[meteorite-list] NASA Mars Rover Targets Unusual Rock En Route to First Destination

[Ron Baalke]

Sept. 19, 2012

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

Guy Webster / D.C. Agle 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
818-354-5011 
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov / agle at jpl.nasa.gov 

RELEASE: 12-332

NASA MARS ROVER TARGETS UNUSUAL ROCK EN ROUTE TO FIRST DESTINATION

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has driven up to a 
football-size rock that will be the first for the rover's arm to 
examine. 

Curiosity is about 8 feet (2.5 meters) from the rock. It lies about 
halfway from Curiosity's landing site, Bradbury Landing, to a 
location called Glenelg. In coming days, the team plans to touch the 
rock with a spectrometer to determine its elemental composition and 
use an arm-mounted camera to take close-up photographs. 

Both the arm-mounted Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer and the 
mast-mounted, laser-zapping Chemistry and Camera Instrument will be 
used for identifying elements in the rock. This will allow 
cross-checking of the two instruments. 

The rock has been named "Jake Matijevic." Jacob Matijevic 
(mah-TEE-uh-vik) was the surface operations systems chief engineer 
for Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) and the project's Curiosity rover. 
He passed away Aug. 20, at age 64. Matijevic also was a leading 
engineer for all of the previous NASA Mars rovers: Sojourner, Spirit 
and Opportunity. 

Curiosity now has driven six days in a row. Daily distances range from 
72 feet to 121 feet (22 meters to 37 meters). 

"This robot was built to rove, and the team is really getting a good 
rhythm of driving day after day when that's the priority," said MSL 
Project Manager Richard Cook of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 
Pasadena, Calif. 

The team plans to choose a rock in the Glenelg area for the rover's 
first use of its capability to analyze powder drilled from interiors 
of rocks. Three types of terrain intersect in the Glenelg area -- one 
lighter- toned and another more cratered than the terrain Curiosity 
currently is crossing. The light-toned area is of special interest 
because it retains daytime heat long into the night, suggesting an 
unusual composition. 

"As we're getting closer to the light-toned area, we see thin, dark 
bands of unknown origin," said Mars Science Laboratory Project 
Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology, 
Pasadena. "The smaller-scale diversity is becoming more evident as we 
get closer, providing more potential targets for investigation." 

Researchers are using Curiosity's Mast Camera (Mastcam) to find 
potential targets on the ground. Recent new images from the rover's 
camera reveal dark streaks on rocks in the Glenelg area that have 
increased researchers' interest in the area. In addition to taking 
ground images, the camera also has been busy looking upward. 

On two recent days, Curiosity pointed the Mastcam at the sun and 
recorded images of Mars' two moons, Phobos and Deimos, passing in 
front of the sun from the rover's point of view. Results of these 
transit observations are part of a long-term study of changes in the 
moons' orbits. NASA's twin Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and 
Opportunity, which arrived at Mars in 2004, also have observed solar 
transits by Mars' moons. Opportunity is doing so again this week. 

"Phobos is in an orbit very slowly getting closer to Mars, and Deimos 
is in an orbit very slowly getting farther from Mars," said 
Curiosity's science team co-investigator Mark Lemmon of Texas A&M 
University. "These observations help us reduce uncertainty in 
calculations of the changes." 

In Curiosity's observations of Phobos this week, the time when the 
edge of the moon began overlapping the disc of the sun was 
predictable to within a few seconds. Uncertainty in timing is because 
Mars' interior structure isn't fully understood. 

Phobos causes small changes to the shape of Mars in the same way 
Earth's moon raises tides. The changes to Mars' shape depend on the 
Martian interior which, in turn, cause Phobos' orbit to decay. Timing 
the orbital change more precisely provides information about Mars' 
interior structure. 

During Curiosity's two-year prime mission, researchers will use the 
rover's 10 science instruments to assess whether the selected field 
site inside Gale Crater ever has offered environmental conditions 
favorable for microbial life. 

For more about Curiosity, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/msl 

and 

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl 

You can follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter at: 

http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity 

and 

http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity 

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