Image: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum)

The Mars Express recently made some historically close passes to Mars’ moon, Phobos, and managed to snap some detailed close-up shots. These are the closest views of the rock we’ve seen… or is it a rock?

The Mars Express flybys, which happen every five months, may also determine if Phobos is a fragile pile of rocky fragments stuck together — what planetary scientists refer to as a rubble pile — or solid through and through.

Some of the new images taken March 7 during one of several recent close flybys of the moon home in on the proposed landing site for a Russian mission, Phobos-Grunt (meaning Phobos soil), that is expected to touch down on the moon next year.

Link

NASA’s Spirit rover {wiki} landed on Mars in 2004. After its planned 90-day mission, the rover kept on working for another six years. Last May, it became stuck in soft soil and could no longer rove, but continued analyzing the Martian environment. Now NASA has decided to put the rover into hibernation mode at least until temperatures rise on Mars, which could be six months.

Despite the science that can be done at the site, the probable end of Spirit’s career as a mobile unit seemed discouraging to JPL rover driver, Ashley Stroupe. A week and a half ago, the rover team changed their approach to getting the rover unstuck and experienced much greater success.

“We had a tremendous amount of hope,” Stroupe said.

In the end, though, they ran out of time. Now, their main task is positioning the rover to capture the greatest amount of solar energy possible: The rover is currently tilted south, away from the sun in the northern sky. If they can reduce the tilt, Spirit may be able to periodically communicate with Earth throughout the winter. If they can’t, it will be a long, silent winter for the robot.

Link

The image above is a portion of a fitting tribute to Spirit at xkcd. Link

(YouTube Link)

Blasting a high-pitched noise from a tweeter into a pipe that focuses the sound waves can create enough pressure to lift troublesome alien dust from equipment, suits or vehicles, according to a study published January in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America.

Wired has the story.

Photo: Vincent Fournier

A photography exhibit detailing the training of American astronauts, along with spacefarers from China and Russia, was recently on display at the London Art Fair.  In addition to snazzy spacesuits and a mission control center that still looks like NASA’s old room, the participants (Like the one in the lower right of the photo above) are made to mobilize in a barren, Mars-like location at the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah.

Vincent Fournier’s Website, where you can see all of his work.

Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s HiRISE camera recently revealed fascinating shots of a dune sea of sorts in a crater of the Hellas impact basin.  What has officials at NASA excited about the dunes is their symmetric nature.

The dunes here are linear, thought to be due to shifting wind directions. In places, each dune is remarkably similar to adjacent dunes, including a reddish (or dust-colored) band on northeast-facing slopes. Large angular boulders litter the floor between dunes.

The most extensive linear dune fields known in the solar system are on Saturn’s large moon Titan. Titan has a very different environment and composition, so at meter-scale resolution they probably are very different from Martian dunes.

Link.  See more stunning images (like frosted dunes) at the HiRISE site.

Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy blog explains that the weird looking tendrils on Mars, as shown above in a photo taken by HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, as:

In the Martian winter, carbon dioxide freezes out of the air (and you thought it was cold where you are). In the summer, that CO2 sublimates; that is, turns directly from a solid to a gas. When that happens the sand gets disturbed, and falls down the slopes in little channels, which spreads out when it hits the bottom. But this disturbs the red dust, too, which flows with the sand. When it’s all done, you get those feathery tendrils. Note that at the tendril tips, you see blotches of red; that’s probably from the lighter dust billowing a bit before settling down.

But we know better don’t we, fellow Neatoramanauts? It’s obvious that Mars is not a planet, it’s one giant lifeform waiting to invade Earth.

Link

The more massive and more compact your planet is, the harder it is to get off of. Something like the Moon, which is only about 1.2% of the mass of the Earth but 27% of the Earth’s radius, is way, way easier to escape from than the Earth. To escape from the Earth’s gravity, you need to reach a speed of 40,000 km/hr (25,000 mph) from the Earth’s surface. To escape from the Moon, on the other hand, you only need to reach 8,600 km/hr (5,400 mph).

This explains why it would be so much easier to travel to one of the moons of Mars than to Mars itself, due to the ease of traveling back home from those places. Link

Nasa hopes the mix of real data and fun will also inspire the planetary scientists of tomorrow.

“We really need the next generation of explorers,” says Michelle Viotti, from the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which oversees Mars missions.

“And we’re also accomplishing something important for Nasa. There’s so much data coming back from Mars. Having a wider crowd look at the data, classify it and help understand its meaning is very important.”

Link to story. Link to game. -via Metafilter

Carl Sagan with a model of the Viking Lander. Photo via Wikipedia

I miss Carl Sagan. Sagan's enthusiasm for science and his knack for translating difficult scientific concepts into simple explanations that many can understand, made him a popular figure. He was an ambassador for science, if you will, as he had inspired many people to study science (yours truly included).

Today would've been his 75th birthday, so in honor of the great astronomer, scientist and author, Neatorama presents 10 Neat Facts About Carl Sagan:

1. Carl Sagan's First Book About Stars

When Carl was five years old, he wondered about the stars: what were they? Unsatisfied with the answers he got from his friends and from adults he knew, Carl went to the library and asked for a book about stars. The librarian handed him ... a book on celebrities! In Keay Davidson's Carl Sagan: A Life, Carl explained how his fascination with the cosmos began:

I gave it back to her and said, "This wasn't the kind of stars I had in mind." She thought this was hilarious, which humiliated me further. She then went and got the right kind of book. I took it—a simple kid's book. I sat down on a little chair—a pint-sized chair—and turned the pages until I came to the answer.

And the answer was stunning. It was that the Sun was a star but really close. The stars were suns, but so far away they were just little points of light.... And while I didn't know the [inverse] square law of light propagation or anything like that, still, it was clear to me that you would have to move that Sun enormously far away, further away than Brooklyn [for the stars to appears as dots of light]....

The scale of the universe suddenly opened up to me. [It was] kind of a religious experience. [There] was a magnificence to it, a grandeur, a scale which has never left me. Never ever left me.

2. Sagan vs. Apple

In 1994, Apple chose the internal codename "Carl Sagan" for its PowerMac 7100. Though it was meant as an homage to Carl (and an in-joke that the computer would make Apple "billions and billions" of dollars), they also used the codenames "Piltdown Man" and "Cold Fusion" for the Power Mac 6100 and 8100, respectively. When Carl found out that he was being put alongside scientific hoaxes, he sued Apple. Though Apple won the suit, the codename was changed to BHA (Butt Head Astronomer) ... which prompted yet another lawsuit from the p.o.'d astronomer! Apple won again, but their lawyers demanded the engineers change the codename one more time, which they did. The PowerMac 7100 was known by its final codename LAW, which stood for "Lawyers Are Wimps."

3. Spaced Out ... On Pot!

In 1969, Carl Sagan wrote under the Pseudonym "Mr. X" about the virtues of cannabis. Harvard Medical School Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry Lester Grinspoon has the article in his website Marijuana Uses:

It all began about ten years ago. I had reached a considerably more relaxed period in my life - a time when I had come to feel that there was more to living than science, a time of awakening of my social consciousness and amiability, a time when I was open to new experiences. I had become friendly with a group of people who occasionally smoked cannabis, irregularly, but with evident pleasure. Initially I was unwilling to partake, but the apparent euphoria that cannabis produced and the fact that there was no physiological addiction to the plant eventually persuaded me to try. My initial experiences were entirely disappointing; there was no effect at all, and I began to entertain a variety of hypotheses about cannabis being a placebo which worked by expectation and hyperventilation rather than by chemistry. After about five or six unsuccessful attempts, however, it happened. I was lying on my back in a friend's living room idly examining the pattern of shadows on the ceiling cast by a potted plant (not cannabis!). I suddenly realized that I was examining an intricately detailed miniature Volkswagen, distinctly outlined by the shadows. I was very skeptical at this perception, and tried to find inconsistencies between Volkswagens and what I viewed on the ceiling. But it was all there, down to hubcaps, license plate, chrome, and even the small handle used for opening the trunk. When I closed my eyes, I was stunned to find that there was a movie going on the inside of my eyelids. Flash . . . a simple country scene with red farmhouse, a blue sky, white clouds, yellow path meandering over green hills to the horizon. . . Flash . . .

