Mars Rover Blog and Forum

It's time for a new volume of this topic. Posts are taking longer and longer and more and more errors are occurring when referencing the topic.

Volume 4 is here.

sol 2147 ( Feb 7, 2010 ) L0R0 detail of "Chocolate Hills":

Notice how the "rind" or "fracture fill" or whatever-the-stuff-is on the top appears to wrap around the curving side on the left.

The "whatever-the-stuff-is" looks more like a coating draped over the rock after is was blasted into its current position.

I look forward to more detailed pancam views of the left side of this rock.

Solar Generator, Is it environmental friendly equipment?
Ideal for camping or emergency power outages, the
Sun Power Port is a portable generator that when used
to its full potential will pay for itself in less than two years.
In one day of full sunshine, the solar panel easily charges
the 12 volt (standard automobile) battery. An inverter
changes the DC current to AC. From there the electrical energy
is easily accessible to most standard 110 volt small
appliances used in North America.
http://www.sunpowerport.com

Here is the latest Planetary Society update on the Mars Rovers, 31 January '10

[link]

--Bill

I am interested in hearing from trained geologists how likely it is, in their opinion, that such geometries as pointed out here: http://martiananomaly.com/ can result in Martian mesa as a result of natural causes.

Thanks in advance.

Dilip

Manned mission to Mars as well?

I suppose this isn’t surprising. But very disappointing non the less. Who do we blame?
The Banks? Wall street? Obama?

“Constellation is dead,” the source told AFP on condition of anonymity, referring to a program that envisioned returning to the moon by 2020 and using Earth’s nearest neighbor as a base for manned expeditions to Mars…
Reports added that the US space agency will work on finding a commercial solution to ferrying US astronauts to the International Space Station after the scheduled end of NASA’s shuttle program in September 2010.
Astronauts will be able to hitch rides aboard Russian Soyuz spacecraft, but the United States will need a commercial alternative if Congress approves White House plans to scrap development of a successor to the shuttle program.
FMR

A short paper on the prelim findings about Marquette si available from LPSC:

http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2010/pdf/2109.pdf

--Bill

Paper on Marquette from the 41st Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (2010):

http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2010/pdf/2109.pdf

--Bill

I have talked about it for months,now it will soon be a reality.Ben has straightened me out quite well,thank you,on just what the place we are stuck in is like. Still interesting science
can be done here,I would think.
What will it mean if Mars has a solid or liquid core?
Joe

Well... this was expected so it shouldn't come out as a surprise. Spirit will continue functioning as a stationary platform.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-030&icid='MostViewHome'

.Mars
One day on Mars is 24 hours and 37 minuets long
GRAVITY is roughly one third Earths Gravity
ATMOSPHERE Roughly 200 times less than Earth's atmosphere.
SURFACE PRESSURE ~7mb or about .007 times the pressure of one Earth atmosphere
95.3% Carbon Dioxide
2.7% Nitrogen
1.6% Argon
0.13 Oxygen
0.07 Carbon Monoxide
0.03 Water Vapor

MARS has 70 times the Carbon Dioxide as Earth
Martian atmosphere is un-breathable for humans. LIFE Support ie:space suit also protects from radiation.

STORMS exist on Mars
WATER ICE FOG is often created in the bottoms of Martian Canyons,In early morning,FROST can form in many places on the surface.

There is no Rain on Mars

ICE CAPS on NORTH and SOUTH POLES
ICE is a combination of water ice and dry ice.
Two kinds of Ice Caps on Mars.
1.Seasonal,acculturated during winter season and evaporates in summer.
2.Residual caps remain thru the year.

Phoenix landed in an "Anartic" Earth analogy, area,
Some of the soil patches examined,'Ice mixed with soil containing energy sources and nutrients that could be used if there were life.
The soil has "percolate" a form of chlorine,hazardous on Earth,but,certain types of BACTERIA are able to live on it here(Earth)

Professor Mark Lemon,Texas A7M,printed in SCIENCE:QUOTE: The soil has a potential energy source and oxygen source for life on Mars. end quote.

