NASA at the 2011 NSTA Conference

NASA at the 2011 NSTA Conference
This is a feature from the NASA/JPL Education Office.

02.24.11 -- Make NASA a part of your NSTA experience this year! The 2011 National Science Teachers Association's
national conference is being held March 10 - 13, 2011, in San Francisco, Calif. Dozens of NASA presentations, workshops
and short courses are scheduled during the conference. To find NASA sessions that fit in your schedule, visit http://bit.ly/faqRgN.

Also, stop by the NASA exhibit booth (#729) in Moscone Center South to learn about exciting new NASA programs and products.

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Advanced NASA Instrument Gets Close-up on Mars Rocks

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

News release: 2011-059 Feb. 18, 2011

Priscilla Vega (818) 354-1357
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Priscilla.r.vega@jpl.nasa.gov

Advanced NASA Instrument Gets Close-up on Mars Rocks

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-059&cid=release_2011-059

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, will carry a next generation,
onboard "chemical element reader" to measure the chemical ingredients in Martian
rocks and soil. The instrument is one of 10 that will help the rover in its upcoming
mission to determine the past and present habitability of a specific area on the Red
Planet. Launch is scheduled between Nov. 25 and Dec. 18, 2011, with landing in August
2012.

The Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) instrument, designed by physics
professor Ralf Gellert of the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada, uses the power of
alpha particles, or helium nuclei, and X-rays to bombard a target, causing the target to
give off its own characteristic alpha particles and X-ray radiation. This radiation is
"read by" an X-ray detector inside the sensor head, which reveals which elements and
how much of each are in the rock or soil.

Identifying the elemental composition of lighter elements such as sodium, magnesium
or aluminum, as well as heavier elements like iron, nickel or zinc, will help scientists
identify the building blocks of the Martian crust. By comparing these findings with
those of previous Mars rover findings, scientists can determine if any weathering has
taken place since the rock formed ages ago.

All NASA Mars rovers have carried a similar instrument – Pathfinder's rover
Sojourner, Spirit and Opportunity, and now Curiosity, too. Improvements have been
made with each generation, but the basic design of the instrument has remained the
same.

"APXS was modified for Mars Science Laboratory to be faster so it could make quicker
measurements. On the Mars Exploration Rovers [Spirit and Opportunity] it took us five
to 10 hours to get information that we will now collect in two to three hours," said
Gellert, the intrument's principal investigator. "We hope this will help us to investigate
more samples."

Another significant change to the next-generation APXS is the cooling system on the X-
ray detector chip. The instruments used on Spirit and Opportunity were able to take
measurements only at night. But the new cooling system will allow the instrument on
Curiosity to take measurements during the day, too.

The main electronics portion of the tissue-box-sized instrument lives in the rover's
body, while the sensor head, the size of a soft drink can, is mounted on the robotic
arm. With the help of Curiosity's remote sensing instruments – the Chemistry and
Camera (ChemCam) instrument and the Mastcam – the rover team will decide where
to drive Curiosity for a closer look with the instruments, including APXS.
Measurements are taken with the APXS by deploying the sensor head to make direct
contact with the desired sample.

The rover's brush will be used to remove dust from rocks to prepare them for
inspection by APXS and by MAHLI, the rover's arm-mounted, close-up camera.
Whenever promising samples are found, the rover will then use its drill to extract a
few grains and feed them into the rover's analytical instruments, SAM and CheMin,
which will then make very detailed mineralogical and other investigations.

Scientists will use information from APXS and the other instruments to find the
interesting spots and to figure out the present and past environmental conditions that
are preserved in the rocks and soils.

"The rovers have answered a lot of questions, but they've also opened up new
questions," said Gellert. "Curiosity was designed to pick up where Spirit and
Opportunity left off."

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars
Science Laboratory mission for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington.

For more information about the mission, visit http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/ . To watch
the spacecraft being assembled and tested, visit http://www.ustream.tv/nasajpl .

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Herschel Measures Dark Matter for Star-Forming Galaxies

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

Trent Perrotto 202-358-0321
Headquarters, Washington
trent.j.perrotto@nasa.gov

News release: 2011-057 Feb. 16, 2010

Herschel Measures Dark Matter for Star-Forming Galaxies

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-057&cid=release_2011-057

PASADENA, Calif. -- The Herschel Space Observatory has revealed how much dark matter it
takes to form a new galaxy bursting with stars. Herschel is a European Space Agency
cornerstone mission supported with important NASA contributions.

The findings are a key step in understanding how dark matter, an invisible substance permeating
our universe, contributed to the birth of massive galaxies in the early universe.

"If you start with too little dark matter, then a developing galaxy would peter out," said
astronomer Asantha Cooray of the University of California, Irvine. He is the principal
investigator of new research appearing in the journal Nature, online on Feb. 16 and in the Feb. 24
print edition. "If you have too much, then gas doesn't cool efficiently to form one large galaxy,
and you end up with lots of smaller galaxies. But if you have the just the right amount of dark
matter, then a galaxy bursting with stars will pop out."

The right amount of dark matter turns out to be a mass equivalent to 300 billion of our suns.

Herschel launched into space in May 2009. The mission's large, 3.5-meter (11.5-foot) telescope
detects longer-wavelength infrared light from a host of objects, ranging from asteroids and
planets in our own solar system to faraway galaxies.

"This remarkable discovery shows that early galaxies go through periods of star formation much
more vigorous than in our present-day Milky Way," said William Danchi, Herschel program
scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "It showcases the importance of infrared
astronomy, enabling us to peer behind veils of interstellar dust to see stars in their infancy."

Cooray and colleagues used the telescope to measure infrared light from massive, star-forming
galaxies located 10 to 11 billion light-years away. Astronomers think these and other galaxies
formed inside clumps of dark matter, similar to chicks incubating in eggs.

Giant clumps of dark matter act like gravitational wells that collect the gas and dust needed for
making galaxies. When a mixture of gas and dust falls into a well, it condenses and cools,
allowing new stars to form. Eventually enough stars form, and a galaxy is born.

Herschel was able to uncover more about how this galaxy-making process works by mapping the
infrared light from collections of very distant, massive star-forming galaxies. This pattern of
light, called the cosmic infrared background, is like a web that spreads across the sky. Because
Herschel can survey large areas quickly with high resolution, it was able to create the first
detailed maps of the cosmic infrared background.

