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From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: November 19, 2013 8:56:36 AM CST
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: FW: Human Spaceflight News - Nov. 19, 2013
Looks like Kyle is on travel or leaveNASA TV: www.nasa.gov/ntv
- 8:30 am Central (9:30 EST) – Expedition 38 with NASA Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio for WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT and WRGB-TV, Schenectady, NY
Human Spaceflight NewsTuesday – November 19, 2013HEADLINES AND LEADSWrist-Sized Bone Scanner Could Fly To The Space Station In 2016Elizabeth Howell - Universe TodayThe University of Saskatchewan hopes to fly a wrist-sized MRI to the International Space Station by 2016 in a standard Progress cargo flight, according to Gordon Sarty, a university professor specializing in medical imaging. Why is this important? It will help doctors keep track of the astronauts' bone strength on orbit, Sarty says of his team's invention. With NASA aiming to run its first one-year mission to the station in 2015, there is renewed emphasis on keeping track of all the nasty things microgravity does to astronauts' bodies in space. Crew members spend two hours a day exercising, but still come back to Earth having trouble balancing, with weaker bones and muscles, and possible facing changes to organs such as the eyes.MEANWHILE, HEADING TO MARS…Mars probe in good shape after launch; mission managers thrilledBy WILLIAM HARWOODCBS NewsA new NASA Mars probe began a 10-month voyage to the red planet Monday, blasting off on a $671 million mission to study the thin martian atmosphere in a bid to find out what triggered a dramatic case of climate change that turned a once-hospitable environment into a cold, presumably barren desert."Something clearly happened," Principal Investigator Bruce Jakosky said before launch. "Water was abundant on early Mars, the environment was something that was capable of supporting liquid water yet today we see a cold, dry planet that is not able to support water. What we want to do is to understand what are the reasons for that change in the climate."NASA launches robotic explorer to MarsMarcia Dunn - Associated PressNASA's newest robotic explorer, Maven, rocketed toward Mars on Monday on a quest to unravel the ancient mystery of the red planet's radical climate change. The Maven spacecraft is due at Mars next fall following a journey of more than 440 million miles. Scientists want to know why Mars went from being warm and wet during its first billion year to cold and dry today. The early Martian atmosphere was thick enough to hold water and possibly support microbial life. But much of that atmosphere may have been lost to space, eroded by the sun.NASA satellite launched to find clues about Mars' lost waterIrene Klotz - ReutersAn unmanned Atlas 5 rocket blasted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Monday, sending a Mars orbiter on its way to study how the planet most like Earth in the solar system lost its water. Unlike previous Mars probes, the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission, or MAVEN, will not be looking at or landing on the planet's dry, dusty surface. Instead, MAVEN will scan and sample what remains of the thin Martian atmosphere and watch in real-time how it is peeled away, molecule by molecule, by killer solar radiation. The first step of the planned year-long, $671 million mission was getting MAVEN into space. The satellite, tucked inside a protective nosecone, lifted off aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at 1:28 p.m. EST/1838 GMT to begin a 10-month flight to Mars.With launch, MAVEN sets off for Mars studyJames Dean – Florida TodayA NASA spacecraft is cruising toward Mars, where its study of the upper atmosphere will help explain how the once warm, wet planet underwent a drastic climate change.The $671 million MAVEN mission began its 10-month trek with an on-time 1:28 p.m. blastoff Monday atop a Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and the spacecraft deployed 53 minutes later.NASA's Maven mission on its way to MarsKristen Leigh Painter
