Mission Accomplished for Mars Orbiter

December 16, 2008 - Pasadena, California — NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has completed its primary mission, finding signs of past watery environments on Mars. The orbiter has returned 73 terabits of science data, more than all earlier Mars missions combined. The spacecraft will build on this record as it continues to examine Mars in unprecedented detail during the next two years. Among the major findings is the revelation that the action of water on and near the surface of Mars occurred for hundreds of millions of years. This activity was at least regional and possibly global in extent, though possibly intermittent. The spacecraft also observed that signatures of a variety of watery environments, some acidic, some alkaline, increase the possibility that there are places on Mars that could reveal evidence of past life, if it ever existed. Since moving into position 186 miles above Mars' surface in October 2006, the orbiter also has conducted 10,000 targeted observation sequences of high-priority areas. It has imaged nearly 40 percent of the planet at a resolution that can reveal house-sized objects in detail, 1 percent in enough detail to see desk-sized features. "These observations are now at the level of detail necessary to test hypotheses about when and where water has changed Mars and where future missions will be most productive as they search for habitable regions on Mars," said Richard Zurek, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Included in the observations are hundreds of stereo pairs used to make detailed topography maps and classic images in support of other Mars missions. One image showed the Mars rover Opportunity poised on the rim of Victoria Crater and another of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander. Orbiter data is being used to select the landing location for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, which is scheduled for launch in 2011. The MRO has found repetitive layering in Mars' permanent polar ice caps, suggesting climate change cycles continue to the present. They may record possible effects of cyclical changes in Mars' tilt and orbit on global sunlight patterns. Recent climate cycles are indicated by radar detection of subsurface icy deposits outside the polar regions, closer to the equator, where near-surface ice is not permanently stable. Other results reveal details of ancient streambeds, atmospheric hazes and motions of water, along with the ever-changing weather on Mars.

An artist's concept of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Image credit: NASA/JPL The High Resolution Imaging Science Experimentcamera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took two images of the larger of Mars' two moons, Phobos, within 10 minutes of each other on March 23, 2008. This view combines the two images. Because the two were taken at slightly different viewing angles, this provides a three-dimensional effect when seen through red-blue glasses (red on left eye). Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

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