4. The Politics of Science

Anyone who has ever worked in a university or an academic institution would know this, but most people assume that because science relies on logic and careful reasoning, scientists would behave in a clinical and dispassionate way. Nothing is farther from the truth.

Carl's popularity had backfired on him not once but twice. In 1967, he was denied tenure at Harvard because his colleagues bristled at "what they perceived as self-aggrandizement and pandering to the public."

In 1992, Carl was again disappointed when his application for membership at the prestigious National Academy of Sciences was denied. Ironically, he received the Public Welfare Medal, the highest award of the Academy for "distinguished contributions in the application of science to the public welfare."

In both instances, Carl persevered and succeeded to overcome setbacks resulting from the politics of science.

5. Billions and Billions

Carl Sagan actually never used the term "billions and billions." His exact words on the series Cosmos were "billions upon billions" (which, for all practical purpose, is pretty much the same thing).

So how did "billions and billions" came to be? We can blame Johnny Carson:

[YouTube Clip]

Carl was a good sport - his final book, titled Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium, opened with a tongue-in-cheek discussion of the catch phrase and noted that Johnny Carson himself was an amateur astronomer.

6. The Sagan Unit

A sagan is defined as at least 4 billion (the smallest amount in "billions" is two billion, so "billions and billions" equal 4 billion). It is estimated that the Milky Way galaxy has 100 sagan (400,000,000,000) stars.

Previously on Neatorama: Fun and Unusual Units of Measurements

7. Pioneer Plaques

Many people know that Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 spacecrafts carry metal plaques that carry a message from mankind. But not many know that it was Carl Sagan, together with Frank Drake (yes, the man who came up with the Drake Equation that attempts to estimate the number of alien civilization in our galaxy), that designed the plaque. The controversial artwork, which featured a nude man and woman, was drawn by Sagan's then-wife Linda Salzman Sagan.

After the Pioneer Program, NASA put a Golden Record aboard the two Voyager spacecrafts, which included a greeting "Hello from the children of planet Earth." That was recorded by then six-year-old Nick Sagan, Carl's son.

8. Carl Sagan Memorial Station ... on Mars!

Nick Sagan grew up to become a novelist and screenwriter. He wrote an episode of Star Trek: Enterprise titled "Terra Prime," which included a CGI of Carl Sagan Memorial Station plaque on Mars.

Image via Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki

The plaque above is fictional - but the Carl Sagan Memorial Station is real. It's the formal name of the NASA Mars Pathfinder lander, which delivered the Sojourner rover that explored the Red Planet.

9. Sagan Asteroid

Just in case a unit of measurement and a memorial station on Mars aren't enough, Carl had another thing named after him: a small asteroid in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter was named the 2709 Sagan.

10. Sagan's Last Interview

In 1996, not long before his death, Carl Sagan was interviewed by Charlie Rose, in which he discussed the rise of pseudoscience in the United States. He looked gaunt in the interview, but as you can see, he remained as sharp as ever:

[Google Video]

Bonus: Carl Sagan A Glorious Dawn Auto-Tune

This has been on Neatorama before, but it's so good that we just have to feature it again for those of you who might've missed it. Behold, Carl Sagan's A Glorious Dawn auto-tuned:

[YouTube Clip]

__________

I'll be the first to acknowledge that this is a woefully inadequate post about one of the most brilliant scientists who ever lived. We didn't talk about Cosmos (because it's so popular, I opted for the more obscure Sagan trivia), his books and Pulitzer Prize, Carl Sagan Day and so on. If you have a Sagan story, please share it in the comments.

Alan Taylor’s excellent photoblog The Big Picture over at Boston.com has a really nifty collection of images of the Martian landscape:

Since 2006, NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has been orbiting Mars, currently circling approximately 300 km (187 mi) above the Martian surface. On board the MRO is HiRISE, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment camera, which has been photographing the planet for several years now at resolutions as fine as mere inches per pixel. Collected here is a group of images from HiRISE over the past few years, in either false color or grayscale, showing intricate details of landscapes both familiar and alien, from the surface of our neighboring planet, Mars. I invite you to take your time looking through these, imagining the settings – very cold, dry and distant, yet real.

