The major science stories from Spirit |
The major science stories from Spirit |
Nov 24 2008, 09:23 PM
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#1
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Administrator Group: Admin Posts: 5172 Joined: 4-August 05 From: Pasadena, CA, USA, Earth Member No.: 454 |
I really, really, really tried to do my own research this time without relying on all you rover-watchers here for help, but after a couple of weeks of banging my head against a wall I'm coming crawling to you for help. I need to produce (for both our website and a podcast) a simplified, big-picture view of what Spirit has accomplished on Mars over the past five years. I've basically got to summarize five years of the mission in four minutes of speaking. The operational details (the main mileposts on the drive) are very easy to figure out with the help of Tesheiner's maps and the discussions in the route map thread, so I've got that in hand. What I am having trouble with is figuring out the answers to the following science questions:
1. What is the summary story that can be told about the history of the interior of Gusev crater based on Spirit's observations? Geology is fundamentally a science devoted to telling a story about a landscape -- what's the basic story that the Gusev landscape is telling us, as revealed by Spirit? 2. What are the biggest science discoveries -- I'm talking about the top three or five stories -- that Spirit has made? There's just so much material on Spirit that I'm having an awful time trying to see the forest for all the trees. All the journal articles that I can find are just devoted to one phase of the mission, so I can't figure out which stories are the most significant. I have all of Salley's great articles to go through, but again, they're so detail-rich that it's difficult to figure out what the big picture is; it's like looking at a Seurat painting up close. Any help or pointers to any place where anybody has already produced some quality science summary would be greatly appreciated. --Emily -------------------- My website - My Patreon - @elakdawalla on Twitter - Please support unmannedspaceflight.com by donating here.
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Nov 25 2008, 06:13 PM
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#2
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Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 3431 Joined: 11-August 04 From: USA Member No.: 98 |
This is a great topic. I'm making a new years' resolution to try to understand the science that's been done a bit more, starting with these links.
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Nov 25 2008, 10:45 PM
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#3
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Member Group: Members Posts: 384 Joined: 4-January 07 Member No.: 1555 |
Emily,
I regret that this observation is not emphasized more by NASA or SS, but to me one of Spirit's most exciting discoveries was that everything off the landing plain appears to be layered and fragmental - coarse rock fragments with generally crude layering in the Columbia Hills, and fine salty sand with fine layering in Home Plate and vicinity. Except for what may be a single included ballistic rock fragment, the Home Plate layering greatly resembles that in Meridiani, especially the pervasive low angle cross beds (with some at higher angles). Other similarities include the underlying distinctive spherule-rich bed (reportedly with crystalline hematite), and the ferric acid sulfates, locally even richer at Gusev (up to 40%) than at Meridiani (up to 30%). Despite these obvious similarities, two completely different (but fundamentally Earth-like) causes have been inferred for the two sets of layered rocks, sulfate minerals, and spherules- volcanic (pyroclastic) surge from a vanished or hidden volcano (with vanished fumaroles and accretionary lapilli) for one, and an exceedingly complex set of events involving salt evaporation from vanished or hidden muddy acid playa lakes, silicate/salt transport and deposition by the wind, and alteration and redeposition by standing and flowing acid liquid water for the other. A fragmental silica-rich bed, stratigraphically between the spherule-rich bed and the beds of Home Plate proper, so far appears to be unique to Gusev, and therefore probably ranks as Spirit's single most interesting discovery. -- HDP Don |
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Nov 28 2008, 05:49 PM
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#4
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Member Group: Members Posts: 276 Joined: 11-December 07 From: Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Member No.: 3978 |
Emily, A fragmental silica-rich bed, stratigraphically between the spherule-rich bed and the beds of Home Plate proper, so far appears to be unique to Gusev, and therefore probably ranks as Spirit's single most interesting discovery. -- HDP Don Thank you, I was wondering when someone was going to say that! -------------------- |
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