The Denver PostThe Colorado-led MAVEN mission cleared the most dangerous hurdle of its life cycle Monday when it successfully left Earth and began its spaceflight to Mars. The NASA-funded program infused an estimated $400 million into Colorado's economy, in addition to the $187 million contract awarded to Centennial-based United Launch Alliance for catapulting it out of Earth's atmosphere and onto its proper trajectory using its Atlas V rocket.Colorado's left-brain, right-brain contributions to the MAVEN mission to MarsSusan Greene – Colorado IndependentThe Mars probe "MAVEN" launched from the Kennedy Space Center on Monday with lots of help from Colorado.The unmanned spacecraft, which will study the Red Planet's atmosphere, was designed and built by Lockheed Martin in Littleton. Centennial-based United Launch Alliance built the rocket that lifted it into space. University of Colorado professor Bruce Jakosky is leading the mission on behalf of NASA. And the University of Colorado's Laboratory of Atmospheric and Space Physics designed two of the instruments that will be used to measure Mars.__________COMPLETE STORIESWrist-Sized Bone Scanner Could Fly To The Space Station In 2016Elizabeth Howell - Universe TodayThe University of Saskatchewan hopes to fly a wrist-sized MRI to the International Space Station by 2016 in a standard Progress cargo flight, according to Gordon Sarty, a university professor specializing in medical imaging. Why is this important? It will help doctors keep track of the astronauts' bone strength on orbit, Sarty says of his team's invention.With NASA aiming to run its first one-year mission to the station in 2015, there is renewed emphasis on keeping track of all the nasty things microgravity does to astronauts' bodies in space. Crew members spend two hours a day exercising, but still come back to Earth having trouble balancing, with weaker bones and muscles, and possible facing changes to organs such as the eyes.Although NASA runs MRIs on crew members before and after flights, Sarty said the ability to get even a simple scan in orbit would be useful — and quite quick. It would take just five to 10 minutes to perform, and would be simple for anyone to do as the scan would commence at the touch of a button.The Canadian Space Agency is allowed just 44 kilograms (97 pounds) to get the MRI to orbit under its utilization agreement on station (which is based on funding). A full-size MRI able to fit in a standard payload rack would have been about 800 kilograms (1,765 pounds), Sarty said.Modifications are necessary. Rather than using superconducting magnets to do the work in orbit, Sarty's design proposes manipulating radio frequency waves instead. Sarty's team currently has a $240,000 grant from the CSA to develop the technology, which goes for about the next year.Sarty said the International Space Station needs to be outfitted to a "Level 4? standard of medical care, meaning that it would include medical imaging on board to help monitor crew health. NASA's Human Research Program Utilization Plan for the station (published in 2012) identifies the addition of ultrasound as a boon to ISS' medical capabilities.As for "Level 4?, the NASA Space Flight Human Human System Standard defines Level 4 as "A moderate to high level of potential risk exists that personnel may experience medical problems on orbit. Risk to the mission is greater for medical issues beyond routine ambulatory medicine." It also assumes a return to Earth can take days. Level 4 applies to Earth, lunar or planetary missions greater than 30 days, but no more than 210 days.The upside for Earth research? The portable MRI could be repurposed, in a sense, to bring into more remote regions. This is especially true of Canada, where tens of thousands of people live in scattered communities in the remote north.Sarty delivered his comments Nov. 16 at the Canadian Space Society's annual summit in Ottawa. To read more about his research, check out this 2012 paywalled paper, "Magnetic resonance imaging of astronauts on the international space station and into the solar system."MEANWHILE, HEADING TO MARS…Mars probe in good shape after launch; mission managers thrilledBy WILLIAM HARWOODCBS NewsA new NASA Mars probe began a 10-month voyage to the red planet Monday, blasting off on a $671 million mission to study the thin martian atmosphere in a bid to find out what triggered a dramatic case of climate change that turned a once-hospitable environment into a cold, presumably barren desert."Something clearly happened," Principal Investigator Bruce Jakosky said before launch. "Water was abundant on early Mars, the environment was something that was capable of supporting liquid water yet today we see a cold, dry planet that is not able to support water. What we want to do is to understand what are the reasons for that change in the climate."Taking off just ahead of approaching clouds, NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution -- MAVEN -- spacecraft, mounted inside a protective nose cone atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket, blasted off on time from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station at 1:28 p.m. EST (GMT-5).Generating 860,000 pounds of thrust, the first stage majestically boosted the rocket out of the dense lower atmosphere and fell away just over four minutes after liftoff. The rocket's hydrogen-fueled Centaur second stage then ignited for the first of two planned "burns," firing for nine-and-a-half