"It turns out that it's much more effective to look at these patterns rather than the individual
galaxies," said Jamie Bock of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Bock is the
U.S. principal investigator for Herschel's Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver instrument
used to make the maps. "This is like looking at a picture in a magazine from a reading distance.
You don't notice the individual dots, but you see the big picture. Herschel gives us the big picture
of these distant galaxies, showing the influence of dark matter."

The maps showed the galaxies are more clustered into groups than previously believed. The
amount of galaxy clustering depends on the amount of dark matter. After a series of complicated
numerical simulations, the astronomers were able to determine exactly how much dark matter is
needed to form a single star-forming galaxy.

"This measurement is important, because we are homing in on the very basic ingredients in
galaxy formation," said Alexandre Amblard of UC Irvine, first author of the Nature paper. "In
this case, the ingredient, dark matter, happens to be an exotic substance that we still have much
to learn about."

NASA's Herschel Project Office is based at JPL, which contributed mission-enabling technology
for two of Herschel's three science instruments. The NASA Herschel Science Center, part of the
Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena,
supports the U.S. astronomical community. JPL is managed by Caltech.

More information is online at http://www.herschel.caltech.edu, http://www.nasa.gov/herschel
and http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Herschel/index.html .

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NASA Releases Images of Man-Made Crater on Comet

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

DC Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726
NASA Headquarters, Washington
Dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Blaine Friedlander 607-254-6235
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
bpf2@cornell.edu

News release: 2011-056 February 15, 2011

NASA Releases Images of Man-Made Crater on Comet

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-056&cid=release_2011-056

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Stardust spacecraft returned new images of a comet showing a scar
resulting from the 2005 Deep Impact mission. The images also showed the comet has a fragile and
weak nucleus.

The spacecraft made its closest approach to comet Tempel 1 on Monday, Feb. 14, at 8:40 p.m. PST
(11:40 p.m. EST) at a distance of approximately 178 kilometers (111 miles). Stardust took 72 high-
resolution images of the comet. It also accumulated 468 kilobytes of data about the dust in its coma,
the cloud that is a comet's atmosphere. The craft is on its second mission of exploration called
Stardust-NExT, having completed its prime mission collecting cometary particles and returning them
to Earth in 2006.

The Stardust-NExT mission met its goals, which included observing surface features that changed in
areas previously seen during the 2005 Deep Impact mission; imaging new terrain; and viewing the
crater generated when the 2005 mission propelled an impactor at the comet.

"This mission is 100 percent successful," said Joe Veverka, Stardust-NExT principal investigator of
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. "We saw a lot of new things that we didn't expect, and we'll be
working hard to figure out what Tempel 1 is trying to tell us."

Several of the images provide tantalizing clues to the result of the Deep Impact mission's collision
with Tempel 1.
"We see a crater with a small mound in the center, and it appears that some of the ejecta went up and
came right back down," said Pete Schultz of Brown University, Providence, R.I. "This tells us this
cometary nucleus is fragile and weak based on how subdued the crater is we see today."

Engineering telemetry downlinked after closest approach indicates the spacecraft flew through waves
of disintegrating cometary particles, including a dozen impacts that penetrated more than one layer of
its protective shielding.

"The data indicate Stardust went through something similar to a B-17 bomber flying through flak in
World War II," said Don Brownlee, Stardust-NExT co-investigator from the University of
Washington in Seattle. "Instead of having a little stream of uniform particles coming out, they
apparently came out in chunks and crumbled."

While the Valentine's Day night encounter of Tempel 1 is complete, the spacecraft will continue to
look at its latest cometary obsession from afar.

"This spacecraft has logged over 3.5 billion miles since launch, and while its last close encounter is
complete, its mission of discovery is not," said Tim Larson, Stardust-NExT project manager at JPL.
"We'll continue imaging the comet as long as the science team can gain useful information, and then
Stardust will get its well-deserved rest."

Stardust-NExT is a low-cost mission that is expanding the investigation of comet Tempel 1 initiated
by the Deep Impact spacecraft. The mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission
Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver built the spacecraft and
manages day-to-day mission operations.

The latest Stardust-Next/Tempel 1 images are online at:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/stardust/multimedia/gallery-index.html

More information about Stardust-NExT is at: http://stardustnext.jpl.nasa.gov .

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Comet Hunter's First Images on the Ground

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

DC Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726
NASA Headquarters, Washington
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Blaine Friedlander 607-254-6235
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
Bpf2@cornell.edu

News release: 2011-054 Feb. 15, 2011

Comet Hunter's First Images on the Ground

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-054&cid=release_2011-054

PASADENA, Calif. -- Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena,
Calif., have begun receiving the first of 72 anticipated images of comet Tempel 1 taken by
NASA's Stardust spacecraft.

The first six, most distant approach images are available at http://www.nasa.gov/stardust and
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov. Additional images, including those from closest approach, are being
downlinked in chronological order and will be available later in the day.

A news conference previously planned for 10 a.m. PST (1 p.m. EST) will be held later in the
day, to allow scientists more time to analyze the data and images. A new time will be announced
later this morning.

Stardust-NExT is a low-cost mission that expands on the investigation of comet Tempel 1
initiated by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft. JPL, a division of the California Institute of
Technology in Pasadena, manages Stardust-NExT for NASA's Science Mission Directorate,
Washington, D.C. Joe Veverka of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., is the mission's principal
investigator. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the spacecraft and manages day-to-
day mission operations.

More information about Stardust-NExT is available at http://stardustnext.jpl.nasa.gov .

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NASA's Stardust Spacecraft Completes Comet Flyby

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

DC Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726
NASA Headquarters, Washington
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Blaine Friedlander 607-254-6235
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
Bpf2@cornell.edu

News release: 2011-053 Feb. 14, 2011

NASA's Stardust Spacecraft Completes Comet Flyby

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-053&cid=release_2011-053

PASADENA, Calif. – Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.,
watched as data downlinked from the Stardust spacecraft indicated it completed its closest approach
with comet Tempel 1. An hour after closest approach, the spacecraft turned to point its large, high-
gain antenna at Earth. It is expected that images of the comet's nucleus collected during the flyby
will be received on Earth starting at about midnight California time (3 a.m. EST on Tuesday, Feb.
15).

