WASHINGTON. The Maven NASA spacecraft began orbiting Sunday around Mars as part of a scientific mission to learn how they changed over time the climate of the Red Planet, the space agency said.
“Based on the observed data navigation, congratulations. Maven is now in orbit, “said Dave Folta , the Goddard Space Flight Center of the NASA .
The applause echoed through the control room Mission Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. Maven (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) entered the Martian orbit at 02:24 GMT (22:24 Sunday in Paraguay), JPL said.
The income occurred after the engine firing probe for thirty minutes to slow its speed. The unmanned probe of 2.45 tons was launched in November 2013 from Cape Canaveral, Florida (southeast USA), so traveled for over ten months and 711 million miles traveled to get closer to Mars with the purpose of studying all layers of the atmosphere.
Maven data will help scientists understand what happened to the water on Mars and the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere several billion years ago and how it changed climate from a warm room to a cold, wet and dry.
How Mars lost its atmosphere is one of the greatest mysteries of science. Responses maven could shed light on the planet’s capacity to support life (even if it was microbial life) long ago.
In addition, the findings of the probe could provide knowledge about how they could survive humans a future visit to Mars, perhaps by 2030.
After weeks calibrating their instruments, will begin a one-year mission to study the gases of the upper layers of the Martian atmosphere, about 6,000 kilometers the surface, and how this interacts with the Sun and the solar wind. There will also be other readings closest to Martian soil levels.
In recent years, NASA has sent several probes to Mars. The robotic vehicle Curiosity , for example, is exploring the surface and sends data on average already established that in the distant past there were conditions to support life, at least microbial.
“As the first vehicle to study the upper atmosphere of Mars, Maven clearly increase our understanding of the history of the Martian atmosphere and how climate has changed over time, and the impact on the evolution of the environment on the surface and the potential habitability of the planet, “he said Sunday in a statement the head of NASA, Charles Bolden .
” Marven also will better prepare future manned missions to Mars in the 2030s, “he added. “The set of instruments onboard Maven aim to find the missing pieces of the puzzle in the history of Mars,” was featured David Mitchell, the head of the project at NASA, who recalled that “all other Mars missions to the present (…) were concentrated on the surface of Mars. “
The project Maven cost $ 671 million, it is equipped with eight instruments, including a spectrometer mass to determine the molecular structures of atmospheric gases and SWEA (Solar Wind Electron Analyzer) sensor, tuned by the French Institute for Research in Astrophysics, which will analyze the solar wind.
At the end of This week, an Indian probe also will orbit the red planet. It is India’s first orbiter sent to Mars to find there traces of the existence of life.
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