[meteorite-list] Mars Phoenix Lander Finishes Successful Work on Red Planet

[Ron Baalke]

Nov. 10, 2008

Dwayne Brown 
Headquarters, Washington 
202-358-1726 
dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov 

Guy Webster/Rhea Borja 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
818-354-6278/0850 
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov, rhea.r.borja at jpl.nasa.gov 

Lori Stiles 
University of Arizona, Tucson 
520-626-4402 
lstiles at email.arizona.edu 

RELEASE: 08-284

MARS PHOENIX LANDER FINISHES SUCCESSFUL WORK ON RED PLANET

WASHINGTON -- NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has ceased communications 
after operating for more than five months. As anticipated, seasonal 
decline in sunshine at the robot's arctic landing site is not 
providing enough sunlight for the solar arrays to collect the power 
necessary to charge batteries that operate the lander's instruments. 

Mission engineers last received a signal from the lander on Nov. 2. 
Phoenix, in addition to shorter daylight, has encountered a dustier 
sky, more clouds and colder temperatures as the northern Mars summer 
approaches autumn. The mission exceeded its planned operational life 
of three months to conduct and return science data. 

The project team will be listening carefully during the next few weeks 
to hear if Phoenix revives and phones home. However, engineers now 
believe that is unlikely because of the worsening weather conditions 
on Mars. While the spacecraft's work has ended, the analysis of data 
from the instruments is in its earliest stages. 

"Phoenix has given us some surprises, and I'm confident we will be 
pulling more gems from this trove of data for years to come," said 
Phoenix Principal Investigator Peter Smith of the University of 
Arizona in Tucson. 

Launched Aug. 4, 2007, Phoenix landed May 25, 2008, farther north than 
any previous spacecraft to land on the Martian surface. The lander 
dug, scooped, baked, sniffed and tasted the Red Planet's soil. Among 
early results, it verified the presence of water-ice in the Martian 
subsurface, which NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter first detected remotely 
in 2002. Phoenix's cameras also returned more than 25,000 pictures 
from sweeping vistas to near the atomic level using the first atomic 
force microscope ever used outside Earth. 

"Phoenix not only met the tremendous challenge of landing safely, it 
accomplished scientific investigations on 149 of its 152 Martian days 
as a result of dedicated work by a talented team," said Phoenix 
Project Manager Barry Goldstein at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory 
in Pasadena, Calif. 

Phoenix's preliminary science accomplishments advance the goal of 
studying whether the Martian arctic environment has ever been 
favorable for microbes. Additional findings include documenting a 
mildly alkaline soil environment unlike any found by earlier Mars 
missions; finding small concentrations of salts that could be 
nutrients for life; discovering perchlorate salt, which has 
implications for ice and soil properties; and finding calcium 
carbonate, a marker of effects of liquid water. 

Phoenix findings also support the goal of learning the history of 
water on Mars. These findings include excavating soil above the ice 
table, revealing at least two distinct types of ice deposits; 
observing snow descending from clouds; providing a mission-long 
weather record, with data on temperature, pressure, humidity and 
wind; observations of haze, clouds, frost and whirlwinds; and 
coordinating with NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to perform 
simultaneous ground and orbital observations of Martian weather. 

"Phoenix provided an important step to spur the hope that we can show 
Mars was once habitable and possibly supported life," said Doug 
McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA 
Headquarters in Washington. "Phoenix was supported by orbiting NASA 
spacecraft providing communications relay while producing their own 
fascinating science. With the upcoming launch of the Mars Science 
Laboratory, the Mars Program never sleeps." 

The University of Arizona leads the Phoenix mission with project 
management at JPL and development partnership at Lockheed Martin 
Corporation in Denver. International contributions came from the 
Canadian Space Agency; the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the 
universities of Copenhagen and Aarhus in Denmark; the Max Planck 
Institute in Germany; the Finnish Meteorological Institute; and 
Imperial College of London. 

For additional information about Phoenix mission findings, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/phoenix   
	
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