Preliminary data already transmitted from the spacecraft indicate the time of closest approach was
about 8:39 p.m. PST (11:39 p.m. EST), at a distance of 181 kilometers (112 miles) from Tempel 1.

This is a bonus mission for the comet chaser, which previously flew past comet Wild 2 and returned
samples from its coma to Earth. During this bonus encounter, the plan called for the spacecraft to
take images of the comet's surface to observe what changes occurred since a NASA spacecraft last
visited. (NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft executed an encounter with Tempel 1 in July 2005).

Stardust-NExT is a low-cost mission that will expand the investigation of comet Tempel 1 initiated
by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena, manages Stardust-NExT for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C.
Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the spacecraft and manages day-to-day mission
operations.

For more information about Stardust-NExT, visit: http://stardustnext.jpl.nasa.gov .

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NASAJPL eCards for Your Valentine

NASAJPL eCards for Your Valentine

Hundreds declared their love this weekend by sending NASAJPL comet Valentines at http://bit.ly/g8coxE, raising our "Love Comet-O-Meter" to its half-way point: "thrusters burning."

So what better time to send it all the way to its goal of "cometary coma" than Valentine's Day itself and the night NASA's Stardust spacecraft makes its encounter with comet Tempel 1? All you have to do is visit http://bit.ly/g8coxE pick your favorite card design, enter your and the recipient's email address and voila! Card sent. Love declared. (Email addresses are not retained by NASAJPL.)

Find even more ways to declare your love through Twitter, Facebook and text message at http://bit.ly/g8coxE and learn more about tonight's big comet encounter!

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NASA Spacecraft Hours From Comet Encounter

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 PHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Stardust-Next Mission Status
NASA Spacecraft Hours From Comet Encounter Feb. 14, 2011

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-050&cid=release_2011-050

PASADENA, Calif. -- As of today, Feb. 14, at 9:21 a.m. PST (12:21 p.m. EST), NASA's Stardust-
NExT mission spacecraft is within a quarter-million miles (402,336 kilometers) of its quarry, comet
Tempel 1, which it will fly by tonight. The spacecraft is cutting the distance with the comet at a rate
of about 10.9 kilometers per second (6.77 miles per second or 24,000 mph).

The flyby of Tempel 1 will give scientists an opportunity to look for changes on the comet's surface
since it was visited by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft in July 2005. Since then, Tempel 1 has
completed one orbit of the sun, and scientists are looking forward to discovering any differences in
the comet.

The closest approach is expected tonight at approximately 8:40 p.m. PST (11:40 p.m. EST).

During the encounter phase, the spacecraft will carry out many important milestones in short order
and automatically, as the spacecraft is too far away to receive timely updates from Earth. These
milestones include turning the spacecraft to point its protective shields between it and the anticipated
direction from which cometary particles would approach. Another milestone will occur at about four
minutes to closest approach, when the spacecraft will begin science imaging of the comet's nucleus.

The nominal imaging sequence will run for about eight minutes. The spacecraft's onboard memory is
limited to 72 high-resolution images, so the imaging will be most closely spaced around the time of
closest approach for best-resolution coverage of Tempel 1's nucleus. At the time of closest encounter,
the spacecraft is expected to be approximately 200 kilometers (124 miles) from the comet's nucleus.

The mission team expects to begin receiving images on the ground starting at around midnight PST (3
a.m. on Feb. 15 EST). Transmission of each image will take about 15 minutes. It will take about 10
hours to complete the transmission of all images and science data aboard the spacecraft.

Live coverage on NASA TV and via the Internet begins at 8:30 p.m. PST (11:30 p.m. EST) from
mission control at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Coverage also will include
segments from the Lockheed Martin Space System's mission support area in Denver. A post-flyby
news conference is planned on Feb. 15 at 10 a.m. PST (1 p.m. EST).

For NASA TV streaming video, scheduling and downlink information, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/ntv .

The live coverage and news conference will also be carried on one of JPL's Ustream channels. During
events, viewers can take part in a real-time chat and submit questions to the Stardust-NExT team at:
http://www.ustream.tv/user/NASAJPL2 .

During its 12 years in space, Stardust became the first spacecraft to collect samples of a comet (Wild
2 in 2004), which were delivered to Earth in 2006 for study. The Stardust-NExT mission is managed
by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems in
Denver built the spacecraft and manages day-to-day mission operations.

A press kit and other detailed information about Stardust-NExT is online at:
http://stardustnext.jpl.nasa.gov .

Media contacts:

DC Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726
Headquarters, Washington
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Blaine Friedlander 607-254-6235
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
bpf2@cornell.edu
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Send a Card, Declare Your Love -- for Comets

Send a Card, Declare Your Love – For Comets

On Feb. 14, NASA's Stardust spacecraft will set its loving gaze on comet Tempel 1. And it got us thinking; don't all comets deserve a day of love – even the ones that are flying solo this Valentine's Day? We say, yes.

So we've set up a little campaign at http://bit.ly/edauDm to let you spread the love when you send one of our free Comet eCards or tell us why you "heart" comets by text, tweet or Facebook post. We'll even throw in a free "I <3 Comets" badge for all participants, making this the most stellar gift you can give this Valentine's Day.

Here's How It Works:

We'll be gauging your love for comets via our Love Comet-O-Meter at http://bit.ly/edauDm. Each time you send an eCard, tweet about your love using our hash tag #comet and @NASAJPL, or comment about why you heart comets on our Facebook widget at http://bit.ly/ie0yjc, the Love Comet-O-Meter will get one step closer to its goal and you'll get a free badge to post anywhere you please.

How Do You Heart Comets? Let Us Count the Ways …

eCard: Select a design from the options at http://bit.ly/edauDm to send your eCard to a special someone. It only takes two steps to send a card, then voila! You'll receive your very own "I <3 Comets" badge.

Text: Take out your cell phone and text HEARTCOMETS to 67463 (msg. and data rates may apply). From there, all you have to do is reply to the message with your declaration of love, and we'll text you back a link to download the "I <3 Comets" badge, plus a link where you can see your comment go live. (Phone numbers will not be published.)

Twitter: Tell us why you heart comets by including our hash tag #comet and @NASAJPL in your tweets and see them displayed on our live Twitter stream (located in our Join the Conversation box at http://bit.ly/ie0yjc). Then visit our Twitter page (http://twitter.com/#!/nasajpl) on Feb. 15 to download your "I <3 Comets" badge.

Facebook: Click on the Facebook tab in our Join the Conversation box at http://bit.ly/ie0yjc. From here, you can comment on the campaign and tell us all the reasons you heart comets. Then download your "I <3 Comets" badge on our Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/NASAJPL) on Feb. 15.

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Upcoming Teacher Workshops: Lunar Certification, Thrill of Discovery, Periodic Table

Upcoming Teacher Workshops: Lunar Certification, Thrill of Discovery, Periodic Table
This is a feature from the NASA/JPL Education Office.

02.11.10 -- Here is a list of upcoming educator workshops.

Lunar and Meteorite Sample Certification
Feb. 19, 2011, 10 a.m. to noon

Target audience: K - 12 teachers

Location: JPL's Educator Resource Center, Pomona, CA

Overview: NASA makes real moon rocks and regolith (moon dirt) available for teachers to borrow. The samples are from NASA's historic Apollo missions. This certification workshop is required in order to bring the excitement of real lunar rocks and regolith samples to your students.

Directions and contact information: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/education/index.cfm?page=115

Thrill of Discovery Workshop
Saturday, March 19, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Target audience: K -12 teachers and out-of-school time educators

Four locations:
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD
Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX
Jackson Middle School Observatory, Champlin, MN

$25 registration fee

Overview: NASA's Discovery and New Frontiers missions are traveling vast distances to find answers to age-old questions. These robotic spacecraft are celestial detectives, revealing how our solar system formed and evolved, and doing brilliant science utilizing way cool technologies.

Come celebrate NASA's Year of the Solar System and receive a great packet of resources, including your own DVD of "Space School Musical."

Complete workshop information: http://www.dawn-mission.org/discovery/thrill_of_discovery.asp

Back by popular demand:
Introduction to the Periodic Table of Elements and the Solar System
Saturday, March 19, 2011, 10 a.m. to noon

Target audience:Recommended for grades 3 and 5

Location: JPL's Educator Resource Center, Pomona, CA

Overview: Do you have trouble understanding the Periodic Table of Elements? This California standards-based workshop will teach you basic principles of what the table represents by using our solar system as an exciting basis for understanding. You will be able to use these activities as a terrific way for students to review for the fifth grade state science test. These activities are easily understood by most third graders. All teachers are welcome!

Directions and contact information: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/education/index.cfm?page=115

More workshops offered by JPL's Education Office can be found at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/education/index.cfm?page=110 .


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JPL Airborne Sensor to Study 'Rivers in the Sky'

Feature Feb. 10, 2011

JPL Airborne Sensor to Study 'Rivers in the Sky'

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-048&cid=release_2011-048

They're called atmospheric rivers — narrow regions in Earth's atmosphere that
transport enormous amounts of water vapor across the Pacific or other regions. Aptly
nicknamed "rivers in the sky," they can transport enough water vapor in one day, on
average, to flood an area the size of Maryland 0.3 meters (1 foot) deep, or about seven
times the average daily flow of water from the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico. The phenomenon was the subject of a recent major emergency preparedness scenario led by the U.S. Geological Survey, "ARkStorm," which focused on the possibility of a series of strong atmospheric rivers striking California — a scenario of flooding, wind and mudslides the USGS said could cause damages exceeding those of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

While atmospheric rivers are responsible for great quantities of rain that can produce
flooding, they also contribute to beneficial increases in snowpack. A series of
atmospheric rivers fueled the strong winter storms that battered the U.S. West Coast
from western Washington to Southern California from Dec. 10 to 22, 2010, producing 28 to 64 centimeters (11 to 25 inches) of rain in certain areas. The atmospheric rivers also contributed to the snowpack in the Sierras, which received 75 percent of its annual snow by Dec. 22, the first full day of winter.

To improve our understanding of how atmospheric rivers form and behave and
evaluate the operational use of unmanned aircraft for investigating these phenomena,
NASA scientists, aircraft and sensors will participate in a National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration-led airborne field campaign slated to begin Feb. 11.

Called Winter Storms and Pacific Atmospheric Rivers, or WISPAR, the field campaign,
which continues through the end of February, is designed to demonstrate new
technology, contribute to our understanding of atmospheric rivers and assist NOAA in
potentially conducting offshore monitoring of atmospheric rivers to aid in future
weather predictions.

A NASA Global Hawk unmanned aircraft operated out of NASA's Dryden Flight
Research Center in Southern California is scheduled to depart Dryden Friday
morning, Feb. 11, on the campaign's first science flight. The 24-hour flight will study
an atmospheric river currently developing in the Pacific Ocean off Hawaii that appears
as though it will impact the Oregon-California coast this weekend. Aboard the Global
Hawk will be new weather reconnaissance devices called dropsondes developed by
the National Center for Atmospheric Research that will take temperature, wind and
other readings as they descend through an atmospheric river. Also aboard will be an
advanced water vapor sensor — the High-Altitude Monolithic Microwave Integrated
Circuit Sounding Radiometer, or HAMSR — created by NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

The remote-sensing HAMSR instrument analyzes the heat radiation emitted by oxygen
and water molecules in the atmosphere to determine their density and temperature. The instrument operates at microwave frequencies that can penetrate clouds, enabling it to determine temperature, humidity and cloud structure under all weather conditions. This capability is critical for studying atmospheric processes associated with bad weather, like the conditions present during atmospheric river events.

HAMSR Principal Investigator Bjorn Lambrigtsen of JPL says the instrument — the
most accurate and sensitive of its kind in the world — will help scientists better
understand these unique weather phenomena.

"The WISPAR campaign is intended to study the concentrated streams of tropical
moisture that sometimes get connected with cold fronts and winter storms approaching
the U.S. West Coast — sometimes called the pineapple express, since they often
originate near Hawaii — which can result in very intense rain events," Lambrigtsen
said. "HAMSR, flying on NASA's unpiloted Global Hawk well above the weather but
close enough to get a much more detailed picture than is possible from a satellite, will
be used to map out this phenomenon and answer scientific questions about the
formation and structure of these systems."

