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The first humans to live on Mars might not identify as astronauts, but farmers. To establish a sustainable settlement on Earth's solar system neighbor, space travelers will have to learn how to grow food on Mars -- a job that could turn out to be one of the most vital, challenging and labor-intensive tasks at hand, experts say. "One of the things that every gardener on the planet will know is producing food is hard -- it is a non-trivial thing," Penelope Boston, director of the Cave and Karst Studies program at New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, said...

Mars in particular is a key target for future human planetary adventures even though on the face of it, it seems so hostile to human life. In fact Mars actually has the most clement environment of any planet in the Solar System outside of Earth and is known to have all of the resources necessary in some accessible form, to sustain life on the surface. So how might we survive on Mars? The crucial things for humans on Mars are the availability of oxygen, shelter, food and water, and not just endless consumables delivered to the planet from Earth. For...

NASA’s Curiosity rover has reached out in a Martian ‘handshake’ like gesture welcoming the end of solar conjunction that marks the resumption of contact with her handlers back on Earth – evidenced in a new photo mosaic of images captured as the robot and her human handlers contemplate a short traverse to a 2nd drilling target in the next few days. “We’ll move a small bit and then drill another hole,” said John Grotzinger to Universe Today. Grotzinger, of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., leads NASA’s Curiosity Mars Science Laboratory mission.

Do you dream of living on Mars? Then turn on your webcam. You've got an application video to make. Mars One, a Netherlands-based group that wants to turn the colonizing of Mars into a reality television phenomenon, has started accepting applications for its astronaut selection program. In just two weeks, more than 78,000 people from more than 120 countries have applied. You don't need previous experience in rocket science, astronomy or really anything to apply for the Mars One astronaut selection program - but you will need to be at least 18 years old and have nerves of steel. Mars...

The Apollo-era astronaut says NASA should be working manned Mars missionsThe second man to set foot on the moon wants to see NASA send people further into space than he ever traveled. Buzz Aldrin trashed NASA's plan to bring an asteroid into lunar orbit in a speech, advocating for a Mars colony. Aldrin, who recently published the book "Mission to Mars: My Vision for Space Exploration," said at the Washington, D.C. Humans to Mars summit Wednesday that President Barack Obama's asteroid mining plan is merely a distraction. "Bringing an asteroid back to Earth? What's that have to do with space...

<p>Setting foot on Mars by the 2030s is human destiny and a US priority, and every dollar available must be spent on bridging gaps in knowledge on how to get there, NASA's chief said Monday.</p> <p>Addressing a conference of space experts at George Washington University, NASA administrator Charles Bolden said that despite hard economic times the United States is committed to breaking new boundaries in space exploration.</p>

The team in charge of successfully landing NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., received the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's highest group honor at a dinner in Washington on Wednesday night, April 24. The 2013 Trophy for Current Achievement honors outstanding achievements in the fields of aerospace science and technology. The Mars Science Laboratory Project built and operates the rover Curiosity, which has been investigating past and current environments in Gale Crater on the Red Planet since its dramatic sky-crane landing in August 2012. The rover has 10 science instruments to investigate whether...

The 10,250-pound Mars 3 spacecraft was comprised of an orbiter and a lander. Once in orbit, the two pieces separated and the 2,500 pound lander housed in a four foot diameter sphere started its descent to the surface. Using a 9.5 foot aeroshell to protect it from the fiery atmospheric entry, a parachute to slow its fall, and retrorockets fired in the final stage of landing, Mars 3 landed safely on December 2, 1971. Once on the surface, the sides of the sphere opened like flower petals revealing the suite of instruments. Mars 3 went to study the planet’s atmospheric...

A nonprofit organization that aims to land four astronauts on Mars in 2023 will kick off its two-year, televised search for Red Planet explorers by this summer. The Netherlands-based Mars One will begin accepting application videos sometime between now and July, charging a fee to weed out folks who aren't serious about their candidacy. The group hopes to raise millions of dollars this way, with the proceeds paying for the ongoing selection process and technology studies. "We expect a million applications with 1-minute videos, and hopefully some of those videos will go viral,” Mars One co-founder and chief executive officer...

