The Curiosity rover’s next destination is a moving mound of wind-blown dark sand blanketing the base of Mount Sharp, the focal point of the Mars mission’s research, scientists said this week.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has recorded itself in another of its famous self-portraits as the mobile robot analyzes bore samples recently collected from a rock slab, the first use of the drill since a short circuit halted use of the device in February.
NASA’s Curiosity rover has returned a stunning image of the sun dipping behind a distant ridge from a vista inside Mars’s Gale Crater, only the Martian sunset spectacle appears blue instead of the reddish hues seen on Earth.
Officials are assessing how to adjust operations to collect future rock core samples with NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover after identifying its drill as the likely source of a short circuit that stopped the rover’s movement in late February.
A short circuit that halted movement of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is not expected to keep the mobile robot stationary for long, but engineers want to know whether the problem will restrict some future science operations.
Carefully analyzing data collected by NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover, scientists discovered a sudden, unexpected spike in methane levels in the martian atmosphere over a two-month period one year ago.
Scientists analyzing imagery from NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover believe sediments left by an ancient lake more than three billion years ago formed a towering mountain that is set to be the robot’s research subject for the rest of its mission on the red planet.
This video captures the final portion of the launch countdown and follows the Atlas 5 rocket’s flight through arrival in the preliminary orbit carrying the Curiosity rover headed for Mars. (Membership Required)