NASA's Global Hawk is an ideal platform from which to conduct WISPAR science
because it is able to fly long distances, stay aloft for more than 24 hours and travel at
high and low altitudes that could be dangerous for humans. Lambrigtsen will be at
Dryden in the Global Hawk Operations Center during the flights, using data from the
sensor and other information to adjust the Global Hawk's flight track, as necessary, to
optimize the sampling of the atmospheric rivers.

Lambrigtsen said the public can monitor the progress of the WISPAR science flights in
real time on a WISPAR version of JPL's hurricane portal website at
http://winterscience.jpl.nasa.gov/WISPAR2011/ . The site will display the most recent
satellite images, the Global Hawk flight track and a real-time subset of HAMSR data.

For more information about WISPAR, visit:
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2011/20110210_atmosphericrivers.html . For
more on HAMSR, see: http://microwavescience.jpl.nasa.gov/instruments/hamsr/ .

Alan Buis 818-354-0474
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov

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New View of Family Life in the North American Nebula

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

Image advisory: 2011-047 Feb. 10, 2011

New View of Family Life in the North American Nebula

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-047&cid=release_2011-047

PASADENA, Calif. -- Stars at all stages of development, from dusty little tots to young adults, are
on display in a new image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

This cosmic community is called the North American nebula. In visible light, the region resembles
the North American continent, with the most striking resemblance being the Gulf of Mexico. But
in Spitzer's infrared view, the continent disappears. Instead, a swirling landscape of dust and
young stars comes into view.

"One of the things that makes me so excited about this image is how different it is from the
visible image, and how much more we can see in the infrared than in the visible," said Luisa
Rebull of NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena,
Calif. Rebull is lead author of a paper about the observations, accepted for publication in the
Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. "The Spitzer image reveals a wealth of detail about the
dust and the young stars here."

The new image is online at
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/spitzer/multimedia/pia13844.html.

Rebull and her team have identified more than 2,000 new, candidate young stars in the region.
There were only about 200 known before. Because young stars grow up surrounded by blankets
of dust, they are hidden in visible-light images. Spitzer's infrared detectors pick up the glow of
the dusty, buried stars.

A star is born inside a collapsing ball of gas and dust. As the material collapses inward, it flattens
out into a disk that spins around together with the forming star like a spinning top. Jets of gas
shoot perpendicularly away from the disk, above and below it. As the star ages, planets are
thought to form out of the disk -- material clumps together, ultimately growing into mature
planets. Eventually, most of the dust dissipates, aside from a tenuous ring similar to the one in
our solar system, referred to as Zodiacal dust.

The new Spitzer image reveals all the stages of a star's young life, from the early years when it is
swaddled in dust to early adulthood, when it has become a young parent to a family of
developing planets. Sprightly "toddler" stars with jets can also be identified in Spitzer's view.

"This is a really busy area to image, with stars everywhere, from the North American complex
itself, as well as in front of and behind the region," said Rebull. "We refer to the stars that are not
associated with the region as contamination. With Spitzer, we can easily sort this contamination
out and clearly distinguish between the young stars in the complex and the older ones that are
unrelated."

The North American nebula still has a mystery surrounding it, involving its power source.
Nobody has been able to identify the group of massive stars that is thought to be dominating the
nebula. The Spitzer image, like images from other telescopes, hints that the missing stars are
lurking behind the Gulf of Mexico portion of the nebula. This is evident from the illumination
pattern of the nebula, especially when viewed with the detector on Spitzer that picks up 24-
micron infrared light. That light appears to be coming from behind the Gulf of Mexico's dark
tangle of clouds, in the same way that sunlight creeps out from behind a rain cloud.

The nebula's distance from Earth is also a mystery. Current estimates put it at about 1,800 light-
years from Earth. Spitzer will refine this number by finding more stellar members of the North
American complex.

The Spitzer observations were made before it ran out of the liquid coolant needed to chill its
longer-wavelength instruments. Currently, Spitzer's two shortest-wavelength channels (3.6 and
4.5 microns) are still working. The composite image shows light from both the infrared array
camera and multiband imaging processor. Infrared light with a wavelength of 3.6 microns is
color-coded blue; 8.0-micron light is green; and 24-micron light is red.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope
mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted
at the Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech
manages JPL for NASA. For more information about Spitzer, visit http://spitzer.caltech.edu/
and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer .

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NASA Announces Candidates for Cubesat Space Missions

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Priscilla Vega 818-354-1357
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Priscilla.v.vega@jpl.nasa.gov

News release: 2011-045 Feb. 9, 2011

NASA Announces Candidates for Cubesat Space Missions

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-045&cid=release_2011-045

PASADENA, Calif. — NASA has selected 20 small satellites, including two from NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., to fly as auxiliary payloads aboard rockets planned to launch in 2011 and 2012.
The proposed CubeSats come from a high school in Virginia, universities across the country, NASA field centers
and Department of Defense organizations.

CubeSats are a class of research spacecraft called nanosatellites. The cube-shaped satellites are approximately
four inches long, have a volume of about one quart and weigh 2.2 pounds or less.

The selections are from the second round of the CubeSat Launch Initiative. The satellites are expected to conduct
technology demonstrations, educational or science research missions. The selected spacecraft are eligible for
flight after final negotiations when an opportunity arises.

The satellites come from the following organizations, which include the first high school proposal selected for a
CubeSat flight:

-- Air Force Research Lab, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio
-- Drexel University, Philadelphia
-- NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. (two CubeSats)
-- NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. (IPEX: Intelligent Payload Experiment, and LMRSat)
-- Naval Research Lab, Washington (two CubeSats)
-- Massachusetts Institute of Technology
-- Morehead State University, Morehead, Ky.
-- The Planetary Society, Pasadena, in partnership with NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
-- Space and Missile Defense Command, Huntsville, Ala.
-- St. Louis University, St. Louis, Mo.
-- Thomas Jefferson High School, Alexandria, Va.
-- University of Colorado
-- University of Hawaii
-- University of Louisiana, Lafayette
-- University of New Mexico
-- U.S. Military Academy
-- U.S. Naval Academy

The first CubeSats to be carried on an expendable vehicle for the agency's Launch Services Program will
comprise NASA's Educational Launch of Nanosatellite, or ELaNa, mission. ELaNa will fly on the Glory mission
scheduled to lift off on Feb. 23. The 12 CubeSat payloads selected from the first round of the CubeSat Launch
Initiative will have launch opportunities beginning later this year.

