After a nearly seven-month journey, it will begin probing the deep interior of a nearby world that once may have looked much more like our own. The Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport mission aims to understand the hidden heat flow of the planet, its seismic activity and the nature of its core.
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All of these could help scientists delve into the history and evolution of our planetary neighbor. There's never really been one like this before. But those didn't work as planned — the instrument on Viking 1 failed, and the one on Viking 2 was overwhelmed by vibrations from the Martian winds. Bruce Banerdt remembers those Viking failures all too well.
NASA's next mission will study the heart of Mars
A graduate student in geological sciences at the time, he felt a pang of dismay when it became clear the sensors wouldn't produce much, if any, seismological data. With a new generation of Martian seismometers ready for launch, "I can hardly even sleep at night, I'm so excited," he said. Rovers, landers and orbiting spacecraft have found evidence of lakes, rivers, volcanoes and life-friendly chemical combinations on Mars. Seismology allows scientists to glimpse the internal machinations that led to those features. Billions of years ago, scientists think, Mars looked much more like Earth: It had water lakes and perhaps even a shallow ocean under puffy clouds that floated in a thick atmosphere.
Tests conducted by the Curiosity rover have shown that microbial life could theoretically have existed in an environment such as this.
Then the planet ' s interior cooled and Mars lost most of its atmosphere. Without it, the water evaporated and the surface became the rusty, dusty expanse we see today. Studying Mars' internal dynamics will help scientists learn why it evolved the way it did, Banerdt said.
Heart on Mars
For example, Earth has a protective magnetic field that prevents our atmosphere from being stripped away by the solar wind and cosmic rays. That field is powered by the movement of molten metal in Earth's core.
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Mars appears to have lost its magnetic shield early in its history, and the planet's atmosphere today is about times thinner than Earth's. Studying the Martian core could help researchers understand why Mars' fate diverged from our own. On a rocky planet like Mars, the heat coming from the interior today is largely produced by radioactive elements, said Sue Smrekar , a JPL geophysicist and InSight's deputy principal investigator. That heat would have powered Martian volcanoes and other geophysical reactions, ultimately producing the planet's atmosphere and at least some of its liquid water.
The Heart of Mars
Knowing things like where the atmosphere came from, what was in it and how long it lasted could help scientists estimate how long Mars hosted life-friendly environments. And knowing the concentrations of radiogenic elements inside Mars will help scientists figure out how much energy was available to fuel all of this activity, Smrekar said. Once InSight lands on Mars in late November, it will act as a solar-paneled doctor, using its three main instruments to take the planet's temperature, check its reflexes and perform a sonogram.
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Good morning Long Beach, here's an Atlas V rocket to start your day. A post shared by Dalton James iamdaltonjames on May 5, at 4: Despite being 4 miles from the pad with a direct line of sight, there was absolutely no seeing InSight as it left Earth for Mars. Sound, yes, but otherwise nothing but pea soup.
NASA's InSight mission will look deep into the heart of Mars for clues about its past
Eeriest and weirdest launch I have ever, err, seen. The Mars InSight lander itself was built by Lockheed Martin of Denver, but it carries scientific instruments developed as part of an international collaboration with space agencies and other scientific institutions around the world.
It carries a suite of highly sensitive seismometers to detect Marsquakes and a special "mole" that will drill up to 16 feet below the Martian surface to take heat readings and help map the planet's "guts. Now we finally get to see our microseismometers leave the launch pad, next stop Mars. Be sure to check out the full details of the Mars InSight mission in our earlier coverage and the video above. A crowdsourced science fiction novel written by CNET readers. The tech industry seeks to overcome outdated ideas about "women in tech.
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