Mars rover says: 'good evening gale crater!'

[Drone]

Originally Posted by TheMailMan78

But our poo slinging ancestors knew enough to carve rocks about them? Sorry but I think these stories are just ancient 4chan stone carvings. Trolls are timeless ya know?

I didn't talk about those carvings. I just said that maybe someone advanced visited Earth before. There was some theory that something must be hidden in human DNA. Some % of it is junk, some scientists believe that maybe that junk keeps the secrets of the universe lol. Maybe they're trolling but maybe that trolling has a reason.

Just found this:

About 80% of the nucleotide bases in the human genome may be transcribed, but transcription does not necessarily imply function.

[PopcornMachine]

Originally Posted by Drone

Fair enough. However, maybe they just didn't wish to be found.

Elvis didn't wish to be found. Makes perfect sense.

Wish we were talking about what is actually being learned on Mars instead of "it makes sense to me without proof, so it must be true" stuff.

I guess they need to pick up the exploration. People are getting bored or something.

[Irony]

Originally Posted by Drone

I didn't talk about those carvings. I just said that maybe someone advanced visited Earth before. There was some theory that something must be hidden in human DNA. Some % of it is junk, some scientists believe that maybe that junk keeps the secrets of the universe lol. Maybe they're trolling but maybe that trolling has a reason.

Just found this:

Found this a while back. Good read about the junk dna theory.

http://m.guardiannews.com/science/20...e&type=article

[micropage7]

NASA’s Curiosity rover took time out of its busy scooping and vibrating schedule on Oct. 9 to inspect a mysterious bright object that it spotted in the sand near its wheels the day before. Engineers have identified the bright bit as “shred of plastic material, likely benign.”

“Yeah so last night was crazy. When we spotted the object near the rover, we had to quickly come up with a totally new plan,” tweeted Keri Bean, a meteorologist on the rover team, on Oct. 8.

Curiosity had to take a break in its intended schedule of analyzing the Martian soil in order to make sure that the fallen object was not going to interfere with sampling activities. A close-up photo (below) taken with the probe’s Remote Micro-Imager of the Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) showed that the object was probably a piece of plastic, though it has still not been definitively identified. Engineers will take more pictures of the rover’s surroundings over the coming days to make sure there are no other potential contaminants. NASA will probably have further news about the object during a press conference on Oct. 11.

Similar loose screws and bits have been shed by previous rovers, including the Mars Phoenix Lander and the Opportunity rover.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/20...right-plastic/

[NinkobEi]

inb4 "its obvious this piece of plastic came from a mars civilization far more advanced than our own" posts

[3870x2]

It turned out to be a piece of the rover.

It kinda worries me that pieces are falling off of the rovers randomly.

[Irony]

It mentioned screws falling off to. It'd be a bummer to fly 33 milion miles and then not be able to move because you lost a lug nut

[D007]

Originally Posted by TheMailMan78

I store my faith in man in stupidity.

Just saying if there was such an advanced civilization in the past they didn't do a very good job leaving any records.Just saying if there was such an advanced civilization in the past they didn't do a very good job leaving any records or trace. We can find dinosaur dung but no trace of a super race?

If they were "super" advanced, They would of made sure the human race had no chance of finding them. Who'd want us destroying their world like we do to ours? Not to mention polluting any sense of honor and loyalty that might exist in their culture and replacing it with monetary obligations and Romney care..

[TheMailMan78]

Originally Posted by D007

If they were "super" advanced, They would of made sure the human race had no chance of finding them. Who'd want us destroying their world like we do to ours? Not to mention polluting any sense of honor and loyalty that might exist in their culture and replacing it with monetary obligations and Romney care..

I just figured they died out because they were all dependent on a massive food dispenser and when it broke no body knew how to take care of themselves.

[Irony]

They ran out of soylant green after they moved underground and wiped the surface clean of all signs of civilization

[Drone]

scoopin'

[Mussels]

thats a nice clean image there. wish we could see it before NASA adjusted the color tones.

[TheMailMan78]

Originally Posted by Drone

http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/ne...rkresumesw.jpg

scoopin'

Just wanna say thanks Drone for all the images you find. I check here everyday.

[Phusius]

I think Drone is secretly on the Space Station, look at those specs, sounds like a government computer to me.

[micropage7]

The rock named Jake Matijevic that Curiosity explored for several days on Mars. Red dots indicate areas where the rover shot the rock with laser blasts while purple circles indicate areas investigated with X-rays beams.

After shooting it with lasers and X-rays, NASA’s Curiosity rover has determined that a rock nicknamed “Jake Matijevic” is of a variety that no other rover has ever spotted on Mars.

The rock, a highly fractionated alkalic rock type, is relatively well known to geologists because it is common in rift zones on Earth and island chains such as the Hawaiian Islands.

“This is a rock type which had not been seen before” by previous Mars rovers including Spirit and Opportunity, said Roger Weins, principle investigator for Curiosity’s ChemCam instrument, during a NASA press conference Oct. 11. It forms under relatively high pressure and often in the presence of water. While Curiosity is mostly focused on sedimentary rocks that could indicate the presence of past conditions for life, Matijevic is an igneous rock that likely formed about 5 miles under the Martian surface.