For more information about NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative program:
http://www.nasa.gov/directorates/somd/home/CubeSats_initiative.html . For more about NASA and agency
programs: http://www.nasa.gov . The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.

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NASA Hosting Events for Valentine's Night Comet Encounter

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Feature: 2011-044B Feb. 08, 2011

NASA Hosting Events for Valentine's Night Comet Encounter

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-044b&cid=release_2011-044b

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA will host several live activities for the Stardust-NExT mission's close
encounter with comet Tempel 1. The closest approach is expected at approximately 8:37 p.m. PST
(11:37 p.m. EST) on Feb. 14, with confirmation received on Earth at about 8:56 p.m. PST (11:56 p.m.
EST).

Live coverage of the Tempel 1 encounter will begin at 8:30 p.m. PST on Feb. 14 on NASA Television
and the agency's website. The coverage will include live commentary from mission control at NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and video from Lockheed Martin Space System's
mission support area in Denver.

Live coverage of a news briefing is planned for 10 a.m. PST on Feb. 15. Scheduled participants are:
-- Ed Weiler, NASA associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, Washington
-- Joe Veverka, Stardust-NExT principal investigator, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
-- Tim Larson, Stardust-NExT project manager, JPL
-- Don Brownlee, Stardust-NExT co-investigator, University of Washington, Seattle

Mission coverage schedule (all times PST and subject to change):

-- 8:30 to 10 p.m., Feb. 14: Live NASA TV commentary begins from mission control; includes
coverage of closest approach and the re-establishment of contact with the spacecraft following
the encounter.

-- Midnight to 1:30 a.m., Feb. 15: NASA TV commentary will chronicle the arrival and
processing of the first five of 72 close-approach images the team expects to be downlinked
after the encounter. The images are expected to include a close-up view of the comet's surface.

-- 10 a.m., Feb. 15: News briefing

-- Starting on Feb. 9, NASA TV will air Stardust-NExT mission animation and other video
during its Video File segments. For NASA TV streaming video, scheduling and downlink
information, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ntv .

-- Commentary and the news conference will also be carried live on one of JPL's Ustream
channels. During events, viewers can engage in a real-time chat and submit questions to the
Stardust-NExT team at: http://www.ustream.tv/user/NASAJPL2 .

The public can watch a real-time animation of the Stardust-NExT comet flyby using NASA's new
"Eyes on the Solar System" Web tool. JPL created this 3-D environment, which allows people to
explore the solar system from their computers. It is available at: http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/eyes .

This flyby of Tempel 1 will give scientists an opportunity to look for changes on the comet's surface
since it was visited by NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft in July 2005. Since then, Tempel 1 has
completed one orbit of the sun, and scientists are looking forward to monitoring any differences in
the comet.

During its 12 years in space, Stardust became the first spacecraft to collect samples of a comet (Wild 2 in 2004), which were delivered to Earth in 2006 for study. The Stardust-NExT mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver built the spacecraft and manages day-to-day mission operations.

A press kit and other detailed information about Stardust-NExT is available at:
http://stardustnext.jpl.nasa.gov .

-end-

DC Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
agle@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726
Headquarters, Washington
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Blaine Friedlander 607-254-6235
Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
bpf2@cornell.edu

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Proposed Mission to Jupiter System Achieves Milestone

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Feature: 2011-041 Feb. 04, 2011

Proposed Mission to Jupiter System Achieves Milestone

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-041&cid=release_2011-041

With input from scientists around the world, American and European scientists
working on the potential next new mission to the Jupiter system have articulated
their joint vision for the Europa Jupiter System Mission. The mission is a proposed
partnership between NASA and the European Space Agency. The scientists on the
joint NASA-ESA definition team agreed that the overarching science theme for the
Europa Jupiter System Mission will be "the emergence of habitable worlds around
gas giants."

The proposed Europa Jupiter System Mission would provide orbiters around two
of Jupiter's moons: a NASA orbiter around Europa called the Jupiter Europa
Orbiter, and an ESA orbiter around Ganymede called the Jupiter Ganymede Orbiter.

"We've reached hands across the Atlantic to define a mission to Jupiter's water
worlds," said Bob Pappalardo, the pre-project scientist for the proposed Jupiter
Europa Orbiter, who is based at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,
Calif. "The Europa Jupiter System Mission will create a leap in scientific knowledge
about the moons of Jupiter and their potential to harbor life."

The new reports integrate goals that were being separately developed by NASA
and ESA working groups into one unified strategy.

The ESA report is being presented to the European public and science community
this week, and the NASA report was published online in December. The NASA
report is available at http://www.lpi.usra.edu/opag .

The proposed mission singles out the icy moons Europa and Ganymede as special
worlds that can lead to a broader understanding of the Jovian system and of the
possibility of life in our solar system and beyond. They are natural laboratories for
analyzing the nature, evolution and potential habitability of icy worlds, because
they are believed to present two different kinds of sub-surface oceans.

The Jupiter Europa Orbiter would characterize the relatively thin ice shell above
Europa's ocean, the extent of that ocean, the materials composing its internal
layers, and the way surface features such as ridges and "freckles" formed. It will
also identify candidate sites for potential future landers. Instruments that might be
on board could include a laser altimeter, an ice-penetrating radar, spectrometers
that can obtain data in visible, infrared and ultraviolet radiation, and cameras with narrow- and wide-angle capabilities. The actual instruments to fly would be selected through a NASA competitive call for proposals.

Ganymede is thought to have a thicker ice shell, with its interior ocean sandwiched
between ice above and below. ESA's Jupiter Ganymede Orbiter would investigate
this different kind of internal structure. The Jupiter Ganymede Orbiter would also
study the intrinsic magnetic field that makes Ganymede unique among all the solar
system's known moons. This orbiter, whose instruments would also be chosen
through a competitive process, could include a laser altimeter, spectrometers and
cameras, plus additional fields-and-particles instruments

The two orbiters would also study other large Jovian moons, Io and Callisto, with
an eye towards exploring the Jupiter system as an archetype for other gas giant
planets.

