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This artist's concept depicts NASA's InSight lander after it has deployed its instruments on the Martian surface. A version of the illustration of the smooth, flat ground that dominates InSight's landing ellipse in the Elysium Planitia region of Mars. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech
No doubt about it, NASA explores some of the most awe-inspiring locations in our solar system and beyond. Once again, who can forget the majesty of astronaut Jim Irwin standing before the stark beauty of the Moon's Hadley Apennine mountain range, of the Hubble Space Telescope's gorgeous "Pillars of Creation" or Cassini's magnificent mosaic of Saturn?
March also plays a part in this visually compelling equation, with the high-definition imagery from the Curiosity rover of the ridges and rounded buttes at the base of Mount Sharp bringing to mind the majesty of the American Southwest. That said, Elysium Planitia-the site chosen for the Nov. 26 landing of NASA's InSight mission to Mars-it is, well, plain.
"If Elysium Planitia were a salad, it would consist of Roman Lettuce and Kale-no dressing," said InSight principal investigator Bruce Banerdt at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "If it were an ice cream, it would be vanilla."
Yes, the landing site of NASA's next Mars mission may well look like a parking lot lot, but that's the way the Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) project likes it.
"Previous missions to the Red Planet have investigated its surface by studying its canyons, volcanoes, rocks and soil," said Banerdt. "But the signatures of the planet's training processes can be found only by sensing and studying evidence." It is InSight's job to study the deep interior of Mars, taking the planet's vital signs-its pulse, temperature and reflexes. "
Taking these vital signs will help the InSight science team look back to when the rocky planets of the solar system. The investigations will depend on three instruments:
The location of Elysium Planitia close to the Martian equator meets an engineering requirement for the stationary InSight lander to receive adequate solar irradiation year-round on its photovoltaic array. The location also meets an engineering constraint for low elevation, optimizing the amount of space used for deceleration during its descent to the surface. The number of candidate landing sites for InSight was selected from the following year. Cameras on NASA Mars Recognition Orbiter will be used to gather information before the final selection. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech
A six-sensor seismometer called the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) will record seismic waves through the interior structure of the planet. Studying seismic waves will tell scientists what might be creating the waves. (On March, scientists suspect that the spirits may be marsquakes or meteorites striking the surface.)
The Mission's Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3) will burrow deeper than any other scoop, drill or probe on the planet. Its observations will shed light on whether Earth and Mars are made of the same stuff.
Finally, InSight's Rotation and Interior Design Experiment (RISE) will be used in the field of radios to assess the wobble of Mars' rotation axis, providing information about the planet's core.
For inSight to do its work, the team needed a landing site that checked off several boxes, because it's a three-legged lander-not a rover-InSight will remain where it keys down.
"Picking a good landing site on Mars is a lot like it's all about location, location, location," said Tom Hoffman, InSight Project Manager at JPL. "And for the first time ever, the evaluation for a Mars landing site had to consider what lay beneath the surface of Mars.We needed not a safe place to land, but also a workspace that's penetrable by our 16-foot-long ( 5-meter) heat-flow probe. "
The Martian Year (26 Earth months).
This map shows the single area under continuing evaluation as the InSight mission's Mars landing site, as of a year before the mission's May 2016 launch. The finalist ellipse marked the flattened portion of flat-lying Elysium Planitia is centered on 4.5 degrees north latitude and 136 degrees east longitude. The landing ellipse on this map covers an area within which the spacecraft has about 99 percent chance of landing when targeted for the center of the ellipse. It is about 81 miles (130 kilometers) long, generally west to east, and about 17 miles (27 kilometers) wide. This ellipse covers the box of a launch at the start of the launch period. If the launcher will move slightly later, the orientation of the ellipse would shift slightly clockwise. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech
So the team focused on a band around the equator, where the solar array would have adequate sunlight to power its year-round systems. Finding an area that would be safe enough for in the future
"The site has a low-enough elevation to a sufficient atmosphere for a safe landing, because the spacecraft will rely first on atmospheric friction with its heat shield and then we parachute digging into Mars' heldous atmosphere for a large portion of its deceleration, "said Hoffman. "And after the fall has fallen away and the braking rockets have kicked in for final descent, there needs to be a flat expanse to land on-not too undulating and relatively free of obstacles.
Of 22 sites considered, only Elysium Planitia, Isidis Planitia and Valles Marineris puts the basic engineering constraints. To the three remaining contenders, images from NASA's Mars orbiters were scoured and weather records searched. Eventually, Isidis Planitia and Valles Marineris were ruled out for being too rocky and windy.
That left the 81-mile long, 17-mile-wide (130-kilometer-long, 27-kilometer-wide) landing ellipse on the western edge of a flat, smooth expanse of lava plain.
"If you've been to Martian coming to explore Earth's interior, we'd be exploring Mars' interior, it would not matter if you'd be in the middle of Kansas or the beaches of Oahu," said Banerdt. Elysium Planitia is the best of the world. perfect. "
After a 205-day journey that began on May 5, NASA's InSight mission will touch down on March on Nov. 26 at little before 3 pm EST (12 p.m. PST). Its solar panels will unfurl within a few hours of touchdown. Mission engineers and scientists will take advantage of their "workspace" before deploying SEIS and HP3 on the surface.
InSight was the 12th selection in NASA's series of Discovery-class missions. Created in 1992, the Discovery Program sponsors frequent, cost-capped solar system exploration missions with highly focused scientific goals.
Explore further:
Five things to know about InSight Mars landing
More information:
For more information about InSight, visit mars.nasa.gov/insight/
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