minutes to complete the initial phase of ascent.After a 27-and-a-half-minute coast, the Centaur re-ignited for an additional five-and-a-half-minute burn, boosting the spacecraft to a velocity of more than 27,000 mph, fast enough to escape Earth's gravity and begin the long trip to Mars.A few minutes after that, MAVEN was released from the Centaur stage to fly on its own, followed by deployment of the orbiter's two solar arrays. Initial telemetry confirmed a healthy spacecraft with no technical problems of any significance."What a Monday at the office," project manager David Mitchell told reporters during a post-launch briefing. "You build something to fly to Mars, and we're now flying to Mars! Maybe I'm not showing it, but I'm euphoric! It's been great, guys. What an effort by this team to get to this point."Jakosky said that after 10 years of planning and development, "I don't have the words to describe what I'm feeling. It's every possible emotion, but they're all positive. This is about the most exciting thing I can imagine happening. This day has been picture perfect from beginning to end."Flight controllers plan to carry out the first of four trajectory correction maneuvers Dec. 3. After that, they will begin activating and checking out MAVEN's scientific instruments.If all goes well, the 2.5-ton spacecraft will reach Mars on Sept. 22, 2014, braking into an elliptical orbit with an eventual high point of around 3,860 miles and a low point of just 93 miles. That will allow the spacecraft to repeatedly fly through the upper reaches of the martian atmosphere to directly sample its constituents and map out its structure.In addition, MAVEN will carry out five "deep dip" sessions lasting about five days each, dropping to a low point of around 78 miles to study the atmosphere in "well mixed" regions where it is 30 times denser than the much thinner "air" the spacecraft normally samples.The mission is expected to last a full year. But if the spacecraft stays healthy, managers say it could remain in operation for up to a decade, carrying out extended observations while serving as a backup communications relay satellite for rovers on the surface of the planet.Unlike recent NASA Mars landers and orbiters that were focused on the surface to determine past and present habitability, MAVEN's instruments will sample the constituents of the atmosphere, probe its structure and study the effects of solar radiation and electrically charged particles blasted away by the sun.The goal is to characterize the atmosphere as it exists today, along with the processes that affect it, gathering the data needed to help researchers understand how the martian atmosphere has changed over time.Scientists believe Mars once enjoyed a warmer, thicker atmosphere that allowed liquid water to flow and pool on the surface, resulting in a global environment that was hospitable to life as it is known on Earth."With Mars having had liquid water early on, we think there must have been a thicker atmosphere that would have produced greenhouse warming so that the planet was warmer early on," Jakosky, MAVEN principal investigator at the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, said during a briefing Sunday. "And something happened. What we want to do is understand where did the water go, where did the carbon dioxide from an early thick atmosphere go?"A major factor is Mars' magnetic field and current lack thereof. Around 3 billion years ago, scientists believe, Mars apparently lost its global magnetic field and along with it, an effective shield against the effects of the solar wind and high energy radiation.A major question is whether the sun's influence, in the absence of an active magnetic field, could have stripped away a significant portion of the atmosphere, slowly but surely changing the climate via lower temperatures and pressures to the point where liquid water could no longer exist on the surface.Another possibility is that significant amounts of CO2 and water ended up trapped in the martian crust. "But we don't see the evidence for widespread, abundant carbon-bearing minerals in the abundance necessary to be a reservoir for that thick early atmosphere," Jakosky said."The other place these could have gone is up to the top of the atmosphere where they could be stripped away and lost to space. The removal process would have involved forcing by the sun, from solar wind, from solar extreme ultraviolet photons, from solar storms that might strip away gas from the top of the atmosphere."MAVEN is all about trying to understand these loss processes, understand what could have happened at the top of the atmosphere and how gas could have been removed from it."MAVEN measures 37.5 feet across its two solar panels, which generate between 1,150 and 1,700 watts of power. The spacecraft is