NASA and ESA officials gave the Europa Jupiter System Mission proposal priority
status for continued study in 2009, agreeing that it was the most technically
feasible of the outer solar system flagship missions under consideration.

Over the next few months, NASA officials will be analyzing the joint strategy and
awaiting the outcome of the next Planetary Science Decadal Survey by the National
Research Council of the U.S. National Academies. That survey will serve as a
roadmap for new NASA planetary missions for the decade beginning 2013.

For more information about the Europa Jupiter System Mission, go to
http://opfm.jpl.nasa.gov/europajupitersystemmissionejsm/ .

JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

-end-

Jia-Rui C. Cook 818-354-0850
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
Jccook@jpl.nasa.gov

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Surprise Hidden in Titan's Smog: Cirrus-Like Clouds

Feature: 2011-040 Feb. 3, 2011

Surprise Hidden in Titan's Smog: Cirrus-Like Clouds

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-040&cid=release_2011-040

Every day is a bad-air day on Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Blanketed by haze far worse than any
smog belched out in Los Angeles, Beijing or even Sherlock Holmes' London, the moon looks like
a dirty orange ball. Described once as crude oil without the sulfur, the haze is made of tiny
droplets of hydrocarbons with other, more noxious chemicals mixed in. Gunk.

Icky as it may sound, Titan is really the rarest of gems: the only moon in our solar system with an
atmosphere worthy of a planet. This atmosphere comes complete with lightning, drizzle and
occasionally a big, summer-downpour style of cloud made of methane or ethane—hydrocarbons
that are best known for their role in natural gas.

Now, thin, wispy clouds of ice particles, similar to Earth's cirrus clouds, are being reported by
Carrie Anderson and Robert Samuelson at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt,
Md. The findings, published this week in the journal Icarus, were made using the composite
infrared spectrometer on NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

Unlike Titan's brownish haze, the ice clouds have the pearly white appearance of freshly fallen
snow. Their existence is the latest clue to the workings of Titan's intriguing atmosphere and its
one-way "cycle" that delivers hydrocarbons and other organic compounds to the ground as
precipitation. Those compounds don't evaporate to replenish the atmosphere, but somehow the
supply has not run out yet.

"This is the first time we have been able to get details about these clouds," says Samuelson, an
emeritus scientist at Goddard and the co-author of the paper. "Previously, we had a lot of
information about the gases in Titan's atmosphere but not much about the [high-altitude]
clouds."

Compared to the puffy methane and ethane clouds found before in a lower part of the
atmosphere by both ground-based observers and in images taken by Cassini's imaging science
subsystem and visual and infrared mapping spectrometer, these clouds are much thinner and
located higher in the atmosphere. "They are very tenuous and very easy to miss," says Anderson,
the paper's lead author. "The only earlier hints that they existed were faint glimpses that NASA's
Voyager 1 spacecraft caught as it flew by Titan in 1980."

The full story is online at:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/titan-clouds.html .

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and
the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., a division of the
California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science
Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were
designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The CIRS team is based at NASA's Goddard Space
Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., where the instrument was built.

#2011-040

Written by Elizabeth Zubritsky/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

Media contact: Jia-Rui Cook/Priscilla Vega
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-0850/354-1357
jccook@jpl.nasa.gov / Priscilla.r.vega@jpl.nasa.gov

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Northern Mars Landscape Actively Changing

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Guy Webster 818-354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

Alan Fischer 520-382-0411
Planetary Science Institute
fischer@psi.edu

Daniel Stolte 520-626-4402
University of Arizona, Tucson
stolte@email.arizona.edu

News release: 2011-039 Feb. 3, 2011

Northern Mars Landscape Actively Changing

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-039&cid=release_2011-039

Sand dunes in a vast area of northern Mars long thought to be frozen in time are changing with
both sudden and gradual motions, according to research using images from a NASA orbiter.

These dune fields cover an area the size of Texas in a band around the planet at the edge of Mars'
north polar cap. The new findings suggest they are among the most active landscapes on Mars.
However, few changes in these dark-toned dunes had been detected before a campaign of
repeated imaging by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on
NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which reached Mars five years ago next month.

Scientists had considered the dunes to be fairly static, shaped long ago when winds on the
planet's surface were much stronger than those seen today, said HiRISE Deputy Principal
Investigator Candice Hansen of the Planetary Science Institute, Tucson, Ariz. Several sets of
before-and-after images from HiRISE over a period covering two Martian years -- four Earth
years -- tell a different story.

"The numbers and scale of the changes have been really surprising," said Hansen.

A report by Hansen and co-authors in this week's edition of the journal Science identifies the
seasonal coming and going of carbon-dioxide ice as one agent of change, and stronger-than-
expected wind gusts as another.

A seasonal layer of frozen carbon dioxide, or dry ice, blankets the region in winter and changes
directly back to gaseous form in the spring.

"This gas flow destabilizes the sand on Mars' sand dunes, causing sand avalanches and creating
new alcoves, gullies and sand aprons on Martian dunes," she said. "The level of erosion in just
one Mars year was really astonishing. In some places, hundreds of cubic yards of sand have
avalanched down the face of the dunes."

Wind drives other changes. Especially surprising was the discovery that scars of past sand
avalanches could be partially erased by wind in just one Mars year. Models of Mars' atmosphere
do not predict wind speeds adequate to lift sand grains, and data from Mars landers show high
winds are rare.

"Perhaps polar weather is more conducive to high wind speeds," Hansen said.

In all, modifications were seen in about 40 percent of these far-northern monitoring sites over the
two-Mars-year period of the study.

Related HiRISE research previously identified gully-cutting activity in smaller fields of sand
dunes covered by seasonal carbon-dioxide ice in Mars' southern hemisphere. A report four
months ago showed that those changes coincided with the time of year when ice builds up.

"The role of the carbon-dioxide ice is getting clearer," said Serina Diniega of NASA's Jet
Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., lead author of the earlier report and a co-author of the
new report. "In the south, we saw before-and-after changes and connected the timing with the
carbon-dioxide ice. In the north, we're seeing more of the process of the seasonal changes and
adding more evidence linking the changes with the carbon dioxide."

