Mars – Page 26 – Astronomy Now

Launch of European Mars mission delayed two months

20 September 2015 Stephen Clark

Officials expect to delay next year’s launch of a European Mars orbiter and lander about two months — from January to March — to remove faulty pressure transducers from the landing craft’s braking system, the European Space Agency announced Friday.

See planet Venus dazzle at greatest brilliancy in the pre-dawn sky

17 September 2015 Ade Ashford

Early risers wishing to see Venus as a dazzling ‘morning star’ need only glance low to the east in the pre-dawn sky. The planet reaches greatest brilliancy on Sunday, 20 September when, for a couple of mornings, it can be seen outshining brightest nighttime star Sirius in the southeast by a factor of seventeen times. Can you see your shadow cast by Venus?

Regional, not global, processes led to huge Martian floods

12 September 2015 Astronomy Now

Gigantic groundwater outbursts created the largest flood channels in the solar system on Mars, 3.2 billion years ago. For many years it was thought that this was caused by the release of water from a global water table, but research just published reveals regional deposits of sediment and ice emplaced 450 million years earlier to be the source.

See the Moon & Venus get close in the pre-dawn sky

9 September 2015 Ade Ashford

As dawn creeps across Western Europe on the morning of Thursday, 10 September, a close conjunction of the two brightest objects in the nighttime sky is taking place low in the east an hour before sunrise. So, set your alarm for 5:30am in the UK to see a beautiful juxtaposition of a 26-day-old waning crescent Moon and dazzling planet Venus in the twilight.

What happened to early Mars’ atmosphere?

3 September 2015 Astronomy Now

Scientists may be closer to solving the mystery of how Mars changed from a world with surface water billions of years ago to the arid Red Planet of today. A new analysis of the largest known deposit of carbonate minerals on Mars suggests that the original Martian atmosphere may have already lost most of its carbon dioxide by the era of valley network formation.

Mountain-climbing Mars rover sends back low-angle selfie

23 August 2015 Stephen Clark

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has recorded itself in another of its famous self-portraits as the mobile robot analyzes bore samples recently collected from a rock slab, the first use of the drill since a short circuit halted use of the device in February.

Historic 24-inch Clark refractor to reopen at Lowell Observatory

20 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona is famous as the place where dwarf planet Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930, but it has an illustrious 121-year-old record of astronomical research and discovery. After a 20-month-long restoration project, Lowell’s historic 24-inch Alvan Clark refractor is poised to reopen for public observing sessions.

Last vestiges of surface water on Mars indicated by salt flat

9 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Mars turned cold and dry long ago, but scientists have discovered evidence of an ancient lake that likely represents some of the last potentially habitable surface water ever to exist on the Red Planet. University of Colorado Boulder researchers estimate that the lake was only about 8 percent as salty as the Earth’s oceans and therefore may have been hospitable to microbial life.

New study favours cold, icy — not warm, wet — early Mars

16 June 2015 Astronomy Now

The high seas of Mars may never have existed, according to a new study that looks at two opposite climate scenarios of early Mars and suggests that a cold and icy planet billions of years ago better explains water drainage and erosion features seen on the planet today.

NASA spacecraft detects impact glass on surface of Mars

9 June 2015 Astronomy Now

NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has detected deposits of glass within impact craters on Mars. Though formed in the searing heat of a violent impact, such deposits might provide a delicate window into the possibility of past life on the Red Planet.