#Martians and #Earthlings might share more than we"ve always thought! - http://clapway.com/2015/07/15/mars-curiosity-rover-discovers-earth-like-crust-223/

The latest data from the Mars Curiosity Rover suggests that Mars had a continental crust similar to the one Earth has. Researchers analyzed data collected with the rover’s ChemCam instrument (short for Chemistry and Camera) and determined that the composition of the rocks on Mars was reminiscent of Earth’s crust.

Mars More Like Earth Than Ever

The new evidence from the Mars Curiosity Rover supports the notion that many scientists have held lately, that Mars was once much more like Earth than previously thought. Because of what researchers had previously known of the Martian surface–namely, that it was covered in dark igneous rocks, similar to the ones that make up the underwater crust of the Earth.

Mars was thought of as being a basaltic planet. Due to this latest discovery from the data gathered by the Mars Curiosity Rover, however, this notion is changing.

The ChemCam on Mars Curiosity Rover

Having recently arrived at Gale Crater, the rover began employing its ChemCam instrument to analyze the rocks in the area. This device works simultaneously as a camera and a laser to study the rocks on Mars through the Mars Curiosity Rover. The ChemCam uses its laser component to vaporize materials that it needs to analyze, and then the camera component analyzes the chemical composition of the newly vaporized material. The Mars Curiosity Rover’s ChemCam also contains a spectrograph, which it uses to analyze details of the various minerals that it comes into contact with before and after the laser does its job.

A Lighter Martian Crust

The lead scientist of the ChemCam instrument, Roger Wiens from the Los Alamos National Library, reported that what they saw was unexpected on Mars. Usually they would expect to find dark rocks, but in this instance they saw large, bright crystals on the rocks analyzed by the Mars Curiosity Rover’s ChemCam instrument. Researchers who observed the pictures and chemical data from the rover determined that the rocks were abundant with feldspar and maybe even quartz, which is very similar to the Earth’s continental crust.

According to Violane Sautter, the first author of the paper which was published in Nature Geoscience, these components of Martian crust resemble a rock type found on Earth known to geologists as Tonalite-Trondhjemite-Granodiorite, or TTG, rocks that were predominant in the Earth’s crust from 2.5 billion years ago in the Archean Era. This latest discovery from the Mars Curiosity Rover brings us closer to our nearest neighboring planet than ever.

---

 

The space adventures are abound with Space Scouts:

Mars Curiosity Rover Discovers Earth-like Crust

NASA Mars Rover Climbs to Find New Rock Features - http://clapway.com/2015/05/25/nasa-mars-rover-climbs-to-find-new-rock-features123/

The NASA Mars Rover Curiosity is continuing its Mars adventure as the Mars rover climbs up a hillside to make a new geological discovery. The Curiosity Mars Rover made a trek of 72 feet up a steep 21-degree slope to take a peek at some pale colored rocks on Mars’ Mount Sharp, as well as some dark colored rocks they had yet to see at close proximity.

 

Hillsides Prove Difficult to Traverse

The Mars rover climbs up hillsides with some difficulty in its travel in the past, as it sometimes finds the slopes very slippery. The scientists have noticed that the Mars rover climbs were more difficult in the area of the planet with ripples in the sand. With this in mind, they took the rover around the rippled area around the crater they want to explore and thought it would be on firmer ground. However, the travel was still slippery and so it turned out not to be the best area for its continued adventure.

 

Mars Rover Climbs Sometimes Need Alternate Route

This has happened in several of the Mars rover climbs in the past, so sometimes the rover has to stop in mid-adventure to find a safer route. When this happens, the scientists have to use data from previous observations the rover has recorded and those from satellite images from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in Mars orbit to figure out a different route to take in their studies of the Mars terrain. Therefore, they have determined several alternate routes of travel to use if the Mars rover climbs prove too difficult or dangerous for the rover to handle, say its drivers at the NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is in Pasadena, California.

There are many other areas on Mars that the researchers hope to observe and study in the future, so the Mars rover climbs will get more scientific as it travels around the Red Planet.

 

Mars Rover Climbs Determined by its Software

Mars rover climbs are determined by its onboard software, which calculates possible amounts of slippage by comparing the tally of its wheel rotation to the real driving distance, which is figured out by calculating the data the rover gets as it makes its travel.

As the Mars rover continues the adventure of studying the Red Planet, the Mars rover climbs could get more slippery and harder for it to travel. Scientists will continue to need to make proper calculations to keep the rover safe and on all six wheels so it can keep making discoveries about Mars and sharing them with the world.

NASA Mars Rover Climbs to Find New Rock Features