Mars
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NASA
Our First View of the Surface of Mars
“Touchdown, we have touchdown!” At 5:12 a.m. PDT, July 20, 1976, mission controllers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory erupted in cheers as they learned that the Viking 1 lander had survived its descent through the thin Martian atmosphere. Forty minutes later, the lander’s first image began to appear on their monitors, slowly forming line by line from left to right.…
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NASA
From Hampton to Mars: How NASA Langley Helped Land on the Red Planet
Fifty years ago, NASA’s Viking 1 and 2 landers made the first successful landings on Mars, opening a new era in planetary exploration. Behind that achievement was a team at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, whose steady leadership and technical expertise helped turn an ambitious idea into a mission that reshaped how we explore other worlds. Building the…
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NASA
The Growing Crescent of Mars as NASA’s Psyche Mission Approaches
Description This composite of images taken by NASA’s Psyche mission shows the crescent of Mars grow as the spacecraft approached the planet for a gravity assist from May 2 to May 15, 2026. The series begins with the smallest crescent at the center of the of the image as Mars is farthest from the spacecraft, and progressively grows as the spacecraft gets…
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NASA
Curiosity Finds Evidence of an Ancient Sandstorm
Description Billions of years ago, an hours-long Martian sandstorm blew so intensely that sand ripples began to climb upon one another as they moved across the surface. These layers of sediment eventually hardened into the multilayered rocks seen in this image, which was taken by NASA’s Curiosity rover on Dec. 12, 2024, the 4,391st Martian day, or sol, of the…
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NASA
Curiosity Blog, Sols 4934-4940: In the Land of the Polygons
Written by William Farrand, Senior Research Scientist, Space Science Institute Earth planning date: Friday, June 26, 2026 There were two planning cycles over this span of sols. The Monday planning took place with Curiosity situated within a unit that from orbital imagery appeared light-toned, and from earlier rover positions appeared smooth. Reaching this unit, the rover team was surprised to…
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NASA
NASA Announces Public-Private Partnership to Advance Mars Science
NASA Wednesday announced a new public‑private partnership to advance Mars science by combining the agency’s scientific leadership with commercial innovation. Under this model, NASA will provide the Aeolus atmospheric‑science instrument payload suite, while Relativity Space supplies the spacecraft, rocket, and cruise operations necessary to deliver the instruments to Mars. This partnership reflects NASA’s growing commitment to approaches that accelerate discovery,…
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NASA
Curiosity Blog: Sols 4913-4919: Planetary explorers, freewheeling to the Yardang unit!
Written by Catherine O’Connell-Cooper, APXS Strategic Planner and Payload Uplink/Downlink Lead, University of New Brunswick, Canada Earth planning day: Friday, June 5th, 2026 In a very broad sense, Curiosity has two modes of doing science – one centred around a defined science campaign (such as the recent boxwork campaign) and the other as we move between campaigns. During a science…
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NASA
Curiosity Blog, Sols 4908-4912: Goodbye Campo Marte, It’s Been Fun!
By Susanne P. Schwenzer, Professor of Planetary Mineralogy at The Open University, UK Earth planning date: Friday, May 29, 2026 Drilling always keeps the rover in place for a little while, and our 47th successful drill, “Campo Marte,” was no exception. The team used the time wisely and on top of the drilling, we also have many observations. Thinking for…
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NASA
New Eruption in the Bismarck Sea
It’s a truism among oceanographers that there is more accurate mapping of the surface of the Moon and Mars than of the deep-ocean floor. That’s especially true for the Bismarck Sea, a relatively deep body of water north of Papua New Guinea. It’s an ocean basin with a geologically complex seafloor rife with faults, volcanic features, rifts, scarps, and active subduction and spreading zones at depths that…
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NASA
Psyche Spacecraft Completes Mars Flyby
NASA’s Psyche spacecraft completed its close approach of Mars on May 15, coming within 2,864 miles (4,609 kilometers) of the planet’s surface. During the flyby, it took this image and others. This representative color image, captured by Psyche’s multispectral imager instrument, features the double-ring crater Huygens and the surrounding heavily cratered southern highlands. This flyby used a gravity assist from Mars to…
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