Have you heard about Ingenuity? The little helicopter flying around on Mars. No? Then you missed the first powered, controlled flight on another planet. So, let’s take a closer look at Ingenuity and the other spacecrafts on the surface of Mars. Do you know any of the other spacecrafts?
Ingenuity – Mars helicopter
As I said before, Ingenuity is a little helicopter, currently sitting on the surface of Mars. How did it get there, you ask? It launched on 30 July 2020 as part of the Mars 2020 mission and was stored under the Perseverance Rover until the Rover dropped it to the ground on Mars.
Although Ingenuity has a mass of about 1.8 kilograms, its rotor blades have a diameter of ~1.2 meters. That seems large, but the density of the atmosphere on Mars is 1% of Earth. So, to fly, Ingenuity needs big blades. At least, that was the theory, as no craft had done a powered, controlled flight on another world. Therefore, the main mission on Ingenuity was to demonstrate just that.
On 19 April 2021 Ingenuity succeeded. It lifted off, rose to an altitude of 3 meters. After hovering there for 30 seconds, it descended and touched back down on the surface. The complete flight took only 39.1 seconds, nonetheless it was a historic flight. Which Perseverance watched and took pictures of. Take a look at them here.
Ingenuity successfully completed its main mission, to demonstrate the technology, on 25 April 2021. Therefore, it got a new mission to demonstrate operations. Part of this mission is to do aerial scouting for the Perseverance rover. Since being dropped on the surface of Mars, Ingenuity has completed 18 flights. And it keeps on flying and supporting Perseverance. So, what is Perseverance, and what is it doing on Mars?
Mars 2020 – Perseverance Rover
As I mentioned before, it is a rover – a rover on the surface of Mars. The mission is to search for signs of ancient life and to collect samples of rock and regolith to be returned to Earth one day.
The rover launched as the Mars 2020 mission on an Atlas V on 30 July 2020. Because of the size of the rover, about 3 meters long, 2.7 meters wide, and 2.2 meters tall, NASA decided to use a sky crane to land Perseverance on Mars. Watch this animation of the landing, to see the details. On 18 February 2021 it arrived at Mars and this is, what happened.
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More InformationSince landing, it has taken more than 100,000 images, and collected six samples of Martian rock and atmosphere by using its seven primary instruments. These are the Mastcam-Z, SuperCam, PIXL, SHERLOC, MOXIE, MEDA, and RIMFAX. In addition to instruments used for its primary mission, Perseverance has technology demonstrators on board. One is the before mentioned Ingenuity. The other is MOXIE, the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment. It successfully demonstrated the production of oxygen from carbon dioxide, taken from Mars´ atmosphere.
In 2021 Perseverance already accomplished a lot. You can read and watch the highlights in this article. Nonetheless, NASA expects that the mission lasts for 1.5 Mars years (about three Earth years). Probably a lot longer, as the Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator powering it has an operational lifetime of 14 years.
Perseverance makes use of experiences gained with previous rovers. Enhancing its capabilities with for example an autopilot for avoiding hazards called Terrain Relative Navigation. As well as a new autonomous navigation system, that allows the rover to drive faster in challenging terrain. Thanks to these features, it recently set records for distance traveled in a day, with 243.3 and 245.76 meters. Follow it around on Mars by visiting this website.
One of the precursors is Curiosity, which is also still active on the surface of Mars. Let’s take a look at it.
Mars Curiosity Rover
The Curiosity rover is a sibling as well as a precursor of the Perseverance rover. Comparable in size and structure, it also uses a Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator as a power source.
It launched on 26 November 2011 on an Atlas V and landed in Gale Crater on 5 August 2012. Also using a sky crane for the landing. In fact, this was the first time using a sky crane for a landing. The main mission is to investigate, if Mars ever had the right environmental conditions to support small life forms. After one year on Mars (about 23 Earth month), Curiosity completed the planned mission. Consequently, NASA extended the mission and Curiosity is still going strong. For example, it recently measured carbon signatures, which are associated with biological processes on Earth.
Although the chassis is quite similar to Perseverance, Curiosity carries other and more instruments. Let’s take a closer look at these 10 instruments. Firstly, MEDLI, which stands for Mars Science Laboratory Entry Descent and Landing Instrument. As the name suggests, it was only used on descent and landing, when it measured the heating and atmospheric pressure changes. Secondly, MARDI, which stands for Mars Descent Imager, also only used on descent and landing to capture color video of the terrain below.
