its lander platform if Opportunity lands safely. For Spirit, those steps took 12 days. The rovers' main task is to explore their landing sites for evidence in the rocks and soil about whether the sites' past environments were ever watery and possibly suitable for sustaining life. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.astrobio.net/news/article799.html http://spaceflightnow.com/mars/mera/040124spirit.html __________________________________________________________________________ NASA HEARS FROM OPPORTUNITY ROVER ON MARS NASA/JPL release 2004-035 25 January 2004 NASA's second Mars Exploration Rover successfully sent signals to Earth during its bouncy landing and after it came to rest on one of the three side petals of its four-sided lander. Mission engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, received the first signal from Opportunity on the ground at 9:05 PM Pacific Standard Time Saturday via the NASA Deep Space Network, which was listening with antennas in California and Australia. "We're on Mars, everybody!" JPL's Rob Manning, manager for development of the landing system, announced to the cheering flight team. NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe said at a subsequent press briefing, "This was a tremendous testament to how NASA, when really focused on an objective, can put every ounce of effort, energy, emotion and talent to an important task. This team is the best in the world, no doubt about it." Opportunity landed in a region called Meridiani Planum, halfway around the planet from the Gusev Crater site where its twin rover, Spirit, landed three weeks ago. Earlier today, mission managers reported progress in understanding and dealing with communications and computer problems on Spirit. "In the last 48 hours, we've been on a roller coaster," said Dr. Ed Weiler, NASA associate administrator for space science. "We resurrected one rover and saw the birth of another." JPL's Pete Theisinger, project manager for the rovers, said, "We are two for two. Here we are tonight with Spirit on a path to recovery and with Opportunity on Mars." By initial estimates, Opportunity landed about 24 kilometers (15 miles) down range from the center of the target landing area. That is well within an outcropping of a mineral called gray hematite, which usually forms in the presence of water. "We're going to have a good place to do science," said JPL's Richard Cook, deputy project manager for the rovers. Once it pushed itself upright by opening the petals of the lander, Opportunity was expected to be facing east. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.astrobio.net/news/article800.html http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2004/26jan_opportunity.htm __________________________________________________________________________ FIRST IMAGES OF OPPORTUNITY SITE SHOW BIZARRE LANDSCAPE NASA/JPL release 2004-036 25 January 2004 NASA's Opportunity rover returned the first pictures of its landing site early today, revealing a surreal, dark landscape unlike any ever seen before on Mars. Opportunity relayed the images and other data via NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter. The data showed that the spacecraft is healthy, said Matt Wallace, mission manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "Opportunity has touched down in a bizarre, alien landscape," said Dr. Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, principal investigator for the science instruments on Opportunity and its twin, Spirit. "I'm flabbergasted. I'm astonished. I'm blown away." The terrain is darker than at any previous Mars landing site and has the first accessible bedrock outcropping ever seen on Mars. The outcropping immediately became a candidate target for the rover to visit and examine up close. Wallace noted that the straight-ahead path looks clear for the rover to roll off its lander platform. The rover is facing north- northeast. JPL Administrator Dr. Charles Elachi said, "This team succeeded the old fashioned way. They were excellent, they were determined, and they worked very hard." JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.astrobio.net/news/article801.html http://www.spacedaily.com/2004/040126014456.5jsyiy0c.html http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-mers-04zm.html http://spaceflightnow.com/mars/mera/040125landing.html http://spaceflightnow.com/mars/mera/040125images.html __________________________________________________________________________ OPPORTUNITY SITS IN A SMALL CRATER, NEAR A BIGGER ONE NASA/JPL release 2004-037 25 January 2004 A small impact crater on Mars is the new home for NASA's Opportunity rover, and a larger crater lies nearby. Scientists value such crater locations as a way to see what's beneath the surface without needing to dig. Encouraging developments continued for Opportunity's twin, Spirit, too. Engineers have determined that Spirit's flash memory hardware is functional, strengthening a theory that Spirit's main problem is in software that controls file management of the memory. "I think we've got a patient that's well on the way to recovery," said Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager Pete Theisinger at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. Opportunity returned the first pictures of its landing site early today, about four hours after reaching Mars. The pictures indicate that the spacecraft sits in a shallow crater about 20 meters (66 feet) across. "We have scored a 300-million mile interplanetary hole in one," said Dr. Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., principal investigator for the science instruments on both rovers. NASA selected Opportunity's general landing area within a region called Meridiani Planum because of extensive deposits of a mineral called crystalline hematite, which usually forms in the presence of liquid water. Scientists had hoped for a specific landing site where they could examine both the surface layer that's rich in hematite and an underlying geological feature of light-colored layered rock. The small crater appears to have exposures of both, with soil that could be the hematite unit and an exposed outcropping of the lighter rock layer. "If it got any better, I couldn't stand it," said Dr. Doug Ming, rover science team member from NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston. With the instruments on the rover and just the rocks and soil within the small crater, Opportunity should be allow scientists to determine which of several theories about the region's past environment is right, he said. Those theories include that the hematite may have formed in a long-lasting lake or in a volcanic environment. An even bigger crater, which could provide access to deeper layers for more clues to the past, lies nearby. Images taken by a camera on the bottom of the lander during Opportunity's final descent show a crater about 150 meters (about 500 feet) across likely to be within about one kilometer or half mile of the landing site, said Dr. Andrew Johnson of JPL. He is an engineer for the descent imaging system that calculated the spacecraft's horizontal motion during its final seconds of flight. The system determined that sideways motion was small, so Opportunity's computer decided not to fire the lateral rockets carried specifically for slowing that motion. Squyres presented an outline for Opportunity's potential activities in coming weeks and months. After driving off the lander, the rover will first examine the soil right next to the lander, then drive to the outcrop of layered-looking rocks and spend considerable time examining it. Then the rover may climb out of the small crater, take a look around, and head for the bigger crater. But first, Opportunity will spend more than a week--perhaps two--getting ready to drive off the lander, if all goes well. Engineering data from Opportunity returned in relays via NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter early this morning and at midday indicate the spacecraft is in excellent health, said JPL's Arthur Amador, mission manager. The rover will try its first direct-to-Earth communications this evening. The main task for both rovers in coming months is to explore the areas around their landing sites for evidence in rocks and soils about whether those areas ever had environments that were watery and possibly suitable for sustaining life. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover project for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, DC. Images and additional information about the project are available from JPL at http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov and from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, at http://athena.cornell.edu. Contacts: Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA Phone: 818-354-5011 Donald Savage NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC Phone: 202-358-1547 Additional articles on this subject are available at: http://www.astrobio.net/news/article802.html http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/rover_update_040125.html __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPRESS SEES ITS FIRST WATER--SCIENTIFIC RESULTS ESA release 06-2004 23 January 2004 Mars Express, ESA's first mission to Mars, will reach its final orbit on 28 January. It has already been producing stunning results since its first instrument was switched on, on 5 January. The significance of the first data was emphasized by the scientists at a European press conference today at ESA's Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany. "I did not expect to be able to gather together--just one month after the Mars Orbit Insertion on 25 December--so many happy scientists eager to present their first results", said Professor David Southwood, ESA Director of Science. One of the main targets of the Mars Express mission is to discover the presence of water in one of its chemical states. Through the initial mapping of the south polar cap on 18 January, OMEGA, the combined camera and infrared spectrometer, has already revealed the presence of water ice and carbon dioxide ice. This information was confirmed by the PFS, a new high-resolution spectrometer of unprecedented accuracy. The first PFS data also show that the carbon oxide distribution is different in the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars. The MaRS instrument, a sophisticated radio transmitter and receiver, emitted a first signal successfully on 21 January that was received on Earth through a 70-metre antenna in Australia after it was reflected and scattered from the surface of Mars. This new measurement technique allows the detection of the chemical composition of the Mars atmosphere, ionosphere and surface. ASPERA, a plasma and energetic neutral atoms analyzer, is aiming to answer the fundamental question of whether solar wind erosion led to the present lack of water on Mars. The preliminary results show a difference in the characteristics between the impact of the solar wind area and the measurement made in the tail of Mars. Another exciting experiment was run by the SPICAM instrument (an ultraviolet and infrared spectrometer) during the first star occultation ever made at Mars. It has simultaneously measured the distribution of ozone and water vapor, which has never been done before, revealing that there is more water vapor where there is less ozone. ESA also presented astonishing pictures produced with the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC). They represent the outcome of 1.87 million km2 of martian surface coverage, and about 100 gigabytes of processed data. This camera was also able to make the longest swath (up to 4000 km) and largest area in combination with high resolution ever taken in the exploration of the Solar System. This made it possible to create an impressive picture, 24 meters long by 1.3 meter high, which was carried through the conference room at the end of the press event by a group of 10-year-old children. Mrs. Edelgard Bulmahn, German Minister for Research and Education, who is also chair of the ESA Council at ministerial level, said at the press conference, "Europe can be proud of this mission: Mars Express is an enormous success for the European space program." Contact: ESA Media Relations Office Phone: +33(0)1.53.69.7155 Fax: +33(0)1.53.69.7690 An additional article on this subject is available at http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/express_water_040123.html. __________________________________________________________________________ MARS EXPRESS COMMISSIONING AND EARLY RESULTS ESA release 23 January 2004 Overall mission status The Mars Express orbiter was successfully inserted into orbit around Mars on 25 December 2003. Since then several maneuvers have been performed using the spacecraft's main engine (plane turn maneuver and apocenter reductions) and several further maneuvers will be performed, using the on- board thrusters, until the mapping orbit is reached on 28 January 2004. The Mars Express spacecraft has continued to show nominal performance over the past week with the payload and subsystems operating as expected. The spacecraft's main engine has been isolated as it will not be used anymore. The Beagle-2 lander was separated from the Mars Express orbiter on 19 December and is assumed to have landed in Isidis Planitia on 25 December. However, attempts to communicate with the lander have so far been unsuccessful. Meanwhile, the orbiter scientific payload commissioning has started and the payload instruments started returning their first scientific measurements from Mars orbit. During this early phase, mostly dedicated to instrument checkout and calibration, high-resolution stereo and color images and high-resolution spectral measurements of the planet are being acquired. The radio science experiment has been obtaining its first scientific data from Mars (bistatic radar measurements), and the MARSIS radar, which is scheduled for deployment at the end of April 2004, will soon be conducting further checkout activities. The early orbits of Mars Express, until about mid-February 2004, represent the best opportunity for optimized observing conditions (illumination, targets of interest, distance to the Sun, lack of eclipses) and, therefore, maximum science return. The planning of the next payload commissioning activities and science operations are progressing nominally. Payload activity timelines are being prepared for the next few weeks, with the goal of optimizing the scientific return while keeping within the limits of the power budget. Science results 19 January 2004 HRSC The first science result showed the Valles Marineris canyon system in stunning detail. Valles Marineris is a giant canyon system stretching 4000 km across the surface of the planet. At its start and end it is 2 km deep and in the middle it is 7 km deep and 600 km wide. 23 January 2004 OMEGA Analysis of data acquired over the southern polar cap on 18 January has revealed the existence of trapped water ice along with carbon dioxide ice. PFS PFS data have shown that there is an imbalance to the distribution of carbon dioxide on Mars. HRSC HRSC has now imaged an area of the martian surface covering 1.87 million km2. This corresponds to 100 Gigabytes of data! The camera images a single track up to 4000 km in length (roughly the size of the United States from coast to coast). A series of stunning images have been released revealing river channels, dust falling over a cliff edge and erosion features. SPICAM A unique measurement was made with SPICAM. By observing a star twice, once through the atmosphere and once with no atmosphere present, it was possible to analyze the martian atmosphere. This has enabled measurements to be made on the distribution of the ozone and water vapor revealing that there is more water vapor where there is less ozone. Orbit and surface coverage information The orbit of the Mars Express spacecraft is very stable. Several more apocenter reduction maneuvers will be conducted in order to reach the selected mapping orbit on 28 January. The early scientific planning is driven by the opportunity to take images and spectral measurements of a number of targets of interest under excellent observing conditions. The current observations cover a variety of essential martian surface features and targets of interest: volcanic terrains, chaotic terrains near Valles Marineris, Isidis Planitia with the Beagle-2 landing site, and the Spirit landing site (Gusev Crater). Later on, once the mapping orbit is achieved, the focus of science data acquisition will be extended to global coverage, mosaic and map construction, and high-resolution imaging and spectral mapping of selected local surface targets. Scientific payload status and measurements The status and performance summarized in the following table. Instrument Activities Status/Performance ASPERA Calibrations (completed) Nominal HRSC/SRC Nadir-pointed stereo and color imaging Nominal MARSIS None Checkout next week OMEGA Nadir-pointed hyperspectral measurements Nominal PFS Nadir-pointed spectral measurements Nominal SPICAM Nadir and star occultation observations Nominal During the past week a number of nadir-pointed and inertial observations were made. Stereo and color images, multi/hyper-spectral visible and near-infrared data sets, and UV-infrared spectra were acquired and delivered by the HRSC/SRC, OMEGA, PFS and SPICAM instruments on board the orbiter. This first set of Mars Express scientific data, containing some of the highest spatial and spectral resolutions ever obtained and returned from Mars orbit, is already revealing important information about martian surface features, in particular in the chaotic and volcanic regions, outflow channel areas, and near the crustal dichotomy boundary. Read the original release at http://sci.esa.int/science- e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=34487. An additional article on this subject is available at http://spaceflightnow.com/mars/marsexpress/040124science.html. __________________________________________________________________________ MARS GLOBAL SURVEYOR IMAGES NASA/JPL/MSSS release 15-21 January 2004 The following new images taken by the Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) on the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft are now available. Granicus Valles (Released 15 January 2004) http://jpl.convio.net/site/R?i=CZ27LTSPmGBO-3BCLCXxIg Frosty Polygons (Released 16 January 2004) http://jpl.convio.net/site/R?i=RrMdsNzuvBxO-3BCLCXxIg Dunes in Twilight (Released 17 January 2004) http://jpl.convio.net/site/R?i=t9jgXOPmLbpO-3BCLCXxIg Pavonis Mons (Released 18 January 2004) http://jpl.convio.net/site/R?i=TwqtdcTDc85O-3BCLCXxIg Lyot Crater in Winter (Released 19 January 2004) http://jpl.convio.net/