The typical weather is cold and clear.Temperatures in the summer in the southern horizon can rise as high as 20C in daytime then plunge at night.
DUST DEVILS spun by daily dramatic temp changes,Criss Cross the landscape.

TEMPERATURE Average Surface -135F to 26F
Daytime temperatures -71 to -53F
Nightime Temperatures -184 to -85F

We will not explain the Tilt of our earth and the result in climate changes

Seasons on Mars sre a little more complicated.
Mars has amore ellipticall orbit than Earth,so the small amount that the planet is closer to or furthur from the Sun over the course of a year do make a difference in the amount of Sunlight that reaches Mars
BUT: For the most part the seasons are caused by the tilt of Mars axis.

Generally accepted that Mars is much colder than it was in its early days.
More than 2 Billion years ago Mars was much warmer and consequently,wetter.

Joe in Texas
Credits:University of Texas at Austin

I have no feeling of friendship,compadra,comrad,
Post's go for days Unanswered.If Hort went to USMF this blog would die.

On the other forum, poster: hungry4info posted a question"Is this the block in the rear,that we were worried about?
Will some one answer this question if they know? Thank you.

Joe in Sunny Sunday ,Republican southern baptist,,by God's grace,Texas

Here at MRB I have asked before many years back and asked do you visit here but do not post.

I am just an average poster nowhere near some of the great knowledge shared by others.

There are some amazing contributors to this site/boards/threads, young and old, all contribute.

If you do visit here can you just say Hello?

We would Welcome you at anytime.

Hello from us anyway......

Hello, fellow bloggers. I've rarely posted here in the past. But I'm aware that some of you have had your personal trouble with Doug Ellison, a so called space expert.

I've had some conflicts with him. In fact, some of my contributions have pleased the staff, according to their words. I've posted various information about Russian space program, including photos from MAKS 2009, info about Koronas-Foton, Chandrayaan-1 (that's Indian mission), etc.

But today things went out of control. There was a thread about a possible Phoenix revival. A message posted by a member, apparently working at NASA/JPL claimed that Odyssey sent signals to Phoenix, then waited to hear back. I tried to tell the person he may be wrong (after all, according to an article on a credible news site stated that Odyssey was only listening, not actually trying to communicate). I told him very carefully: "Excuse me, but you may be wrong". Less than 10 minutes I got a message from Douglas Ellison, entitled "FINAL WARNING". He accused me of being rude.

So, this is the first issue. Douglas was obviously lying. This is a defamation and he knew that.

Then I asked him what's wrong with "Excuse me". No reply.

After all, I carefully thought about the situation and decided to end my relationship with UMSF and Doug Ellison. I sent a PM entitled: "Please, deregister my account". I also asked him to remove or lock some of my threads in which I've dedicated much of my free time.

Instead of this, I got permanently banned. No deactivation. My personal information is still there. This includes: contact information, instant message service accounts and, most seriously, an avatar which is a photo of me.

I sent an email to Doug Ellison: "Please, respect my wishes". I told him that I no longer wish my personal information to be there.

No reply.

What can I do? Being offensive is something I can accept. But my account is suspended and my personal information is still there. I told him I'm no longer giving him the right to keep it on his website. This could be considered a copyright issue.

I've had a problem with my view of current posts in a topic not updating to the current post.

The example:

[link]

The last post, #151, January 20, 2010 9:45 PM is all I see. On the Forum Menu, it shows that that last post is by Horton, Thu Jan 21, 2010 23:43 EDT. I know I've made a couple of posts since #151. In fact, my last post there was sort of a test post where I said "Pancams up at Exploratorium" and was able to see all the following posts once my "test post" made it to the thread. As I'm sure it would do if I made another test this morning.

I've refreshed the page, cleared my browser cache (IE6, I need to update...), cleared my cookies and cleared the History, but to no avail.

Ideas?

--Bill