equipped with eight scientific instruments and a UHF communications package that can relay data back to Earth from rovers on the martian surface.The instruments will measure a wide variety of factors to determine how fast the current atmosphere is leaking away into space to help scientists figure out what the rates might have been in the past when the sun was more active."The most intense loss is thought to have occurred early in the history (of the solar system) when the sun and the solar wind were more intense," Jakosky said. "The loss rates today are low enough that we're probably not going to see the loss of the entire atmosphere."The reason we're studying it today, even though the loss rates are so much lower, is that we can understand the specific processes that are going on and learn how to extrapolate them backwards in time."Six of MAVEN's instruments will characterize particles and fields, measure the interaction of the atmosphere with electrically charged particles from the sun and the effects of high-energy solar radiation. Other instrument packages will carry out remote sensing and chemical analysis of particles in the martian atmosphere.Nick Schneider, leader of MAVEN's imaging ultraviolet spectrograph team, said "the reason we're studying the composition and structure of the atmosphere is that it reveals to us how much energy the atmosphere is receiving from the sun and the times when there's excess energy input in the form of those harsh ultraviolet photons or particles from the solar wind."High levels of solar radiation can cause the atmosphere to warm and expand slightly, triggering chemical reactions that can break molecules apart and strip away electrons."We can measure all of that," Schneider said. "The excess energy in all these forms also causes extra atmospheric escape. As we're making these measurements, studying the properties of the atmosphere, we're very sensitive to how the input conditions are leading to atmospheric escape."Of particular interest is what happens to the atmosphere during periods of high solar activity, "because those are the times most representative of the early sun," Schneider said."So when we're measuring the escape rates during periods of high solar activity, that's our best guess about how much atmospheric escape was occurring billions of years ago. If we add up that level of atmospheric escape over time, we'll have a good sense of just how much atmosphere Mars lost through escape to space."While the history of climate change on Mars is the primary focus of the MAVEN mission, Jakosky said the the results could help scientists get a better understanding of planetary evolution in general."If we think more broadly, we're understanding processes by which a planetary environment can change through time," Jakosky said. "We don't know the whole range of processes yet, but as we're starting to discover more and more planets outside our solar system and see Earth-like planets and ask about whether there could be life on those, we want to understand what makes a planet habitable, and what makes a planet go from being habitable to not being habitable."So I see this as a much broader mission than just exploring the Mars upper atmosphere today and the history of the climate. But that's where we start."NASA launches robotic explorer to MarsMarcia Dunn - Associated PressNASA's newest robotic explorer, Maven, rocketed toward Mars on Monday on a quest to unravel the ancient mystery of the red planet's radical climate change.The Maven spacecraft is due at Mars next fall following a journey of more than 440 million miles.Scientists want to know why Mars went from being warm and wet during its first billion year to cold and dry today. The early Martian atmosphere was thick enough to hold water and possibly support microbial life. But much of that atmosphere may have been lost to space, eroded by the sun."We want to know: What happened?" said Michael Meyer, NASA's lead Mars scientist.To help solve this environmental puzzle, Maven will spend an entire Earth year measuring atmospheric gases once it reaches Mars on Sept. 22, 2014.This is NASA's 21st mission to Mars since the 1960s. But it's the first one devoted to studying the Martian upper atmosphere.The mission costs $671 million.Maven — short for Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, with a capital "N'' in EvolutioN — bears eight science instruments. The spacecraft, at 5,410 pounds, weighs as much as an SUV. From solar wingtip to wingtip, it stretches 37.5 feet, about the length of a school bus.A question underlying all of NASA's Mars missions to date is whether life could have started on what now seems to be a barren world."We don't have that answer yet, and that's all part of our quest for trying to answer, 'Are we alone in the universe?' in a much broader