[meteorite-list] NASA Curiosity Rover Team Selects Second Drilling Target on Mars

[Ron Baalke]

May 9, 2013

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

Guy Webster 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
818-354-6278 
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov 

RELEASE: 13-136

NASA CURIOSITY ROVER TEAM SELECTS SECOND DRILLING TARGET ON MARS

PASADENA, Calif. -- The team operating NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on 
Mars has selected a second target rock for drilling and sampling. The 
rover will set course to the drilling location in coming days. 

This second drilling target, called "Cumberland," lies about nine feet 
(2.75 meters) west of the rock where Curiosity's drill first touched 
Martian stone in February. Curiosity took the first rock sample ever 
collected on Mars from that rock, called "John Klein." The rover 
found evidence of an ancient environment favorable for microbial 
life. Both rocks are flat, with pale veins and a bumpy surface. They 
are embedded in a layer of rock on the floor of a shallow depression 
called "Yellowknife Bay." 

This second drilling is intended to confirm results from the first 
drilling, which indicated the chemistry of the first powdered sample 
from John Klein was much less oxidizing than that of a soil sample 
the rover scooped up before it began drilling. 

"We know there is some cross-contamination from the previous sample 
each time," said Dawn Sumner, a long-term planner for Curiosity's 
science team at the University of California at Davis. "For the 
Cumberland sample, we expect to have most of that cross-contamination 
come from a similar rock, rather than from very different soil." 

Although Cumberland and John Klein are very similar, Cumberland 
appears to have more of the erosion-resistant granules that cause the 
surface bumps. The bumps are concretions, or clumps of minerals, 
which formed when water soaked the rock long ago. Analysis of a 
sample containing more material from these concretions could provide 
information about the variability within the rock layer that includes 
both John Klein and Cumberland. 

Mission engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in 
Pasadena, Calif., recently finished upgrading Curiosity's operating 
software following a four-week break. The rover continued monitoring 
the Martian atmosphere during the break but the team did not send any 
new commands because Mars and the sun were positioned in such a way 
the sun could have blocked or corrupted commands sent from Earth. 

Curiosity is about nine months into a two-year prime mission since 
landing inside Gale Crater on Mars. After the second rock drilling in 
Yellowknife Bay and a few other investigations nearby, the rover will 
drive toward the base of Mount Sharp, a 3-mile (5-kilometer) tall 
layered mountain inside the crater. 

JPL manages the Mars Science Laboratory Project, of which Curiosity is 
the centerpiece, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in 
Washington. 

For more information about the mission, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/msl 

To follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter, visit: 

http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity 

and 

http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity 

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