[meteorite-list] NASA Mars Rover Curiosity Nears Mountain-Base Outcrop

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 1 Aug 2014 16:01:48 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <201408012301.s71N1maN017937_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-257

NASA Mars Rover Curiosity Nears Mountain-Base Outcrop
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
August 01, 2014

As it approaches the second anniversary of its landing on Mars, NASA's
Curiosity rover is also approaching its first close look at bedrock that
is part of Mount Sharp, the layered mountain in the middle of Mars' Gale
Crater.

The mission made important discoveries during its first year by finding
evidence of ancient lake and river environments. During its second year,
it has been driving toward long-term science destinations on lower
slopes of Mount Sharp. Those destinations are in an area beginning about
2 miles (3 kilometers) southwest of the rover's current location, but an
appetizer outcrop of a base layer of the mountain lies much closer --
less than one-third of a mile (500 meters) from Curiosity. The rover
team is calling the outcrop "Pahrump Hills."

"We're coming to our first taste of a geological unit that's part of the
base of the mountain rather than the floor of the crater," said
Curiosity Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute
of Technology, Pasadena. "We will cross a major terrain boundary."

For about half of July, the rover team at NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, California, drove Curiosity across an area of
hazardously sharp rocks called "Zabriskie Plateau." Damage to
Curiosity's aluminum wheels from driving across similar terrain last
year prompted a change in route planning to skirt such rock-studded
terrain wherever feasible. The one-eighth mile (200 meters) across
Zabriski Plateau was one of the longest stretches without a suitable
detour on the redesigned route toward the long-term science destination.

"The wheels took some damage getting across Zabriskie Plateau, but it's
less than I expected from the amount of hard, sharp rocks embedded
there," said JPL's Jim Erickson, project manager for Curiosity. "The
rover drivers showed that they're up to the task of getting around the
really bad rocks. There will still be rough patches ahead. We didn't
imagine prior to landing that we would see this kind of challenge to the
vehicle, but we're handling it."

Another recent challenge appeared last week in the form of unexpected
behavior by an onboard computer currently serving as backup. Curiosity
carries duplicate main computers. It has been operating on its B-side
computer since a problem with the A-side computer prompted the team to
command a side swap in February 2013. Work in subsequent weeks of 2013
restored availability of the A-side as a backup in case of B-side
trouble. Last week, fresh commanding of the rover was suspended for two
days while engineers confirmed that the A-side computer remains reliable
as a backup.

Curiosity landed inside Gale Crater on Aug. 5, 2012, PDT (Aug. 6, 2012,
EDT). During its first year of operations, it fulfilled its major
science goal of determining whether Mars ever offered environmental
conditions favorable for microbial life. Clay-bearing sedimentary rocks
on the crater floor in an area called Yellowknife Bay yielded evidence
of a lakebed environment billions of years ago that offered fresh water,
all of the key elemental ingredients for life, and a chemical source of
energy for microbes, if any existed there.

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Project continues to use Curiosity to
assess ancient habitable environments and major changes in Martian
environmental conditions. The destinations on Mount Sharp offer a series
of layers that recorded different chapters in the environmental
evolution of early Mars.

JPL, a division of Caltech, built the rover and manages the project for
NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

For more information about Curiosity, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/msl

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/

You can follow the mission on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity

and on Twitter at:

http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity

Guy Webster
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6278
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov

2014-257
Received on Fri 01 Aug 2014 07:01:48 PM PDT