sense," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's science mission director.Unlike the 2011-launched Curiosity rover, Maven will conduct its experiments from orbit around Mars.Maven will dip as low as 78 miles above the Martian surface, sampling the atmosphere. The lopsided orbit will stretch as high as 3,864 miles.Curiosity's odometer reads 2.6 miles after more than a year of roving the red planet. An astronaut could accomplish that distance in about a day on the Martian surface, Grunsfeld noted.Grunsfeld, a former astronaut, said considerable technology is needed, however, before humans can fly to Mars in the 2030s, NASA's ultimate objective.Mars remains an intimidating target even for robotic craft, more than 50 years after the world's first shot at the red planet.Fourteen of NASA's previous 20 missions to Mars have succeeded, beginning with the 1964-launched Mariner 4, a Martian flyby. The U.S. hasn't logged a Mars failure, in fact, since the late 1990s.That's a U.S. success rate of 70 percent. No other country comes close. Russia has a poor track record involving Mars, despite repeated attempts dating back all the way to 1960.India became the newest entry to the Martian market two weeks ago with its first-ever launch to Mars.An estimated 10,000 NASA guests descended on Cape Canaveral for the afternoon liftoff of the unmanned Atlas V rocket carrying Maven, including a couple thousand from the University of Colorado at Boulder, which is leading the effort."We're just excited right now," said the university's Bruce Jakosky, principal scientist for Maven, "and hoping for the best."NASA satellite launched to find clues about Mars' lost waterIrene Klotz - ReutersAn unmanned Atlas 5 rocket blasted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Monday, sending a Mars orbiter on its way to study how the planet most like Earth in the solar system lost its water.Unlike previous Mars probes, the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission, or MAVEN, will not be looking at or landing on the planet's dry, dusty surface. Instead, MAVEN will scan and sample what remains of the thin Martian atmosphere and watch in real-time how it is peeled away, molecule by molecule, by killer solar radiation.The first step of the planned year-long, $671 million mission was getting MAVEN into space. The satellite, tucked inside a protective nosecone, lifted off aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at 1:28 p.m. EST/1838 GMT to begin a 10-month flight to Mars.United Launch Alliance is a partnership of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.Upon arrival, MAVEN will fire its braking rocket to put itself into a highly elliptical orbit around Mars, which will allow it to dip down as close as about 65 miles from the ground to gather air samples for analysis.At its highest point, MAVEN will be about 3,728 miles away, a vantage point for measuring how much and what types of radiation are sweeping past the planet from the sun and cosmic sources.The point of the project is to determine how much of the atmosphere is being lost to space today and extrapolate back in time to figure out what was happening in Mars' past.EARTH'S LOST TWIN?In the 49 years since NASA's Mariner 4 spacecraft flew by Mars for the first time, an increasingly more sophisticated series of orbiters, landers and rovers have amassed solid evidence that the fourth planet from the sun was once much more like Earth, with oceans, rivers, rain and snow."We see a lot of evidence for liquid water having flowed over the surface in ancient times. We see river channels, features that look like there have been lakes inside of impact craters. We see minerals that form only in the presence of liquid water," said lead scientist Bruce Jakosky, with the University of Colorado at Boulder."All of these suggest that there has been water on the planet early in time and today of course we see a cold, dry, desert-like planet," he said.Figuring out what happened to Mars' climate hinges on learning what happened to the planet's water and the once-thick atmosphere needed to keep Mars warm enough for surface water.The information also is expected to help scientists home in on when in Mars' history it may have been most suitable for life to evolve.NASA's ongoing Curiosity rover mission is scouting for potential habitats that could have supported microbial life."Water is a requirement for life and if we understand where the water has been and why it's not there anymore we can learn more about what the history of the potential for life has been," Jakosky said.There are two options for where the planet's missing water and atmosphere went: down into the ground or up into space.Scientists know some of the planet's carbon dioxide ended up on the surface and joined with minerals in the crust. But so far, the ground inventory is not large enough to account for the early, thick atmosphere Mars would have needed to support water on its surface.MAVEN is designed to explore the other option, that the water and atmosphere were lost into space, a process that began about 4 billion years ago when the planet's protective magnetic field mysteriously turned off."The sun, the solar wind can drive processes that remove gas from the top of the atmosphere. We want to understand whether the sun was able to remove gas from the top of the atmosphere and how much," Jakosky said.MAVEN is due to reach Mars on September 22, 2014 - two days before India's Mars Orbiter Mission, which launched on November 5. India's probe has been raising its orbit around Earth and should be in position on December 1 to begin the journey to Mars.With launch, MAVEN sets off for Mars studyJames Dean – Florida TodayA NASA spacecraft is cruising toward Mars, where its study of the upper atmosphere will help explain how the once warm, wet planet underwent a drastic climate change.The $671 million MAVEN mission began its 10-month trek with an on-time 1:28 p.m. blastoff Monday atop a Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and the spacecraft deployed 53 minutes later."What a Monday at the office," said Dave Mitchell, the mission's project manager from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. "We built something to go to Mars, and we're now flying to Mars."Lifting off on its first attempt, the 19-story rocket's roar reverberated across nearby Kennedy Space Center, setting off car alarms and prompting cheers from mission supporters who packed an office building balcony.The bronze-and-white rocket disappeared above clouds that posed the only threat during the nearly problem-free countdown.After separating from the rocket, the spacecraft deployed its gull-wing solar arrays, and all systems were reportedly functioning well early in flight."This day has been picture-perfect from beginning to end,"said Bruce Jakosky, the mission's principal investigator from the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics.Circle next Sept. 22 on your calendar: that's when MAVEN is expected to drop into an elliptical orbit around Mars, flying between 78 miles and 3,900 miles above the surface.The Lockheed Martin-built spacecraft will join two NASA orbiters, a European orbiter and the NASA rovers Opportunity and Curiosity already operating at Mars, and is racing an Indian mission also headed there.MAVEN's arrival won't match the hype of Curiosity's dramatic descent and landing last year, promoted as "seven minutes of terror," but mission managers say it's no easy feat."There is no point at which you know it's occurred safely until it's occurred safely," Jakosky said.Short for "Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN," the mission is the first dedicated to studying Mars' upper atmosphere and history of climate change.Previous missions have found compelling evidence that water flowed on the surface of ancient Mars, conditions that would have required a warmer, more dense atmosphere than exists today.Mars now is a cold, dry desert with a very thin atmosphere, conditions under which liquid water would freeze or evaporate.Scientists want to know where the water and greenhouse gases from Mars' early, thicker atmosphere went.Solar wind and storms are believed to have stripped away much of the atmosphere when Mars lost a protective magnetic field 3.5 billion years ago, likely because its core cooled.But figuring out exactly how that is happening today, at slow rates, will be the focus of MAVEN's eight science instruments for at least one Earth year.The mission's findings will make it possible to model how Mars' climate changed over billions of years.More broadly, studying how once habitable conditions became uninhabitable will inform understanding about the potential for life on Mars and other planets.First, MAVEN has to get there."This really is just the beginning of the journey," said Mitchell after the launch.The launch was the 10th of the year for United Launch Alliance, which has another Atlas V launch planned Dec. 5 from California and one from the Cape in January.The Space Coast could play host to another launch within a week: SpaceX is targeting next Monday for launch of a commercial communications satellite by an upgraded Falcon 9 rocket.NASA's Maven mission on its way to MarsKristen Leigh Painter
