The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is a long-range, long-duration, roving mobile laboratory. Its name is Curiosity Rover. It is part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program. It is the next logical step beyond the twin Spirit and Opportunity rovers and will continue to study the martian geology from the surface of Mars.

The Mars Science Laboratory rover has six wheels and cameras mounted on a mast. It is twice as long and three times as heavy as the Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit and Opportunity. It is nearly the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. The rover will be capable of reaching a destination that is 20 to 40 kilometers (12 to 24 miles) long, about the size of a small crater or wide canyon and three to five times smaller than previous landing zones on Mars.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, California manages the  Mars Science Laboratory Project.

The Mars Science Laboratory operates under its own power, nuclear power source. It generates electricity to power the science instruments and other systems and allows the rover to operate at higher and lower latitudes than those that might be traversed by a similarly equipped rover dependent on solar and battery power.

The aim of the mission is: 

1. To examine martian rocks and soils in greater detail than ever before in order to understand the geologic processes that formed and modified them.

2. To collect and crush martian rock and soil samples and distribute them to on-board test chambers for chemical analysis. It will carry a suite of scientific instruments to identify organic compounds such as proteins and amino acids and assess Mars as a potential habitat for microbial life, in the past or present.

3. To study the martian atmosphere and determine the distribution and circulation of water and carbon dioxide, whether frozen, liquid or gaseous. To identify features such as atmospheric gases that may be associated with biological activity.

Mars Landing

MSL was delivered by next-generation landers using precision landing systems. In the final minutes before touchdown, the spacecraft activated its parachute and retro rockets before lowering the rover package to the Mars Surface on a tether (similar to the way a skycrane helicopter moves a large object).

The landing site of the Mars Science Laboratory mission was Gale Crater, Mars.

MSL is expected to remain active after landing for one Mars year (687 Earth days - two Earth years). NASA selected the Gale Crater landing site on the basis of highly detailed images sent to Earth by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and in addition to data from previous mars missions.

Specs:

The Curiosity rover  is 30m (10 ft) in length and weighs 900 kg (1,984 lb) including 80kg (176 lb) of scientific instruments.

Curiosity is 5 times as large and carry more than 10 times the mass of scientific instruments as the Mars Exploration Rovers Spirit or Opportunity.

* In late 2004 Aerojet test-fired a Viking flight spare rocket engine assembly in order to help design a new engine which will deliver the Mars Science Laboratory rover to the surface of Mars. The rocket engine used in the test was originally built, tested and delivered in 1973 for the Viking program. The engine was put into storage after the successful landing of the Viking 1 and Viking 2 spacecraft on Mars in 1976.

Aerojet under contract with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, received the engine for five hot fire tests that were conducted to evaluate engine capabilities as well as general health checks. The hot fire tests determined that the key elements and features within the Viking engine are relevant to and meet the requirements of NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory mission.

* On Saturday 19 November  2011, the launch of the Atlas V was delayed by one day to allow time for the team to remove and replace a flight termination system battery. The launch was rescheduled for Saturday, November 26 from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. There was a one hour and 43 minute launch window at 10:02 a.m. EST.

* Liftoff was on time at 10:02 a.m. EST on 26 November 2011 from Space Launch Complex 41 on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.  It was scheduled to arrive at Mars on August 6, 2012

The selected investigations and principal investigators were:

1. Mars Science Laboratory Mast Camera, Michael Malin, Malin Space Science Systems (MSSS), San Diego, California. 
Mast Camera will perform multi-spectral, stereo imaging at lengths ranging from kilometers to centimeters, and can acquire compressed high-definition video at 10 frames per second without the use of the rover computer.

2. ChemCam: Laser Induced Remote Sensing for Chemistry and Micro-Imaging, Roger Wiens, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico.
ChemCam uses laser beams that can blast a rock from up to 10 metres away, vaporizing a small amount of the underlying mineral and then collecting the light emitted by the vaporized rock to see what it's made of.

France provided ChemCam's laser and telescope.

3. MAHLI: MArs HandLens Imager for the Mars Science Laboratory, Kenneth Edgett, MSSS. 
MAHLI will image rocks, soil, frost and ice at resolutions 2.4 times better, and with a wider field of view, than the Microscopic Imager on the Mars Exploration Rovers.

4. The Alpha-Particle-X-ray-Spectrometer for Mars Science Laboratory (APXS), Ralf Gellert, Max-Planck-Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany. 
APXS will determine elemental abundance of rocks and soil. APXS will be provided by the Canadian Space Agency.

5. CheMin: An X-ray Diffraction/X-ray Fluorescence (XRD/XRF) instrument for definitive mineralogical analysis in the Analytical Laboratory of MSL, David Blake, NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California.
CheMin, will identify and quantify all minerals in complex natural samples such as basalts, evaporites and soils, one of the principle objectives of Mars Science Laboratory.

6. Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD), Donald Hassler, Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, Colorado. 
RAD will characterize the broad spectrum of radiation at the surface of Mars. The data data will be valuable to better determine how future human crews can cope with radiation doses during their stays on Mars, an essential precursor to human exploration of the planet. RAD will be funded by the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters.

7. Mars Descent Imager, Michael Malin, MSSS. 
The Mars Descent Imager produced high-resolution color-video imagery of the MSL descent and landing phase, providing geological context information, as well as allowing for precise landing-site determination.

8. Sample Analysis at Mars with an integrated suite consisting of a gas chromatograph mass spectrometer, and a tunable laser spectrometer (SAM), Paul Mahaffy, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.
SAM will perform mineral and atmospheric analyses, detect a wide range of organic compounds and perform stable isotope analyses of organics and noble gases.

The total cost of the Mars Science Laboratory project is about US$2.5 billion.

If successful, the Mars Science Laboratory will pave the way for future Martian surface and sample return spacecraft.

Did you know?

For the first time since the Viking Landers, the minivan-sized MSL rover will bring an analytical laboratory to the martian surface.

It was originally scheduled for launch in December 2009 and to arrive in October 2010.

Curiosity's radioisotope thermoelectric generator is 1st to space made entirely with Russian plutonium.

Mars Science Laboratory Links

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Updated: Saturday 23rd, February, 2013