Link

Photo: NASA

Going to Mars is costly.  The conventional thinking of round-trip missions is losing more and more ground to an idea made public last year.  Theoretical physicist/cosmologist Paul Davies addressed the NASA Astrobiology Science Conference, and laid out a solid (and sometimes humorous) case for the One Way Ticket plan.

He points out the commercial angle, saying that not only would a patent trade emerge from discoveries, but televised coverage of the pioneers would be lucrative as well.  And those pioneers?  He says our planet is full of risk-takers seeking adventure that would fill the role nicely.

By comparison, a one-way trip to Mars would not be so risky. But it does need a spirit of adventure of the sort that the early explorers had, in particular the people who opened up Antarctica. These people often went knowing that there was a high probability that they would not come back, and that if they didn’t come back, they were going to their deaths. I’m not suggesting that going to Mars necessarily means an instant death, but it may mean a premature death, it may mean your life expectancy is shortened by a little bit. But as I said, people attempt that risk in all sorts of other walks of life.

And what I have in mind is not just four miserable people sitting around on the martian surface waiting to die, (laughter) but that they would actually be doing useful job work.

You wouldn’t be going there as tourists, you wouldn’t be going there for fun. You’d be going there to do science, and emailing all this stuff back. Your publication record would be sensational. (laughter) You would no doubt have all sort of honors heaped on you.

But you wouldn’t be coming home.

Link.   Previously on Neatorama: Chart of Missions to Mars

Image: Bryan Christie

Illustrator Bryan Christie specializes in transforming “complex ideas into compelling images”, especially scientific or technological ideas. One of his recent works is this chart of the human exploration of Mars, organized by country, date, type, and successfulness. Click the link for a larger view.

Link via Fast Company | Artist’s Website

The new findings confirm suspicions that water once shaped the Martian landscape on a regional scale instead of forming isolated oases, said rover project leader Steven Squyres of Cornell University in New York State.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by sunnyspeaks.

Continuing today’s special theme: Expedia has announced affordable trips to mars. It’s now cheaper to vacation on Mars than to visit Las Vegas!

That’s right! Expedia has dropped all booking fees—including fees on flights to Mars. Right now you can save over $3 trillion on a Mars vacation—and in this economy, you can’t afford NOT to go!

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by MatthewInman.

Claymation has never been this good: Link [embedded YouTube clip, quite risque yet oh-so-funny. You've been warned ...]

Here’s some good news for all the space buffs out there: NASA’s Phoenix lander may have captured the first images of liquid water on Mars. Photographs appear to show water droplets that splashed onto the craft’s leg during landing.

“The controversial observation could be explained by the mission’s previous discovery of perchlorate salts in the soil, since the salts can keep water liquid at sub-zero temperatures. Researchers say this antifreeze effect makes it possible for liquid water to be widespread just below the surface of Mars, but point out that even if it is there, it may be too salty to support life as we know it.”

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by whitespace.

Its hard to believe these little things can even fly. They are about as small as a quarter and are simply cool.

Ilan Kroo and his colleagues at Stanford hope to use them for Mars exploration or atmospheric research one day!

Link – via djowtlaw

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by slowboy.

Mars Rover was rovin’ along the Red Planet where it snapped a picture of what looks like … a log of wood? The photo immediately a conspiracy theory rush in the blogosphere:

The unusual image was featured in a NASA press release in 2004, although the space agency made no mention of the timber-like object captured on the spacecraft’s 115th day on Mars.

But one website insists it is a leaked image that ‘could get someone killed.’ A writer from TheCrit.com said NASA’s claims Mars was a desert world were ‘lies’ and that ‘there are vast forests on Mars, ones that are kept from the public.’

They go on to speculate the ‘wood’ was brought to its present position by a flood of water that must have happened within 40 years ‘because the wood is intact.’

Link

This fantastic discovery, of course, is in a long list of strange objects (humanoid, skull, doorway, cave) already found.