AN INTRODUCTION TO THE MARS SCIENCE LABORATORY CURIOSITY ROVER MISSION AND THE SAMPLE ANALYSIS AT MARS INSTRUMENT SUITE AND EDUCATION AND PUBLIC OUTREACH PROGRAM

The Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover landed in Gale Crater in August 2012. Curiosity is the largest rover with the most advanced suite of scientific instruments ever to explore another planet. Its size and mass required engineers to devise an entirely new landing technique to land Curiosity safely, and it became the first Mars rover to land with its wheels on the ground, ready to go. The primary science goal for this mission is to quantitatively assess the habitability of environments preserved in Gale Crater to determine whether they could have supported life at some time in the past, or even today. Instruments onboard Curiosity are collecting data that enable scientists to analyze the geology and geochemistry of Gale Crater, including the role that water has played in shaping and influencing this landscape, and characterize the surface radiation environment. These investigations provide context for the environments recorded in Gale Crater, helping scientists better understand how they formed, how they evolved, and what effect that might have had on the preservation of evidence of life, if it ever existed in the crater.

Curiosity has allowed scientists to make a number of important discoveries during its primary mission. Data from its instruments reveal abundant evidence of past water in Gale Crater. It has confirmed that Mars’s atmosphere is enriched in heavy isotopes, indicating that much of the martian atmosphere has been lost. Curiosity enabled the determination of the first age and surface exposure dates for rocks on Mars, from the surface of Mars. And, Curiosity data shows evidence of an ancient habitable environment in Gale Crater. At the time of writing, Curiosity is exploring The Kimberley formation, an interesting intersection of multiple terrain types along the path to Curiosity’s ultimate destination: a 5-km-high mountain in the middle of Gale Crater called Mount Sharp.

I will provide a brief overview of the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover mission to set the stage for the ‘Curiosity on Mars’ session. I will highlight the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument suite, a powerful trio of instruments onboard Curiosity that analyze rock, soil, and atmospheric samples, and will share information about the SAM Education and Public Outreach program.