Subscribe free to our newsletters via your
. GPS News .




MARSDAILY
Opportunity In Search Of Aluminum-Hydroxyl Clays
by Staff Writers
Pasadena CA (JPL) May 14, 2014


File image.

Opportunity is exploring south of 'Solander Point' on the west rim of Endeavour Crater. The rover is approaching a region of aluminum-hydroxyl clay minerals detected from orbit.

On Sol 3650 (May 1, 2014), Opportunity drove more than 312 feet (95 meters), first straight southward, then southwestward, heading for the clays. With the rover conveniently near a ripple crest, on Sol 3652 (May 3, 2014), it performed a touch-and-go activity with the robotic arm.

The arm's microscopic imager (MI) acquired images for a mosaic, then its alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS) was placed for an overnight integration. On the next sol, Opportunity drove more than 199 feet (60 meters) to the southwest into the region of putative clay minerals.

On Sol 3655 (May 6, 2014), the rover bumped about 18 feet (5.5 meters) to reach an exposed rock outcrop. Also on Sol 3655, Opportunity began the first step of a process to correct for spacecraft clock drift.

The clock has drifted during the rover's decade on Mars, and this affects some subsystems. Only a one-second correction was done on this sol. The team intends to correct the clock slowly, by just a few seconds each sol, to eventually remove all of the clock drift over the course of a year.

On Sol 3656 (May 7, 2014), the APXS performed an atmospheric argon measurement.

Motor currents on the right-front wheel have been well behaved since resumption of backward driving. As of Sol 3656, solar-array energy production is 689 watt-hours, with a re-calibrated atmospheric opacity (Tau) of 0.607 and an improved solar-array dust factor of 0.916. Perfectly clean solar arrays would have a dust factor of 1.0, so the larger the dust factor, the cleaner the arrays.

Total odometry is 24.47 miles (39.38 kilometers).

.


Related Links
Mars Rovers at JPL
Mars Rovers at Cornell
Mars News and Information at MarsDaily.com
Lunar Dreams and more






Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.

Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle








MARSDAILY
Reset and Recovery for Opportunity
Pasadena CA (JPL) May 09, 2014
Opportunity is exploring south of "Solander Point" on the west rim of Endeavour Crater. The rover is headed to a region of aluminum-hydroxyl clay minerals detected from orbit. On Sol 3645 (April 25, 2014), Opportunity experienced a reset caused by write errors in flash (non-volatile) memory. As a result, the rover halted the sol's planned activities and waited for instructions from the gro ... read more


MARSDAILY
Asian consortium lifts bid for Australian food manufacturer

Corn dwarfed by temperature dip suitable for growing in caves, mines

Winners and losers in cereal production from El Nino

Bee biodiversity boosts crop yields

MARSDAILY
A Lab in Your Pocket

Molecular Foundry Opens the Door to Better Doping of Semiconductor Nanocrystals

New lab-on-a-chip device overcomes miniaturization problems

US chip giant Intel to pump $6 bn into Israel: minister

MARSDAILY
Airbus Group Inc. banners 300th UH-72A helicopter delivery

Belgium asks U.S. for F-16 upgrade equipment

Czechs sign agreement to fly Saab's Gripen fighter for another 12 years

China Southern orders 80 A320 planes: Airbus

MARSDAILY
US auto parts maker to outsource interiors to China

Google self-driving car coming around the corner

Nissan venture aims for 20% of China electric car market

Two-stroke scooters are 'super-polluters': study

MARSDAILY
Vietnam violence throws snag for US plans in Asia

China to rein supreme in world commodities in 2014: report

China evacuates 3,000 nationals from Vietnam after deadly unrest

Swiss turn down world's highest minimum wage

MARSDAILY
Emissions From Forests Influence Very First Stage of Cloud Formation

Emerald ash borers were in US long before first detection

China demand for luxury furniture 'decimating rosewood'

Super-charged tropical trees of Borneo vitally important for global carbon cycling

MARSDAILY
Earth Science Applications Travelogue: Maury Estes

GOES-R Propulsion and System Modules Delivered

Experts demonstrate versatility of Sentinel-1

Kazakhstan's First Earth Observation Satellite to Orbit

MARSDAILY
Nanoscale heat flow predictions

Harnessing Magnetic Vortices for Making Nanoscale Antennas

New method for measuring the temperature of nanoscale objects discovered

Nanomaterial Outsmarts Ions




The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2014 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement All images and articles appearing on Space Media Network have been edited or digitally altered in some way. Any requests to remove copyright material will be acted upon in a timely and appropriate manner. Any attempt to extort money from Space Media Network will be ignored and reported to Australian Law Enforcement Agencies as a potential case of financial fraud involving the use of a telephonic carriage device or postal service.