Mars Lander Pulls All-Nighter Posted on July 23rd
NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander pulled an
all-nighter for the first time Monday.
Mission controllers extended the
spacecraft’s schedule to keep it awake during the Martian night so the lander could coordinate with observations made by NASA’s
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) as it flew over Phoenix.
Phoenix is using its weather station (which
measures temperature, wind speed and wind direction), stereo camera and
fork-like thermal and conductivity probe to monitor changes in the lower
atmosphere and at the surface of Mars as MRO monitors the atmosphere and ground
from above.
The $420 million Phoenix mission, which touched down in the
northern reaches of Mars on May 25, is examining the Martian dirt and
underlying ice to look for possible signs of habitability in the planet’s past.
MRO has been orbiting Mars for two years now, studying its surface with
cameras, spectrometers and radar.
The lander
also stuck its conductivity
probe into the Martian dirt Sunday for more than 24 hours of measurements.
One goal of this test is to see whether some of the water ice trapped in the regolith becomes vapor and enters the atmosphere as the
time of day, and therefore the amount of sunlight hitting the ground, changes.
“We are looking for patterns of
movement and phase change,” said Michael Hecht, lead scientist for Phoenix’s Microscopy,
Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA), which includes the fork-like
probe.
“The probe is working
great,” Hecht added. “We see some changes in soil electrical
properties, which may be related to water, but we’re still chewing on the
data.”
Phoenix can also stick its conductivity
probe up in the air and monitor changes in the atmospheric humidity.
The extended work shift to
coordinate with MRO began on Sunday afternoon Pacific Time. In Mars time at Phoenix’s landing site, the schedule lasts from the
morning of Phoenix’s
55th Martian day, or sol, to the afternoon of its 56th sol.
The plan for the 56th sol also
includes having the lander continue to test its techniques
for collecting
a sample of the rock-hard ice lying just below the surface layer of dirt.
Once the collecting method is pinned down, Phoenix will use its robotic arm to deliver
the icy sample to its Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA), which bakes
samples and uses the vapors given off to determine their composition.
Both of the doors to the oven chosen
for the ice sample opened successfully Saturday, as confirmed
by images from the lander’s stereo camera.
