NASA has high hopes for rover
Curiosity is the seventh American lander mission to Mars.
According to Dwayne Brown, NASA headquarters spokesman, Curiosity follows in the tread marks of the two Viking missions in 1976, the Pathfinder mission in 1997, the rovers Spirit and Opportunity in 2004 and the Mars Phoenix in 2008.
The rover Opportunity, said Brown, is still moving and transmitting information eight years beyond its expected expiration date. Spirit ceased to operate in 2010.
Curiosity's mission has been planned to last longer than any other lander or rover.
“Its primary mission is scheduled to last for two years,” said Brown, “But the way it is designed and built and it's powered by a nuclear battery, this thing could last for years.”
According to NASA, Curiosity is twice as long, about 10 feet, and five times as heavy as Spirit and Opportunity.
Curiosity did inherit the earlier rovers' six-wheel drive, mast-mounted cameras and suspension system.
Unlike the earlier rovers, Curiosity is designed to gather rock and soil samples, process them and deliver them to onboard test chambers. NASA describes Curiosity as a large, mobile laboratory.
Curiosity will search for the building blocks of extraterrestrial life, as well as investigate how Mars turned from a wet and warm planet into its present cold and dry condition.
During its mission, Curiosity will analyze dozens of samples drilled from rocks or scooped from the ground as it explores within a greater range than any previous Mars rover.
“It's pure science, because when we find out answers to one thing, it will lead to more and deeper questions,” said Jackie Pfeiffer of Cabot, a former grade school teacher and space exploration fan who was present when the rocket carrying Curiosity lifted off Nov. 26, 2011 from Cape Canaveral, Fla.
“I think it is going to provide information beyond our wildest dreams. People say we don't get anything out of space, but we get spinoffs from space that people don't realize,” Pfeiffer said.
Curiosity didn't land any- where near any of its predecessors on the Martian surface.Its landing target was the Gale Crater located on the Martian equator between the planet's northern lowlands and the heavily cratered southern hemisphere.“We actually picked a site after years of study of what would be the most opportune site that would tell us Mars' history. We picked a site that might have been a reservoir of water,” NASA's Brown said. “It was the best site that would offer a good historical site of the Red Planet.”Brown said the best and brightest minds studied pictures taken from orbiting surveyor satellites to decide on the best site.But just because the Curiosity has successfully landed doesn't mean the difficulty or the danger in the mission is any less.Brown said because of the 14 minutes it takes a radio command to Curiosity to travel from Earth to Mars, there is a long lag time before controllers on Earth will know if the rover has successfully executed a command.“This is a marathon, not a sprint,” said Brown, adding the rover should travel no more than a few feet a day.Even though this is the most advanced rover ever designed by humankind, said Brown, “this is the hardest NASA mission ever attempted in the history of robotic planetary exploration.“The technology involved is almost out of Buck Rogers,” he said. “We never tried this before; we don't know if it's going to work. We have done everything humanly possible to ensure success.”Brown likened Curiosity's components to a long string of dominoes. It takes just one domino being out of place to prevent all the rest from falling in line, he said.“The excitement is worldwide. There are landing events all over the world,” he said. “Mars inspires a lot of people, particularly kids. We hope to have great success, but we are letting folks know this in not easy. This is no walk in the park.“We want to answer the big question: Could life have actually been on Mars?” Brown said. “We're not going to find life, not going to find bugs crawling around, but we're looking for biological and organic traces. We don't know what we are going to find.”He said the Mars Phoenix found ice under the Martian surface.“Science says if you have water, you can have life. Could have conditions once supported life on Mars or might still support life on Mars?” Brown asked.“Some scientists say if there is life on Mars, it is underground,” he said.“Mars is similar to Earth. That's why Hollywood loves Mars. Mars could have been like Earth until something catastrophic happened to the planet and wiped it out,” he said.