The rover had been investigating Matijevic mostly as an early test of the instruments on its arm, such as the Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS), which bombards a sample with X-rays to determine its chemical composition. Curiosity also used its ChemCam instrument to shoot the rock with more than 400 laser blasts, vaporizing microscopic amounts and then analyzing the resulting dust and plasma. This investigation showed that the rock contained a lot of elements such as silicon, aluminium, sodium, and potassium.

“This was surprising because it differed from the composition from what we know of rocks on Mars,” said Edward Stolper, Curiosity science team co-investigator, during the conference.


Scientists think this rock formed in the interior of Mars when magma moved up through cooler rock. As the magma cooled, elements including nickel, iron, and magnesium crystallized out of it first, leaving behind a material rich in silicon, aluminum, sodium, and potassium, as well as a higher fraction of dissolved water. Though the rock was unusual, the Curiosity team was careful to point out that it was just one isolated sample and not to extrapolate too much about early Martian geology based on it.

Engineers also discussed the case of the mysterious plastic object that Curiosity had spotted several days ago while scooping bits of Martian soil. They concluded that it is likely a bit of bonding material that fell off the rover or a piece of tubing that came off the descent stage and was recently blown off the probe. In either case, “it’s completely inconsequential to the rover’s function” and no further pieces have been seen, said engineer Chris Roumeliotis, the lead turret rover planner. Curiosity is continuing to go through its Martian dust rinse and repeat cycle to clean out its sample delivery instrument of any left-over contaminants from Earth.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/20...nge-matijevic/

[TheMailMan78]

Nasa Engineer 1: Ohhh look a rock! I wonder what its made out of?

Nasa Engineer 2: Dunno! Could be made out of anything!

Nasa Engineer 3: We should shoot it with 400 lasers to find out!

Nasa Engineer 4: What if its explosive?

Nasa Engineer 1, 2, 3: Shut da F#@K UP noob. We are blastin this bitch with 400 lasers!

Mars Rover: IMMA FIRIN MA LAZA!

[3870x2]

Originally Posted by TheMailMan78

Nasa Engineer 1: Ohhh look a rock! I wonder what its made out of?

Nasa Engineer 2: Dunno! Could be made out of anything!

Nasa Engineer 3: We should shoot it with 400 lasers to find out!

Nasa Engineer 4: What if its explosive?

Nasa Engineer 1, 2, 3: Shut da F#@K UP noob. We are blastin this bitch with 400 lasers!

Mars Rover: IMMA FIRIN MA LAZA!

Unfortunately the rover didn not come with the ability to poke it with a stick.

[PopcornMachine]

Frau Farbissina: "Laser ON!"

[Drone]

The rock named Jake Matijevic

ha, it has a name!

[Irony]

I seem to remember already talking about this rock a couple weeks ago, when they first named it after the dead engineer...

Edit: found an article:

Jake Matijevic, a mathematician-turned-rover-engineer who played an important role in the design of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL, dubbed "Curiosity"), now appears in Wikipedia as "Jake Matijevic (rock)." Jake passed away just days after Curiosity's landing in August. With his understated manner, I can imagine his small smile on seeing he's now more famous as a rock on Mars than as an engineer.

Here's a link

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/willia...b_1923627.html

[Drone]

^ Yeah, I see. Found two pics of that rock:





Edit:

And here's a scuffmark NASA's Curiosity made in a windblown ripple of Martian sand with its wheel



If I didn't know it's Martian I'd never guess. Lol it looks like our regular rocks and pebble.

[Drone]

Still scoopin'. Bigger pics this time

[micropage7]

Curiosity Rover Finds More Strange, Bright Objects in Martian Soil



NASA’s Curiosity rover took three scoops from a small Martian sand dune and found several bright particles in the soil. Scientists think these are unrelated to the odd bright object that Curiosity saw last week, which turned out to be plastic that fell from the probe, and are probably indigenous Martian mineral flecks.

Curiosity has sat for several weeks at an area called Rocknest, where its job has been to sample the Martian soil, practicing using its scoop and analysis instruments. The plan was to take three scoops and send the sand through the Collection and Handling for In-Situ Martian Rock Analysis (CHIMRA) tool to clean it of any material that may have hitchhiked from Earth.

The first scoop was interrupted by the aforementioned bright plastic litter but, after determining that it was benign, engineers proceeded with their schedule. In the second scoop, “we began to see some bright flecks in the scoop areas,” said geologist John Grotzinger of Caltech, Curiosity’s project scientist, during a NASA press conference on Oct. 18.


After last week’s plastic encounter, Curiosity’s science team worried the new particles might be man-made. Since they turned up in scoop holes, however, the granules must have been buried in the subsurface. They likely came from larger minerals that broke down. They might also represent the product of some geological soil process that generates a bright but unknown mineral.

“The science team started calling them schmutz,” said Grotzinger. “We can’t rule out that they’re something man-made but we don’t think that they are.”

In coming weeks, Curiosity will position its high-resolution ChemCam to get a close-up look at the schmutz. In the meantime, the rover completed its three scoops and has delivered a sample of Martian soil to its internal CheMin instrument. It will determine what minerals occur in this area



http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/20...coops-objects/

[Mussels]

HD images from mars still tickles my jimmies.

[TheMailMan78]

Originally Posted by Mussels

HD images from mars still tickles my jimmies.

The dude abides. I may not always agree with Drone on some things but he comes through in this thread. However so does micropage7 now! Keep em' comin'!