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Curiosity Finds Volcanic Soils
Zothecula writes "NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has completed its first soil analysis of the Red Planet. The unmanned explorer used an advanced, miniaturized X-ray diffraction instrument that is part of the Chemistry and Mineralogy instrument (CheMin) of its internal laboratory. The soil, collected at a site designated 'Rocknest' in Gale Crater, reveals that Martian soil is a weathered volcanic type similar to soils found in the Hawaiian Islands."
And, of course, a shot of the area because it looks cool.
I really hope that Curiosity finds a Martian cat one day.
Ezekiel 23:20
I always get the funny looks @ the laundramat.
Worthless link, apparently just promoting his personal site.
Martian soil is a weathered volcanic type similar to soils found in the Hawaiian Islands
Now all it needs is air pressure, oxygen, water, more sunlight, an ozone layer, a magnetic field, arable soil, flora, and fauna--and we can live there no problem!
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
agreed... someone mod this Original Post down
The link to the site has a pic under Martian light and colour balanced for Earth.
I wonder, when humans get there, which will our brains see - the one on the left
or will our brains "colour" adjust to the pic on the right...?
Wow, evidence that there were once active volcanoes on Mars, who would have guessed that...
I think Olympus Mons is bigger than Hurricane Sandy, although it probably didn't affect anybody on this planet.
... my cat, FluffBall accidentally got into the building where NASA was constructing the rover.... They were doing a test to see if it can pick up and crush rocks to see what it's made of. My poor cat wandered too close and all I could do was watch. The hole he got through was too small for me to get through and the doors were locked.
Curiosity killed the cat :(
It's not like anyone would expect to find a lot of sedimentary or organic minerals on mars.
A lot of the dirt we see on Earth, is made from decayed plant material, even normal beach (non-volcanic) sand on our beaches are made up of a lot of crustacean shells. Even with some water chances are Mars is lifeless, if there is live it wouldn't be as plentiful. So the soil would be mostly volcanic like.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Martian atmosphere is 95% carbon dioxide. Plants like carbon dioxide. Now we just have to plant enough macadamia and pineapple plants to start terraforming and produce oxygen. :-)
They are in the commissioning phase for the instruments. They chose to sample this location precisely because it looked like it would be a fairly ordinary volcanic sand. They say in the press release that it's more or less what they were expecting. They weren't expecting big surprises, just confirmation that the instruments do indeed seem to be working.
They will have more interesting sedimentary rocks to sample once they move on to new sites. In fact, some finely-layered, probably sedimentary bedrock outcrop can be seen on the other side of the gully to the northeast of where the rover is now, in the direction they are planning to head next (the telescopic zoom on the mastcams is awesome!). I think the short-term plan is to drill some of those outcrops and run them through the chemical and other analyses. Then they'll probably turn around and head south to look at the main outcrops on the mountain in the middle of Gale Crater, but that's probably a month or two away at least.
What, and we should just assume the expectations are correct? It's always better to know for sure. The reaction from the people interviewed seems to be "Yep, pretty much exactly as we expected". That doesn't mean it was a waste of time, that means they can be even more sure that their models and predictions are right. There's no point in basing a later hypothesis on data which you haven't actually proven: you risk spending years of time and huge sums of money barking up the wrong tree.
With the, what, $10 per American that this cost?
I found the links to various terrestrial applications of the x-ray diffraction technology to be quite interesting. Portable or just more compact lab equipment based on this could be quite useful.
Who knows? We may soon be able to run a sample through one of these and see what Slashdot editors have been smoking.
Have gnu, will travel.
Too bad the temperature of MARS makes that unlikely with current crop strains since from what I understand, the predominance of carbon dioxide in MARS' atmosphere would make it a growing paradise in combination with volcanic soil types...
* Any of you that are more "attuned" to this type of madness? Please - "sound off" & correct me where I may be incorrect above!
APK
P.S.=> Of course, there's PROBABLY botanists/scientists/geneticists "hard @ work" circumventing THAT little "roadblock" on the temperatures that plants can stand, as far as "lows", too (terra-forming? NOT "out-of-the-question" here, if not eventually only) - I state this, since we as human beings are PRETTY GOOD @ solving problems MOST of the time, & especially when it matters...
... apk
Martian soil contains volcanic residue, and Strawberry Tang, that is why its red.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
we're watching footage from mars
Go figure, silly comment by an AC Obama supporter... Chickenshit.
Tt cost 400 Million, so around 1 dollar and 30 cents.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on