MV Astronomy Club

mars super slueth

by carol higgins

The arrival of February brings with it the happy news that winter is half over. But for planetary scientists, this month marks the exciting end of a seven-month, 300 million-mile voyage by three spacecraft, and the start of unique and ambitious missions to explore planet Mars. All three launched in July 2020 to take advantage of an alignment of Earth and Mars that occurs every 26 months, providing the fastest path to Mars.

First to arrive is the Al Amal (Hope) orbiter on February 9. Developed and managed by the United Arab Emirates with help from U.S., Canadian, and other international partners, Hope is UAE’s first interplanetary mission. Onboard are three science packages: a high-resolution color camera, and an infrared and ultraviolet spectrometer. It will monitor and collect data about the layers of the atmosphere and weather to help researchers better understand climate dynamics such as dust storms and clouds, and the ongoing loss of atmospheric hydrogen and oxygen.

On February 10, China’s Tianwen-1 Mars spacecraft arrives. It carries two main components: an orbiter, and a separate lander/rover combination that will be sent to the surface a few months later. The orbiter will serve as a relay station to send data back to Earth, and has seven science packages including two cameras, subsurface radar equipment, spectrometer, magnetometer, and several particle analyzers.

The lander/rover has two cameras, ground-penetrating radar, climate monitor, magnetic field detector, and mineral analyzers. The mission goals include looking for subsurface water and investigating the soil, geology, environment, and atmosphere of the planet. This is China’s second attempt to reach Mars, the first failed to leave Earth orbit almost ten years ago. A successful Tianwen-1 mission would make significant contributions to the scientific community.

And last but not least, the super sleuth of them all arrives on February 18. That day NASA’s Perseverance Rover attempts a landing in an ancient river delta at the edge of Jezero Crater, the site of a lake about 3.5 billion years ago. Perseverance is the most sophisticated rover ever built, evolving from the accomplishments of NASA’s four successful rovers. Its main mission is to search for signs of ancient microbial life, learn about past environments, collect rock and “soil” samples for future retrieval, and run an experiment to produce oxygen from the atmosphere. The six-wheeled rover is the size of a small car and carries a wide array of science instruments. It has 19 cameras and the science payload has seven major systems; weather and dust analyzer, x-ray spectrometer, ground-penetrating radar, spectrometers, lasers to search for organic compounds, and two microphones. But one of the most exciting experiments is

Skycrane lowers Perseverance to Mars Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech the Ingenuity Helicopter! It is small and Hanny’s Voorwerp. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, W. Keel, Galaxy Zoo Team weighs four pounds, with a wingspan of about four feet. It will only make short, 90 second flights up to 15 feet in altitude but it will be the first time flight has been attempted on another world. The February 18 landing is around 3:30 p.m. (EST) and promises to be exciting and nerve-wracking. Some refer to the Entry, Descent, and Landing phase as “seven minutes of terror” as we await a signal from the rover indicating it safely touched down. First, its heat shield has to survive a fiery descent through the Martian atmosphere where temperatures will reach 3,800 degrees Fahrenheit. Then a parachute has to sufficiently slow the vehicle so the “sky crane” can deploy its cables and gently lower the rover to the surface. It will take 11 minutes for its landing status report to reach Earth. NASA will cover the landing live, visit the https:// mars.nasa.gov/mars2020 website. February promises to be quite a busy month on Mars! Wishing you clear skies and good health!•

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