Scientific Information From The Mars Exploration Rover Mission
NASA's 2003 Mars Exploration Rover Mission has amassed an enormous amount of scientific information related to the Martian geology and atmosphere, as well as providing some astronomical observations from Mars. This article covers information gathered by the Opportunity rover during the initial phase of its mission. Information on science gathered by Spirit can be found mostly in the Spirit rover article.
The ongoing unmanned Mars exploration mission, commenced in 2003 sent two robotic rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, to explore the Martian surface and geology. The mission was led by Project Manager Peter Theisinger of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Principal Investigator Steven Squyres, professor of astronomy at Cornell University.
Primary among the mission's scientific goals is to search for and characterize a wide range of rocks and soils that hold clues to past water activity on Mars. In recognition of the vast amount of scientific information amassed by both rovers, two asteroids have been named in their honor: 37452 Spirit and 39382 Opportunity.
Read more about Scientific Information From The Mars Exploration Rover Mission: Water Hypothesis, Spherules and Hematite, What Spirit Rover Discovered About Rocks and Minerals On Mars, First Atmospheric Temperature Profile, Astronomical Observations, See Also, Further Reading
Famous quotes containing the words scientific, information, mars, exploration, rover and/or mission:
“A nap, my friend, is a brief period of sleep which overtakes superannuated persons when they endeavour to entertain unwelcome visitors or to listen to scientific lectures.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“I have all my life been on my guard against the information conveyed by the sense of hearing—it being one of my earliest observations, the universal inclination of humankind is to be led by the ears, and I am sometimes apt to imagine that they are given to men as they are to pitchers, purposely that they may be carried about by them.”
—Mary Wortley, Lady Montagu (1689–1762)
“The sword’s a cross; thereon He died:
On breast of Mars the goddess sighed.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“I call her old. She has one family
Whose claim is good to being settled here
Before the era of colonization,
And before that of exploration even.
John Smith remarked them as he coasted by....”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“Old Rover in his moss-greened house
Mumbles a bone, and barks at a mouse.”
—Walter De La Mare (1873–1956)
“We never can tell how our lives may work to the account of the general good, and we are not wise enough to know if we have fulfilled our mission or not.”
—Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards (1842–1911)