Posted by Raimondo Pictet | 0 comments
What next for Spirit?
As you might have heard, Spirit (NASA’s first of two Mars Exploration Rovers) is trapped in sand since May 1st, 2009. After several months of effort, NASA decided to stop trying to free Spirit from the sand trap, which by the way is called Troy.
It’s not the first time a MER* is trapped. Opportunity had been trapped in April 2005, but JPL specialists managed to free it completely after 40 days of hard work, thanks to a lighter mock rover that was put in the same conditions in a sandbox down on earth. The model was lighter to simulate the lower gravity on Mars. They have been working the same way for Spirit during several months, but in vain. NASA announced on January 26h that Spirit had become a “stationary research platform”.
But Spirit hasn’t quite become fully stationary yet. The JPL are now concentrating all efforts on trying to give the rover a more favorable final position so that the solar panels can collect more sunlight. Manoeuvres are very difficult because only four of Spirit’s six wheels are functional. In fact, Spirit has been driving around backwards since its first wheel jammed in 2006.
So how fruitful will the Stationary Platform be? The funny thing is, Spirit has already done a great discovery while trapped in Troy. It actually made a great discovery thanks to Troy. As it was trying to break free back in December, its wheels stirred and turned some of soil beneath it upside down, thus revealing precious samples of sulfates. Why is this big? Ray Arvidson of the Washington University in St. Louis explains: “Sulfates are minerals just beneath the surface that shout to us that they were formed in steam vents, since steam has sulfur in it. Steam is associated with hydrothermal activity – evidence of water-charged explosive volcanism. Such areas could have once supported life.”
Now, NASA scientists hope to study the red planet’s core. Spirit has already begun studying tiny variations the planets rotation. While stationary, Spirit will track the motion of an exact point on the surface (its current position) over months to calculate its long-term motion with great accuracy. NASA scientists hope this will help determine the planet’s inner composition.
Spirit will also study how martian winds affects martian soil, and its composition at the particular place it is stationed.
I’m really sad for Spirit. But we can’t blame her: she landed January 4th, 2004, and the mission was planned to last only three months. Spirit, along with her sister Opportunity, have been the most successful robots ever to land on alien soil, and one of Mankind’s most incredible engineering feats.
“Spirit is not dead,” says Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “It has just entered another phase of its long life.”
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*MER stands for Mars Exploration Rover. Two MERs were sent in 2004: MER-A, referred to as Spirit, and MER-B, referred to as Opportunity.
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Source: Science@NASA
Comic courtesy of xkcd