Mars 3 Lander transmitted for less than 15 seconds - then disappeared Images captured by Nasa orbiter from 2007 believed to show parachute and heatshield Next step is to research the 3-dimensional aspects of the finds to determine absolute proof It transmitted data back to earth for just 14.5 second before everything 'went dark.' But now incredible pictures from Nasa's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter [MRO] have revealed the site and possible remains of the Soviet Mars 3 Lander that arrived, and then seemingly disappeared, on the Red Planet in 1971. The MRO has been orbiting Mars since 2006, taking a host...

Slough and his colleagues are working on a system that shoots ringlets of metal into a specially designed magnetic field. The ringlets collapse around a tiny droplet of deuterium, a hydrogen isotope, compressing it so tightly that it produces a fusion reaction for a few millionths of a second. The reaction should result in a significant energy gain. "It has gain, that's why we're doing it," Slough said. "It's just that the form the energy takes at the end is hot, magnetized metal plasma. ... The problem in the past was, what would you use it for? Because it kinda...

In an effort to avoid problems caused by interference, NASA will temporarily limit scientific observations by its Mars rovers and orbiters beginning Thursday as the Red Planet passes behind the sun as seen from Earth. The sun will appear between Earth and Mars throughout the month of April in a setup known as a Mars solar conjunction, which can interfere with communications between the two planets. Specifically, during these solar conjunctions, solar flares and charged particles being emitted from the sun can disrupt radio communications, and thus could interfere with the stream of data being sent back and forth to...

Sun in the Way Will Affect Mars Missions in April This diagram illustrates the positions of Mars, Earth and the sun during a period that occurs approximately every 26 months, when Mars passes almost directly behind the sun from Earth's perspective. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech March 20, 2013 Mars Missions Status Report PASADENA, Calif. - The positions of the planets next month will mean diminished communications between Earth and NASA's spacecraft at Mars. Mars will be passing almost directly behind the sun, from Earth's perspective. The sun can easily disrupt radio transmissions between the two planets during that near-alignment. To prevent...

Since its daredevil landing on Mars last summer, NASA’s Curiosity rover has been avidly exploring its new home in Gale Crater. But there’s been one worry that several people have voiced since Curiosity launched — what if the rover contaminates the surface of Mars with Earth life? Mars and Earth are very different places. Earth’s butterscotchy little brother is a dry and gelid little world. Among its other hazards are surface pressures approaching 1000 times lower than at Earth’s sea level, temperatures which can be low enough to freeze carbon dioxide, and practically no oxygen. Full of curiosity of their...

After recovering from a computer problem, the Mars rover Curiosity is sidelined again, further delaying the restart of science experiments. The latest complication occurred over the weekend when the six-wheel rover entered safe mode after experiencing a software file error. 'We would definitely like to get over this and get back to doing something.' - Project manager Richard Cook Curiosity remained in contact with ground controllers, but it can't zap rocks, snap pictures or roam around until the problem is fixed. Rover team members had expected to resume activities Monday, but they now have to wait a bit longer —...

Mars One co-founder tells CBC about its proposed one-way trip to the Red Planet Mars One hopes to have people living on the planet — for the rest of their lives — by 2023.(Mars One/YouTube) The man behind the private space project dubbed Mars One is looking for people to travel to Mars, but he's not offering a return ticket. "The technology to get humans to Mars and keep them alive there exists," Bas Lansdorp told Day 6 host Brent Bambury in an interview that aired this week on CBC Radio. "The technology to bring humans from Mars back to...

Rising above the present location of NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, higher than any mountain in the 48 contiguous states of the United States, Mount Sharp is featured in new imagery from the rover. > A pair of mosaics assembled from dozens of telephoto images shows Mount Sharp in dramatic detail. The component images were taken by the 100-millimeter-focal-length telephoto lens camera mounted on the right side of Curiosity's remote sensing mast, during the 45th Martian day of the rover's mission on Mars (Sept. 20, 2012). This layered mound, also called Aeolis Mons, in the center of Gale Crater rises more...