The other 8 instruments are still in active use on the rover. This includes the cameras Mastcam and MAHLI, which capture color photos and videos of the Martian terrain. In addition, MAHLI, the Mars Hand Lens Imager, captures close-up magnified images of rocks on the surface.
Four of the instruments are spectrometers. Let’s start with APXS, which stands for Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer. It measures the amounts and types of elements, when placed next to a rock or soil surface. ChemCam, short for Chemistry and Camera, uses a laser, camera, and spectrometer to identify the chemical and mineral composition of rocks and soils. Another instrument focused on the composition of minerals is CheMin, which is a short name for the Chemical and Mineralogy instrument. And finally, the last of the spectormeters is SAM. It stands for Sample Analysis at Mars and searches for organic chemicals and light elements potentially associated with life.
At long last, Curiosity has two radiation detectors, called RAD and DAN. RAD stands for Radiation Assessment Detector and measures type and amount of radiation on the surface of Mars. Thus helping to prepare for a potential visit of humans. Likewise, DAN, short for Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons, helps this task by searching for water.
Do you want to know more about the instruments? Take a look at the rover in 3D or the website about the instruments. Finally, if you want to see, where Curiosity currently is on the surface of Mars, this website has you covered.
InSight
To summarize what we learned so far, what do all the previous crafts have in common? They are all mobile. So, for a change, let’s look at a lander. By that, I mean the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport mission, or short InSight.
InSight launched on 5 May 2018 on an Atlas V and successfully landed in Elysium Planitia on 26 November 2018. Started it’s planned mission of 709 Sols (or 728 Earth days), which meanwhile it surpassed. The lander has a mass of 360 kilograms and a diameter of 1.56 meters. That is, without deployed solar panels. With its solar panels deployed, it has a width of 6 meters.
InSight is the first mission to in-depth study the interior of Mars: its crust, mantle, and core. Therefore, it has three primary instruments: SEIS, HP3, and RISE. Let’s take a closer look at them, one by one.
SEIS, the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure, is a seismometer that measures the seismic vibrations of Mars. In this case, marsquakes and impacts of meteorites. The results will help us understand, how the rocky planets of the Solar System formed.
HP3, the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package, measures the temperature coming from the inside of Mars. Therefore, it hammers itself to about 5 meters beneath the surface. Unfortunately, this didn’t go as planned. The instrument, also called the mole, wasn’t able to get to the required depth. For more about that, see this article.
RISE, the Rotation and Interior Structure Experiment, keeps track of the precise position of the lander. Hence, allowing scientists to determine how much Mars’ poles wobble on its way around the sun. Furthermore, allowing scientists to determine size, composition, and condition of the core.
Speaking of unusual ways, how would you clean your solar panels from dust on Mars? The team of InSight did it by dropping sand on the lander. That can’t be true, you say? You can read the whole story in this article.
Zhurong rover
The missions listed before are all run by NASA. But they are not alone on Mars anymore. Because on 14 May 2021 a lander and rover from CNSA, China’s national space agency, set down in the southern Utopia Planitia. Making the first landing of a spacecraft from China on Mars a success.
Zhurong launched on 23 July 2020 on a Long March 5 as part of the Tianwen-1 mission. Not only the first independent mission of China to Mars, but also a complex one. Because it consists of an orbiter, a lander, and a rover. The lander has no instruments. So, let’s focus on the rover.
Zhurong has a mass of 240 kilograms, a height of 1.85 meters and is powered by solar panels. With the latter powering six scientific instruments. Let’s start with RoPeR, short for Mars Rover Penetrating Radar, a ground-penetrating radar, which can look up to 100 meters below the surface. RoMAG, short for Mars Rover Magnetometer, is a magnetometer used to obtain the fine-scale structures of the magnetic field of the crust. MarSCoDe, short for Mars Surface Compound Detector, is a laser-based spectroscope. Coupled with MSCam, short for Multispectral Camera, they search for the historical presence of water. In addition, MCS, short for Mars Climate Station, measures the temperature, pressure, wind velocity and direction of the surface atmosphere. Finally, NaTeCam, short for Navigation and Topography Cameras, is a camera used to construct topography maps of the surface.
All in all, an impressive first mission of China to Mars. Let’s see, what they are up to next.
Credit for image featured at the top: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
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