Curiosity has landed

[floridaorange]

Re: Curiosity has landed

incredible thx rez

[feather]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Last Tuesday the team at NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory finished what amounted to a complete overhaul of the Curiosity Rover’s software. Asked why this was necessary, Ben Cichy, Curiosity’s chief software engineer, explains that the software required to help Curiosity land on the surface of Mars and the software it needs to drive around and avoid obstacles is completely different. But as we’ve reported, Curiosity’s hardware is pretty modest. Cichy says it didn’t have enough memory to hold the software for both the landing mission and the surface mission, so the software had to be swapped out remotely after landing.


The process took four days. “We had to be really, really careful, we didn’t want to ‘brick’ the rover and end up not being able to communicate with it anymore,” says Cichy. “We were very methodical.”

NASA Pulls Off 160-Million-Mile Software Patch | Wired Enterprise | Wired.com

[Kamal]

Re: Curiosity has landed

You guys read about the camera? I read somewhere that the camera is only 2 MP but the lens on it can really zoom out. The reason for the smaller MP is because of limited bandwidth and with the amount of other test data that the curiosity is beaming back, they didn't want their precious bandwidth getting bogged down sending 20 megabyte photos (in addition to the fact that all of this hardware was approved nearly a decade ago).

So using a 2MP camera and zooming far out, it takes a series of photos which are stitched back together on earth.

Think about that when you pan around that image and look at the clarity and depth of field of the terrain and that was only day 2.

[unkle]

Re: Curiosity has landed

It's fucking incredible to see another planet very similar to ours.
I cant imagine, if the people can go there in the next 100 years.

[Jenks]

Re: Curiosity has landed

we sure have come far from poop slinging and banana feasts.

Hey, I like to sling poop as much as the next guy, but it's great to pause and give props to the awesome feats our fellow man can accomplish.

[Jenks]

Re: Curiosity has landed

You guys read about the camera? I read somewhere that the camera is only 2 MP but the lens on it can really zoom out. The reason for the smaller MP is because of limited bandwidth and with the amount of other test data that the curiosity is beaming back, they didn't want their precious bandwidth getting bogged down sending 20 megabyte photos (in addition to the fact that all of this hardware was approved nearly a decade ago).

So using a 2MP camera and zooming far out, it takes a series of photos which are stitched back together on earth.

Think about that when you pan around that image and look at the clarity and depth of field of the terrain and that was only day 2.

Didn't know that about the camera, that's pretty cool. I would have guessed a much more powerful camera, but it makes a ton of sense with bandwidth issues.

[floridaorange]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Didn't know that about the camera, that's pretty cool. I would have guessed a much more powerful camera, but it makes a ton of sense with bandwidth issues.

Right? You would think there would be another powerful camera taking automatic photos and storing them on a memory card to be retrieved after the mission or something .

[feather]

Re: Curiosity has landed

They could've just sent an iPhone or Android along with Curiosity

[Kamal]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Yep, but the iPhone was launched in 2007 and the hardware for the curiosity, which was top of the line at the time, had already been selected and approved back in 2004

I guess the next batch of Rovers will start doing a lot more.

I just read that the Curiosity can transmit a max of 32 MB / day of data back to the 2 orbiting satellites. That's slower than USB 1.0 speeds.

[feather]

Re: Curiosity has landed

How do they transmit? Radio?

[demonAfro]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Ha we should already have a colony on the moon and mars!

This.Very this.

[res0nat0r]

Re: Curiosity has landed

I remember reading there are some studies going on right now about the long term affects of low gravity on the body. Some scientists who were onboard the ISS for a long time are having some problems when they've returned to earth because of being in low G's for so long.

[floridaorange]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Guess they could simply hook up a water pipeline from the colorado river to Mars as well. Grow veggies and fruits using hydro from the river as well. Colonies on Mars ftw.

[unkle]

Re: Curiosity has landed

There is water on Mars or not ???







Yes, is a stupid question.

[floridaorange]

Re: Curiosity has landed

Water on Mars is much less abundant than it is on Earth, at least in its liquid and gaseous states of matter. Most of the water known is locked in the cryosphere (permafrost and polar caps), and there are no bodies of liquid water which could create a hydrosphere. Only a small amount of water vapor is present in the atmosphere.^[1]
Current conditions on the planet surface do not support the long-term existence of liquid water. The average atmospheric pressure and temperature are far too low, leading to immediate freezing and resulting sublimation. Despite this, research suggests that in the past there was liquid water flowing on the surface,^[2][3] creating large areas similar to Earth's oceans.^[4][5][6][7]
There are a number^[8] of direct and indirect proofs of water's presence either on or under the surface, e.g. stream beds,^[9][10][11] polar caps, spectroscopic measurement,^[12] eroded craters or minerals directly connected to the existence of liquid water (such as goethite), grey, crystalline hematite, phyllosilicates, opal,^[13] and sulfate.^[14][15]With the improved cameras on advanced Mars orbiters such as Viking, Mars Odyssey, Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Express, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter pictures of ancient lakes,^{[16][17][18][19][20][20][21][22]} ancient river valleys,^[9][23] and widespread glaciation^{[24][25][26][27][28]} have accumulated. Besides the visual confirmation of water from a huge collection of images, an orbiting Gamma Ray Spectrometer found ice just under surface of much of the planet.^[29][30][31] Also, radar studies discovered pure ice in formations that were thought to be glaciers.^{[32][33][34][35][36][37]} The Phoenix lander exposed ice as it landed, watched chunks of ice disappear,^[38][39][40]detected snow falling,^[41] and even saw drops of liquid water.^[42][43][44]