A supermassive doomsday comet is heading toward the planet in 2014, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. The comet presents a good-news, bad-news situation for the Red Planet, and for us earthlings as well. NASA says Comet 2013 A1, also known as Comet Siding Spring, is almost certain to miss Mars on Oct. 19, 2014. However, there's still a chance — a less than a 1-in-600 chance — that Mars could be hit, due to the remaining uncertainty about the comet's path. That uncertainty is likely to be cleared up over the next few months, eventually resulting in...

On March 25, 2010, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced on their blog that ESA’s study of the mass of Phobos had been accepted for publication in the scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters. The announcement excerpted startling conclusions of ESA’s findings: “We conclude that the interior of Phobos likely contains large voids. When applied to various hypotheses bearing on the origin of Phobos, these results are inconsistent with the proposition that Phobos is a captured asteroid.” (1,2) Since that time, a number of prominent ancient astronaut blogs have had plenty to say about the findings. The ESA findings were most...

NASA is reporting that an analysis of a rock powder sample collected by the Curiosity rover suggests that ancient Mars could have supported living microbes. The sample contained traces of sulfur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, and carbon -- key chemical ingredients for life. For astronomers, the news constitutes the latest clue in their pursuit of a scientific holy grail: Answering the big question about whether life ever existed on the Red Planet. Their challenge until now has been to confirm whether the Martian atmosphere could have supported a habitable environment. The preliminary evidence now suggests the answer is yes...

A Super Fast Comet Is Headed For Mars The EconomistMarch 5, 2013Shutterstock A PAIR of middle-aged tourists (see previous post) are not the only thing headed for Mars. Comet C/2013 A1 (Siding Spring) is also on its way. Discovered on January 3rd, some calculations of its orbit, according to Phil Plait, the rather good “Bad Astronomer”, have it passing 37,000km above the surface of the planet in October 2014—roughly the height at which communication satellites orbit Earth, and a remarkably close shave by cosmic standards. An official NASA website puts the most likely “close-approach” distance between the comet and Mars...

This year seems to be one for comets. In addition to the two projectiles that will zoom near Earth, a third one has recently been discovered. The newest one, though, won't fly by our planet. Instead, it will pass uncomfortably close to Mars in 2014. Named C/2013 A1, the comet will fly near the Red Planet on Oct. 19, 2014 according to preliminary orbital prediction models. The icy missile is thought to have first originated from the Oort Cloud, which is a hypothetical region containing billions of cometary nuclei located around our solar system. Comets have struck planets in the...

In case you just can’t get enough impact news, it looks like Mars may actually get hit by a comet in 2014! As it stands right now, the chance of a direct impact are small, but it’s likely Mars will get pelted by the debris associated with the comet. The comet is called C/2013 A1, discovered on Jan. 3, 2013 by the Australian veteran comet hunter Robert McNaught. Extrapolating its orbit, they found it will make a very near pass of Mars around Oct. 19, 2014, missing the planet by the nominal distance of about 100,000 kilometers. Observations taken at...

A maverick millionaire obsessed with space travel vowed to send a manned mission to Mars, even announcing the date the rocket carrying one man and one woman would set off for the Red Planet: Jan. 5, 2018.

PASADENA, Calif. - The ground team for NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has switched the rover to a redundant onboard computer in response to a memory issue on the computer that had been active. The intentional swap at about 2:30 a.m. PST today (Thursday, Feb. 28) put the rover, as anticipated, into a minimal-activity precautionary status called "safe mode." The team is shifting the rover from safe mode to operational status over the next few days and is troubleshooting the condition that affected operations yesterday. The condition is related to a glitch in flash memory linked to the other, now-inactive, computer.

nnis Tito, a billionaire financier who in 2001 became the first space tourist, has launched a project to send two civilians on “an historic journey” to the Red Planet in January 2018. “We have not sent humans beyond the moon in more than 40 years,” Mr Tito said at a press conference in Washington on Wednesday. “I’ve been waiting, and a lot of people my age, have been waiting. And I think it’s time to put an end to that lapse”. The mission, a “return fly-by”, in which the spacecraft would fly around Mars rather than land, would last for...

