New Mars Forums

While there seems to be a consensus on a Europa orbiter,there is still a heated discussion on the type of lander;whether to go for a soft landing on Europa or hard landing.Soft landing means more fuel and less payload delivered to the surface.The characteristics of the surface are not very well known so soft landing can be very dangerous.Better characterisation of the surface needs to be done if soft landing is to be considered.

It looks like finally an auroral footprint from Europa has been identified in Jupiters northern lights alongside that from IO.Whereas IO's footprint is known to originate from its active volcanoes spewing out gases,Europas role is still unclear.More probably it could arise from  charged particles interacting with its ionosphere rather than dirctly related to activity on the Europan surface.Or could this be indirect  evidence for some kind of tectonic activity on Europa!!!Who knows!!

Although not directly related to the New Horizons mission but somewhat relevant,Hubble observations seem to show a smaller size for XENA than prevously thought,but still 30% larger than Pluto.The greater size seems to have resulted from the brighter surface of the 10th planet compared to Pluto which shows up somewhat reddish in Hubble views.The brighter surface of Xena could be attributed to gases which have frozen from the once present atmosphere onto the surface ,since the 10th planet at present lies at its furthest point in its orbit from the Sun.

In the LPSC,scientists have been discussing which target should come first to explore in the outer solar system.Some have even suggested that it would be easier to fund a mission to exploring Titan and Enceladus, since the new findings from Cassini have revealed new tantalizing possibilities for astrobiology.It seems to be easier to get to the water on Enceladus which possibly lies just metres under the surface whereas on Europa,one must dig about 20 km to get to the theorised water ocean.Any votes on this?

If Home plate deposits turn out to be volcanic in origin,that would pose a big question mark as to the true origin of the meridiani deposits observed by opportunity.We still have to identify the composition of the layered rocks thou..the origin of the sulphate rock in meridiani have recently been attributed to volcanic rather than water origin.Any thoughts about this? :?

I believe its a question of weight.NH weighs  just about over 300 kgs whereas spacecraft like Galileo and Cassini weigh over 1000 kg each.For the latter two to bring them into orbit around the gaseous planets,poses a limit on their accelaration for them to be able to be captured into orbit around Jupiter and Saturn.NH is not meant to orbit these 2 planets and therefore affords to  reach higher velocities and just do a flyby.NH is probably the first spacecraft to  be escaping the solar system rather than put into  orbit around the sun.

It seems that US congress has advised NASA to study projects to explore the jovian moon Europa.There will be a lot of lobbying as always happens with each space mission as to the funds that should be allocated for such a mission.For further details visit The Planetary Society website.

I believe winter is coming where Cindy is ;Frosting or defrosting.depends where you arein the world!Where I am ,we hardly have any frost in winters!

Anyways nice pics!!

It seems that defrosting is following some pattern;may be indicating variations in the ground under the frost!!??

Titan radar images in!

For a change,kuiper belt objects seem to be getting cartoon character names :Santa,Rudolph....Pluto!

MOC images have been indicating that global warming is ongoing even on the Red Planet.Scientists blame Earth's global warming to human pollution.Why should Mars be warming up even  in the absence of any human activity?   Same processes occurring at the same time on both planets would seem to point towards a solar origin for the warming!!Anyone has any ideas regarding this subject? 8)  :?