Curiosity: Mars Science Lab Landing and Surface Operations

Skeptic Ginger said:
Perchlorate that's been found before? That's the big news?

I'm missing something.
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No, not really. Joe Palca is the one who "missed" something, unfortunately interpreting "This data is gonna be one for the history books. It's looking really good" as meaning a discovery was "earthshaking".

Interestingly, though Palca says "earthshaking" in the podcast and transcript, and this word was repeated (and later modified to "earth shattering") when other outlets picked up the story, the associated NPR text simply says "remarkable" in the same place.

I wonder if they edited it after the hoopla?

ETA: Indeed they did. Google's preview of the page still shows "earthshaking" where it now has "remarkable". Bad form NPR!
 

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Curiosity Computer Recovery on Track

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has transitioned from precautionary "safe mode" to active status on the path of recovery from a memory glitch last week. Resumption of full operations is anticipated by next week.

Controllers switched the rover to a redundant onboard computer, the rover's "B-side" computer, on Feb. 28 when the "A-side" computer that the rover had been using demonstrated symptoms of a corrupted memory location. The intentional side swap put the rover, as anticipated, into minimal-activity safe mode.

Curiosity exited safe mode on Saturday and resumed using its high-gain antenna on Sunday.

"We are making good progress in the recovery," said Mars Science Laboratory Project Manager Richard Cook, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "One path of progress is evaluating the A-side with intent to recover it as a backup. Also, we need to go through a series of steps with the B-side, such as informing the computer about the state of the rover -- the position of the arm, the position of the mast, that kind of information."

The cause for the A-side's memory symptoms observed last week remains to be determined.
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This swap-over may delay the analysis of the first powdered drill sample until after the solor conjunction, which begins April 4 and lasts for around 30 days.
 
MSL was put in sleep mode today as a precaution in anticipation of a solar flare that erupted yestarday.

Curiosity sleeps as solar eruption barrels toward Mars; other missions operating normally

The unsettled space weather comes as Curiosity is recovering from a memory hiccup that put its science experiments on hold. It was the first major problem to hit the car-size since landing in an ancient crater near the Martian equator last year to hunt for the chemical building blocks of life.

Engineers were in the middle of troubleshooting when they decided to wait for the weather to pass. The delay means it’ll take longer for Curiosity to return to analyzing the pinch of rock powder from a recent drilling.

Since its instruments are turned off, it can’t use its radiation sensor to track the solar particles.

“It’s just bad timing,” Cook said.
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Puppycow said:
Could cosmic rays be what's corrupted the memory?
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That's the usual suspect, at least. It will be interesting to see if the RAD data is salvagable at the time the error occurred. That's probably the thinking behind the decision to put MSL in sleep mode - the risk of having a memory issue caused by the current flare without a proven backup.
 
If the culprit is, in fact, cosmic rays, does it make a difference whether the computer is under power or in sleep mode?
 
SezMe said:
If the culprit is, in fact, cosmic rays, does it make a difference whether the computer is under power or in sleep mode?
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I think the issue is having a chuck of active memory that is corrupted. Damage caused during sleep mode will be recognized during Curiosity's version of the power-on self test and either repaired or marked as damaged (or both, I guess.) In fact, they seem to think that the (then)primary computer will correct itself when it's powered on and then can be used as a backup system.
 
Some notes from today's rover update:

Micheal Myers:

The rover is now fully commissioned. With the completion of the drilling and drill sample analysis, all firsts have been acomplished.

The rover is the current interation of of the overall Mars Exploration Program which, using experience and data gathered from past missions, is targeting discrete regions of the planet - both current and historic - for possible habitats for life. Each mission and finding seems to broaden the possibility for these habitats.

Gale crater was selected as a target of interest in this overall scheme based on morphologocal and geochemical data gathered from orbit. Gale Crater led to the discovery of an ancient streambed. This streambed was followed down to Yellowknife Bay.

Mineral found in Yellowknife Bay have indicated a near-neutral envoirnment with slightly saltly liquid water.

CheMin:

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The drill sample powder from the John Klein rock was grey-green, indicating that it wasn't heavily oxidized, providing a possibility that organic material (if present) could have been preserved. CheMin analysis of the drill sample indicated a basic minerology very similar to the igneous surface sands and regolith, with the addition of phyllosilicates - the sample being 20=30% smectite which is a water-forming mineral. The abundance of salts like halite and calcium sulfaltes instead of the iron and magnesium sulfayes which were found at Meridiani point to a near neutral pH enviornment. The best terrestrial analouse for the materials found at Yellowknife exist as lakebed sediments in southern Australia.

SAM:

The five major gases detected in the drill sample by the SAM and TLS instruments:

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Water: The large amount of water detected was given off at very high temeratures - between 500-1500 degrees Farenheight - which is good confirmation of the phyllosilicate clays such as smectite found by CheMin. This water that is bound in the clay minerals and released when the sample is heated.

Oxygen: This is being interpreted as the product of the decomposition of perchlorate which is interesting.

CO2: This is not completely understood - it could be generated during the analysis or could be the result of decomposition of a carbonate. The SAM team will be following up with this.

Sulfur Dioxide/Hydrogen Sulfide: This is fascinating due to the sample being much more reduced or oxidized than the surface samples.

TLS:

A key finding from the TLS was a very low deuterium/hydrogen ratio in the water sample as compared with surface samples - the surface sample ratio thought to be a result of water being lost to space.

Organics:

Some chloromethane compounds were found with the disclaimer that, being the first drill sample, there could also very well be a product of terrestrial contamination.

Hopefully one of our resident geolosits will correct any errors I have introduced here. As always, the full upadte (this one is woth the time to watch) can be found at JPL's UStream channel.
 
Dump Curiosity! Some old codger called 'Opportunity' has found something interest according to the BBC:

The nine-year-old robot has identified rock laden with what scientists believe to be clay minerals.

Their presence is an indication that the rock, dubbed Esperance, has been altered at some point in the past through prolonged contact with water.

Opportunity has seen a clay-bearing outcrop before but scientists say this is by far the best example to date.

"It's very rich," said Steve Squyres, the rover's principal investigator.
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Apparently Opportunity was supposed to last only 90 Martian days but has so far racked up more than 3,000:

It has an "arthritic" robotic arm, its solar panels are losing efficiency, and it drives backwards to save wear on its locomotion system.

It is also now having to contend with glitchy flash memory. But the US space agency is determined to keep pushing the vehicle for as long as possible.

"Remember, the rover continues in a very hostile environment on Mars," said John Callas, Nasa's Opportunity project manager.

"The rover could have a catastrophic failure at any moment. So, each day is a gift."
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A friend of mine is a member of the science team-- she wrote this interesting write-up that appeared yesterday in The Guardian.

I particularly liked this description of the financial cost of the mission:
Exploration is not without cost. Over 10 years – conception, build, launch, landing and continuing operation – Curiosity spent about $2.5bn here on Earth. That's a lot. But it's also the cost of one movie ticket for each person in the United States during the past decade. (It's a pretty darn good movie, worth seeing, in my opinion).
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