A recently discovered comet will make an uncomfortably-close planetary flyby next year — but this time it’s not Earth that’s in the cosmic crosshairs. According to preliminary orbital prediction models, comet C/2013 A1 will buzz Mars on Oct. 19, 2014. According to calculations by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), close approach data suggests the comet is most likely to make a close pass of 0.0007 AU (that’s approximately 63,000 miles from the Martian surface). However, there’s one huge caveat. Due to uncertainties in the observations — the comet has only been observed for 74 days (so far), so it’s difficult...

Canadian geologists have found more evidence that impact craters may, in fact, be the best places to look for signs of past life on Mars and other worlds, and could even have been the place life began on Earth... It was during some field work on the 15-mile (24 kilometer) wide Haughton crater that he and his colleagues recognized what appeared to be the remains of hydrothermal structures. These would have been steaming vents at one time, releasing heat for millennia that had been generated by the impact event.

I found a link to this INTERACTIVE VIEW of the Curiosity Rover on Mars on the ASTRONOMY PICTURE OF THE DAY ARCHIVE. It is one of the most amazing uses of this technology I have seen. It is like standing beside the Rover on Mars and using a pair of binoculars. Give it a try. It is really fun.

Explanation: This remarkable self-portrait of NASA's Mars Curiosity Rover includes a sweeping panoramic view of its current location in the Yellowknife Bay region of the Red Planet's Gale Crater. The rover's flat, rocky perch, known as "John Klein", served as the site for Curiosity's first rock drilling activity. At the foot of the proud looking rover, a shallow drill test hole and a sample collection hole are 1.6 centimeters in diameter. The impressive mosaic was constructed using frames from the rover's Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) and Mastcam. Used to take in the panoramic landscape frames, the Mastcam is standing...

Explanation: What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't human? Then you might be the robotic Curiosity rover currently exploring Mars. Curiosity landed in Gale Crater last August and has been busy looking for signs of ancient running water and clues that Mars could once have harbored life. Pictured above, Curiosity has taken a wide panorama that includes its own shadow in the direction opposite the Sun. The image was taken in November from a location dubbed Point Lake, although no water presently exists there. Curiosity has already discovered several indications of dried streambeds on Mars, and...

Explanation: On January 25 (UT) 2004, the Opportunity rover fell to Mars, making today the 9th anniversary of its landing. After more than 3,200 sols (Mars solar days) the golf cart-sized robot from Earth is still actively exploring the Red Planet, though its original mission plan was for three months. Having driven some 35 kilometers (22 miles) from its landing site, Opportunity's panoramic camera recorded the segments of this scene, in November and December of last year. The digitally stitched panorama spans more than 210 degrees across the Matijevic Hill area along the western rim of Endeavour Crater. Features dubbed...

Scientists have long believed that comets and, or a type of very primitive meteorite called carbonaceous chondrites were the sources of early Earth's volatile elements -- which include hydrogen, nitrogen, and carbon -- and possibly organic material, too. Understanding where these volatiles came from is crucial for determining the origins of both water and life on the planet. New research led by Carnegie's Conel Alexander focuses on frozen water that was distributed throughout much of the early Solar System, but probably not in the materials that aggregated to initially form Earth... It has been suggested that both comets and carbonaceous...

The river is nearly 1,000 miles long and almost 1,000 feet deep at points This image by the European Space Agency shows the Reull Vallis on Mars. The European Space Agency announced Thursday that it has taken high-definition pictures of an ancient river nearly 1,000 miles long on Mars. According to the report, the "striking" river also has "numerous tributaries" and is believed to be more than 4 miles wide and nearly 1,000 feet deep at some points. The agency believes that the river was carved by water between 1.8 and 3.5 billion years ago and went dry due...

