Another visitor to Mars.The newest emissary EMISSARY. One who is sent from one power or government into another nation for the purpose of spreading false rumors and to cause alarm. He differs from a spy. (q.v.) from Earth arrived at the Red Planet on March 10. The NASA NASA: see National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA in full National Aeronautics and Space Administration Independent U.S. craft, known as the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, joins three other satellites exploring the planet: two from NASA and one from the European Space Agency European Space Agency (ESA), multinational agency dedicated to the promotion, for exclusively peaceful purposes, of cooperation among European states in space research and technology. . Meanwhile, the twin rovers Spirit and Opportunity, more than 2 years after they landed, continue their treks along the Red Planet's surface. Using instruments ranging from radar sensors to gamma-ray detectors Gamma-ray detectors Instruments that register the presence of gamma (γ) radiation. Such detectors convert some or all of the energy of gamma radiation into an electrical signal. , Orbiter will explore the Martian atmosphere and surface and search for underground deposits of water. The craft's highest-resolution camera will discern features as small as a card table. Orbiter will also scope out sites suitable for future landing missions and act as a communications relay for other craft, radioing data to Earth at 10 times the rate of any previous Mars craft. The new arrival is currently in a highly elongated e·lon·gate tr. & intr.v. e·lon·gat·ed, e·lon·gat·ing, e·lon·gates To make or grow longer. adj. or elongated 1. Made longer; extended. 2. Having more length than width; slender. orbit. Over the next 6 months, engineers will command Orbiter to dip into the Martian atmosphere some 500 times to slow the craft and ease it into the smaller, circular orbit required for the main mission, which will begin in November.--R.C. |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion