LONDON: Since late-2014, the team-up between NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover on the surface and the MAVEN spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet is telling scientists what on Earth happened to Mars’ atmosphere and water and what lessons we can learn from this planetary disaster.
MAVEN or the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN mission (MAVEN) entered Martian orbit on Sep. 21, 2014. Its mission is to characterize the current state of Mars’ weak upper atmosphere and ionosphere and determine the rate of gas loss.
MAVEN is researching the historical loss of Martian water and carbon dioxide into space. It’s studying the whole region from the top of the upper atmosphere down to the lower atmosphere so the connection between the two can be better understood.