Explanation: Stickney Crater, the largest crater on the martian moon Phobos, is named for Chloe Angeline Stickney Hall, mathematician and wife of astronomer Asaph Hall. Asaph Hall discovered both the Red Planet's moons in 1877. Over 9 kilometers across, Stickney is nearly half the diameter of Phobos itself, so large that the impact that blasted out the crater likely came close to shattering the tiny moon. This stunning, enhanced-color image of Stickney and surroundings was recorded by the HiRISE camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as it passed within some six thousand kilometers of Phobos in March of 2008. Even...

Dream of going to space but don’t feel like putting in the work to become a NASA astronaut? Here’s your chance to possibly make that fantasy come true. Mars One, a Netherlands-based nonprofit, is seeking volunteers to help colonize the Red Planet, according to Mashable. To meet an aggressive goal of putting people on Mars by 2023, Mars One released its basic astronaut requirements on January 8. Rather than recruiting scientists or pilots, the organization says it will consider anyone, so long as they are at least 18 years old. Intelligence, good mental and physical health and dedication to the...

All of Curiosity's instruments have been commissioned. The drill is the only tool that has yet to be deployed. Its hammer action will enable the device to retrieve powdered samples from up to 5cm inside the rock, which can then passed to the rover's onboard laboratories for analysis. As Curiosity trundled through Yellowknife Bay in December, it used its survey instruments to try to identify the most promising candidate rock. This equipment comprises the mast-mounted colour cameras and laser spectrometer, and the arm-held "hand lens" camera and X-ray spectrometer. Continue reading the main story Take a trip to Mars Explore...

A Martian meteorite recently found on Earth may represent a missing link between Mars' warm, wet past and its present cold and dry state, a new study shows. The meteorite — named NWA 7034 — is markedly dissimilar from other meteorites from Mars that scientists have studied on Earth. NWA 7034 has about 10 times more water content (about 6,000 parts per million) than any of the 110 other known meteorites that have fallen to Earth from Mars, suggesting that the meteorite probably came from the Martian surface, as opposed to deeper inside, said University of New Mexico planetary scientist...

A newly discovered comet has the potential to put on a dazzling celestial display late next year, when it will be so bright you may be able to see it briefly in the daytime sky. The discovery of the object named Comet ISON was announced Monday (Sept. 24) by Russians Vitali Nevski and Artyom Novichonok, who detected it in photographs taken three days earlier using a 15.7-inch (0.4-meter) reflecting telescope of the International Scientific Optical Network (ISON), near Kislovodsk. The new comet is officially known as C/2012 S1. When first sighted, Comet ISON was 625 million miles (1 billion kilometers)...

Explanation: What's in this smooth soil on Mars? In late October, NASA's robotic Curiosity rover stopped near a place dubbed Rocknest as it continues to explore Gale Crater on Mars. Rocknest is the group of stones seen near the top left of the above image -- just to the left of Curiosity's mast. Of particular interest was the unusually smooth patch of soil named Wind Drift seen to the left of Curiosity, which was likely created by the Martian wind blowing fine particles into Rocknest's wake. The above image shows part of Mt. Sharp in the background to upper right,...

Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D., Texas) claimed that the United States had a $5.6 trillion surplus at the end of the Clinton administration Tuesday.

On Tuesday, November 20, Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity chief scientist John Grotzinger told NPR that an upcoming announcement about data from a recently collected soil sample by Curiosity’s Sample Analysis at Mars, or SAM, instrument would be “one for the history books.” This comment fueled speculation about the possible discovery of evidence indicating past or present life on Mars. Curiosity rover on December 3 during a press conference at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California. Explaining the announcement, Space.com describes that Curiosity “found evidence of chlorine, sulfur, and water in Mars dirt studied by...