The Denver PostThe Colorado-led MAVEN mission cleared the most dangerous hurdle of its life cycle Monday when it successfully left Earth and began its spaceflight to Mars.The NASA-funded program infused an estimated $400 million into Colorado's economy, in addition to the $187 million contract awarded to Centennial-based United Launch Alliance for catapulting it out of Earth's atmosphere and onto its proper trajectory using its Atlas V rocket.MAVEN, which stands for Mars Atmospheric and Volatile EvolutioN, is the first NASA mission devoted to understanding the Red Planet's upper atmosphere.Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Jefferson County designed, assembled and tested the spacecraft. About 52 minutes after ULA completed its phase of the mission, sending MAVEN on its merry way, mission operations were handed over to Lockheed's Waterton Canyon facility just outside Denver, which will monitor the spacecraft for the remainder of its life span.The mission's principal investigator, Bruce Jakosky, is from the University of Colorado at Boulder's Laboratory of Atmospheric and Space Physics, which will act as the science operations center. LASP also built two instruments and helped with a third that is aboard the spacecraft.Josh Lothringer is a senior at CU majoring in astrophysics and was able to provide support to the MAVEN team before the spacecraft and its instruments left Colorado for Florida. The mission launched from Cape Canaveral."It's sort of surreal that something I've been in the same room with is now traveling tens of thousands of miles per hour," Loth-ringer said.Scientists hope the scientific readings it obtains shed light on the baffling question, "What happened to the water?" Mars exhibits traits that suggest it may have had bodies of water covering its ancient surface. But the atmosphere today is far too thin to sustain life. Scientists hope MAVEN will send back data that will help explain how that atmosphere was stripped away by solar winds.The $671 million mission was on time and on budget, with hundreds of Coloradans working on it throughout the past decade.It will take 10 months for the spacecraft to reach Mars. Lockheed Martin plans to conduct an orbit-insertion maneuver next Sept. 22. While the launch is considered the riskiest phase of the mission, orbit insertion is a close second."That is the big deal," said Steve Jolly, chief engineer for Lockheed Martin. "If you miss Mars, you just fly by and can never make it back."Jolly said many missions throughout history have met devastating fates when approaching the Red Planet.The primary mission is slated for one earth year — with the closest orbit reaching 90 miles and several "deep dips" planned that will bring the spacecraft within 55 miles of Mars' surface.Colorado's left-brain, right-brain contributions to the MAVEN mission to MarsSusan Greene – Colorado IndependentThe Mars probe "MAVEN" launched from the Kennedy Space Center on Monday with lots of help from Colorado.The unmanned spacecraft, which will study the Red Planet's atmosphere, was designed and built by Lockheed Martin in Littleton. Centennial-based United Launch Alliance built the rocket that lifted it into space. University of Colorado professor Bruce Jakosky is leading the mission on behalf of NASA. And the University of Colorado's Laboratory of Atmospheric and Space Physics designed two of the instruments that will be used to measure Mars.One Coloradan masterminded the right-brain parts of the mission –- art and poetry contests in which the winners' work was burned to a disk that was Velcroed onto the spacecraft."We were looking for a way that offers a voice to everyone. We wanted to give earthlings a chance to think about the beauty of the universe and make a personal connection with Mars," Stephanie Renfro, head of education and outreach for the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado's Going to Mars Campaign, told The Independent last summer.Out of hundreds of submissions made from students throughout the country, first place went to an installation of eight Mars models made by kindergarteners in the Boulder Valley School District.The DVD also is carrying more than 1,500 Haiku poems that Earthlings wrote about the mission. Renfro had hoped the relatively simple five-seven-five syllable Japanese style of poetry form would allow school-aged writers to compete with even the most accomplished bards. It also gives wordsmiths who may not have much knowledge about space exploration equal footing with science geeks who may not be as keen writing poetry.Here are the five poems that received the most critical acclaim on the Internet:It's funny, they named
Mars after the God of War
Have a look at Earth
– Benedict Smith, United KingdomThirty-six million
miles of whispering welcome.
Mars, you called us home.
–Vanna Bonta , USAStars in the blue sky
cheerfully observe the Earth
while we long for them
– Luisa Santoro, Italydistant red planet
the dreams of earth beings flow
we will someday roam
– Greg Pruett , USAMars, your secret is
unknown for humanity
we want to know you.
–Fanni Redenczki, HungaryFly safe, MAVEN. We send Mars our best from Colorado.END
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