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More Details About Mars Mystery Rock
First time accepted submitter GPS Pilot writes "Previous reports said the rock that suddenly appeared out of nowhere was merely 'the size of a jelly doughnut.' Now, a color image shows additional reasons for this metaphor: 'It's white around the outside, in the middle there's kind of a low spot that's dark red,' said lead scientist Steve Squyres. In the image, the object does stick out like a sore thumb amidst the surrounding orange rocks and soil. Its composition is 'like nothing we've ever seen before. It's very high in sulfur, it's very high in magnesium, it's got twice as much manganese as we've ever seen in anything on Mars.'"
.... See subject. I think the evidence speaks for itself.
Maybe it's not a rock...
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
Almost everyone has assumed that if aliens ever show up that it would be a big show: "We come in peace. Take us to your leader" Or, if not that, then something like, "We've been here watching for decades | hundreds | thousands of years." I don't think anyone ever considers it possible that an alien presence would be revealed by a prank to be followed by the intergalactic equivalent of Nelson's "Ha ha!" or "You guys are a hoot! You're our favorite 4D TV show!" Well, it beats being eaten.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Sometimes a rock is just a rock, could had ended there because winds, a chain reaction caused by the rover, even a small asteroid hitting the planet and spreading pebbles around is easier to happen than life forms moving it.
With 1/3 the gravity of Earth I can see typical 80 mph winds carrying something as small as a doughnut
http://saveie6.com/
some poor martian is trying to figure out how to snatch his breakfast without the camera seeing him...
The wind on Mars is not "strong" enough to move rocks on the surface. Even though winds on Mars can probably reach large speeds, the atmospheric density is so low, that the force the wind can impose on a rock is quite small. For instance, a wind of 10 meters per second (about 20 miles per hour) here on Earth produces a force which is four times stronger than does a 50 meter per second wind (a bit more than 100 miles per hour) on the surface of Mars. So, since a 20 mile per hour wind here on Earth does not generally move rocks about on the surface (though it does raise dust), the winds on Mars don't move rocks on the surface either.
Jim Murphy
Mars Pathfinder ASI/MET Science Team
Source: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/mars/ask/atmosphere/Feel_of_Wind_on_Mars.txt
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
If any of your endeavors involve a 54.6 million km journey through space I'm sure you'll get your share of free marketing too.
The Horta, from the episode 26, Devil in the Dark. Now, where are my 600 quatloos?
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
So this rock moved when we weren't looking at it... Do you realize what this means? It's a Weeping Angel! Get that rover out of there now! (But don't look away. Don't even blink. Blink and you're dead.)
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
if you meant mars, because it'd be a learning experience, then yes.
if you meant mars because it might be more hospitable than a future earth, then no. earth could be hit by a big rock and would still be far more hospitable than mars.
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=7708&st=345
These are some picture posted there:
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?act=attach&type=post&id=31925
http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?act=attach&type=post&id=31954
science baffles scientist,still.
News Alert. Authorities in California are raiding Justin Bieber's home looking for evidence through his security videos of him throwing rocks at the Mars Rover Opportunity.
If you look in the photo provided by CNN in the article, look at the rock which casts a shadow near the top left corner of the photo.
That same rock is there in the newer photo with the donut-rock. Now, just look down a little bit and slight right you will see a darker spot that wasn't that dark in the earlier picture and it appears to cast a shadow. Therefore, there are more rocks (at least two) that weren't there before.
Previewing comments are for sissies!
Not to mention the Warp Drive, the least reliable propulsion system in history, and the nut job that compensated for that by adding a holo deck.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
I've done a very quick animated gif: https://imgflip.com/gif/69vpc If you see the circled area, that looks like the area the rock has come from, probably flicked there by the front wheels?
Insert signature here...
The whole thing is being shot in a Hollywood studio. A night janitor was goofing around with the set and didn't put things back properly. Happens all the time.
If it moves again, KILL IT! (I grew up watching those movies...)
A bit of dry ice forms in a crack in a stone and stays below freezing for a day or a million years before a rover tyre moves some soil and exposes it to the heat of the sun. The dry ice sublimates but instead of earth water's slow process of expanding and cracking a rock, sublimated dry ice occasionally pops a rock shard quite a long distance. Like pop-rocks.
Pop rock manufacture (from Wikipedia): The candy is made by mixing its ingredients and heating them until they melt into a syrup, then exposing the mixture to pressurized carbon dioxide gas (about 600 pounds per square inch or 40 bar) and allowing it to cool. The process causes tiny high-pressure bubbles to be trapped inside the candy.