Explanation: They might look like trees on Mars, but they're not. Groups of dark brown streaks have been photographed by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on melting pinkish sand dunes covered with light frost. The above image was taken in 2008 April near the North Pole of Mars. At that time, dark sand on the interior of Martian sand dunes became more and more visible as the spring Sun melted the lighter carbon dioxide ice. When occurring near the top of a dune, dark sand may cascade down the dune leaving dark surface streaks -- streaks that might appear at first...

Data that NASA's discovery wee a sample of Martian dirt could be earth-shattering, but the space agency is taking time to check its work. NASA's not sharing a 'historic' find on Mars... yet Data from a sample of Martian dirt could be earth-shattering, but the space agency is taking time to check its work. SAM, a mobile sample analysis lab, is currently mounted on Curiosity and finding interesting stuff in Martian soil. It seems NASA and the Curiosity rover have found something exciting and nerd-tastic on Mars, but the space agency's scientists are holding back for now, despite how painful...

In Musk's vision, the ambitious Mars settlement program would start with a pioneering group of fewer than 10 people, who would journey to the Red Planet aboard a huge reusable rocket powered by liquid oxygen and methane. "At Mars, you can start a self-sustaining civilization and grow it into something really big," Musk told an audience at the Royal Aeronautical Society in London on Friday (Nov. 16). Musk was there to talk about his business plans, and to receive the Society’s gold medal for his contribution to the commercialization of space.

Science isn't something that just happens overnight. It takes many measurements, oodles of analysis, re-testing and re-analysis before any groundbreaking announcement can be made. So, on the surface of Mars, inside Gale Crater on a plain called Aeolis Palus, our tenacious six-wheeled Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is doing cutting-edge laboratory work on an alien world and mission scientists are itching to announce a "historic" discovery. "This data is gonna be one for the history books. It's looking really good," John Grotzinger, lead scientist of the MSL mission, said in an interview with NPR. But what is he referring to and...

On Aug. 28, 2012, during the 22nd Martian day, or sol, after landing on Mars, NASA's Curiosity rover drove about 52 feet (16 meters) eastward. The drive imprinted the wheel tracks visible in this image. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech After decades of following the water, the reality that “life as we know it” may never have gotten a foothold on Mars’ surface, at least, has arguably taken root within the planetary science community. If life ever was or is lurking on the Red planet, it’s been extremely coy about revealing itself. The recent news that the Mars Curiosity rover has thus far...

Methane is M.I.A. on Mars. Back in 2009, NASA announced some pretty astounding observations from Mars. They thought they'd spotted signs of methane in the red planet's atmosphere, which would force astronomers to contemplate the possibility of biological activity on Mars. NASA's Curiosity rover hasn't made any close encounters of the third kind yet, and after analyzing Mars' atmosphere, turned up no traces of methane. The rover used its Sample Analysis at Mars to measure atmospheric composition for the first time today, and while more tests need to be conducted to determine methane presence definitely, it's not looking good for...

After years of debate, a mystery with implications for life gets the 'sniff' test. Is there methane on Mars? The question has dogged scientists since 1969, when George Pimentel at the University of California, Berkeley, an instrument leader on NASA's Mariner 7 programme, held a press conference to announce that methane had been detected near Mars’ south polar cap. The revelation came less than 48 hours after his team received the data it was based on; he retracted the finding a month later after realizing that the methane signal was actually coming from carbon dioxide ice. It is easy to...

Ground-based observatories and proposed-but-cancelled spacecraft such as the European Space Agency's Darwin project or NASA's Terrestrial Planet Finder could scan the atmospheres of exoplanets for signs of extraterrestrial life. Molecules each absorb specific types of light, resulting in patterns known as spectra that allow scientists to identify what the molecules are. Some chemicals or combinations of chemicals might be unique to life as we know it, and could thus serve as strong evidence of aliens. One key gas astrobiologists looking for extraterrestrial life would concentrate on would be oxygen, since researchers often think this molecule is too chemically reactive to...