Researchers are using HiRISE to repeatedly photograph dunes at all latitudes, to understand
winds in the current climate on Mars. Dunes at latitudes lower than the reach of the seasonal
carbon-dioxide ice do not show new gullies. Hansen said, "It's becoming clear that there are very
active processes on Mars associated with the seasonal polar caps."

The new findings contribute to efforts to understand what features and landscapes on Mars can
be explained by current processes, and which require different environmental conditions.

"Understanding how Mars is changing today is a key first step to understanding basic planetary
processes and how Mars changed over time," said HiRISE Principal Investigator Alfred McEwen
of the University of Arizona, Tucson, a co-author of both reports. "There's lots of current activity
in areas covered by seasonal carbon-dioxide frost, a process we don't see on Earth. It's important
to understand the current effects of this unfamiliar process so we don't falsely associate them
with different conditions in the past."

The University of Arizona Lunar and Planetary Laboratory operates the HiRISE camera, which
was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. JPL, a division of the
California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for
NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver,
built the orbiter. For more about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, visit http://www.nasa.gov/mro
. For more about HiRISE, visit http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu .

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Caltech to Host Earth Sciences Weekend for Teachers

Caltech to Host Earth Sciences Weekend for Teachers
This is a feature from the NASA/JPL Education Office.

02.03.11 -- Caltech's Tectonics Observatory is hosting the Spring 2011 Meeting of the Far-Western Section
of the National Association of Geoscience Teachers (NAGT). The meeting is aimed at geoscience teachers
at community colleges, four-year colleges and high school. All are welcome -- participants need not be a member of NAGT.

The event will be held Friday through Sunday, March 25 - 27, 2011, at the Arms Building on Caltech's campus in Pasadena, CA.

The agenda includes field trips, workshops, tours and speakers that will cover a wide range of Earth Sciences.
Participants will be introduced to recent developments in tectonics, geochemistry, seismology, petrology and geomorphology.

Attendees can earn 1.5 continuing education units through the University of Southern California's Rossier School of Education.

For detailed information and a registration packet, go to http://www.tectonics.caltech.edu/meetings/nagt/ .

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JPL Hosts Annual High-Tech Small Business Conference

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIF. 91109 TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Priscilla Vega 818-354-1357
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Priscilla.v.vega@jpl.nasa.gov

News release: 2011-037 Feb. 2, 2011

JPL to Host High-Tech Small Business Conference

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-037&cid=release_2011-037

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., will host the 23rd
annual High-Tech Conference for Small Business on Tuesday, March 1, and Wednesday, March
2, at the Westin Los Angeles Airport Hotel.

The conference will provide an opportunity for technologically oriented small businesses owned
by minorities, women, veterans and service-disabled individuals to discuss subcontract
opportunities with major corporations, federal agencies, local government agencies and JPL's
purchasing and technical communities.

Various "how-to" workshops will include information about conducting business with JPL and
the federal government, certification programs offered by the federal government and JPL's
future technological needs.

"This year, more than ever, people are looking for new ways to market their business and gain
exposure," said Edgar Murillo, High-Tech Conference coordinator and a small business
administrator at JPL. "The High-Tech Conference provides information to assist small businesses
in developing strategies to prepare to become a contractor."

Due to limited space, only prime contractors and government agencies will be allowed to exhibit.
There is no fee to exhibit. Interested and qualified exhibitors should contact Edgar Murillo at
818-354-4550, or at Edgar.M.Murillo@jpl.nasa.gov .

It is estimated there will be 1,000 attendees, including nearly 300 prime contractors, as well as
various JPL subcontractors and government representatives participating as exhibitors.

Interested attendees are encouraged to register early for this event. Online registration is available
at: http://acquisition.jpl.nasa.gov/boo/2011HT/index.asp .

The cost is $140 per person. The registration deadline is Friday, Feb.11. The Westin Los Angeles
Airport Hotel is located at 5400 West Century Blvd., Los Angeles 90045.

JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

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NASA's NEOWISE Completes Scan for Asteroids and Comets

MEDIA RELATIONS OFFICE
JET PROPULSION LABORATORY
CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION
PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91109. TELEPHONE 818-354-5011
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

Trent Perrotto 202-358-0321
Headquarters, Washington
trent.j.perrotto@nasa.gov

News release: 2011-031 Feb. 1, 2011

NASA's NEOWISE Completes Scan for Asteroids and Comets

The full version of this story with accompanying images is at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-031&cid=release_2011-031

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's NEOWISE mission has completed its survey of small bodies,
asteroids and comets, in our solar system. The mission's discoveries of previously unknown objects
include 20 comets, more than 33,000 asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, and 134
near-Earth objects (NEOs). The NEOs are asteroids and comets with orbits that come within 45
million kilometers (28 million miles) of Earth's path around the sun.

NEOWISE is an enhancement of the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, mission that
launched in December 2009. WISE scanned the entire celestial sky in infrared light about 1.5 times. It
captured more than 2.7 million images of objects in space, ranging from faraway galaxies to asteroids
and comets close to Earth.

In early October 2010, after completing its prime science mission, the spacecraft ran out of the frozen
coolant that keeps its instrumentation cold. However, two of its four infrared cameras remained
operational. These two channels were still useful for asteroid hunting, so NASA extended the
NEOWISE portion of the WISE mission by four months, with the primary purpose of hunting for
more asteroids and comets, and to finish one complete scan of the main asteroid belt.

"Even just one year of observations from the NEOWISE project has significantly increased our
catalog of data on NEOs and the other small bodies of the solar systems," said Lindley Johnson,
NASA's program executive for the NEO Observation Program.

Now that NEOWISE has successfully completed a full sweep of the main asteroid belt, the WISE
spacecraft will go into hibernation mode and remain in polar orbit around Earth, where it could be
called back into service in the future.

In addition to discovering new asteroids and comets, NEOWISE also confirmed the presence of
objects in the main belt that had already been detected. In just one year, it observed about 153,000
rocky bodies out of approximately 500,000 known objects. Those include the 33,000 that NEOWISE
discovered.

NEOWISE also observed known objects closer and farther to us than the main belt, including roughly
2,000 asteroids that orbit along with Jupiter, hundreds of NEOs and more than 100 comets.

These observations will be key to determining the objects' sizes and compositions. Visible-light data
alone reveal how much sunlight reflects off an asteroid, whereas infrared data is much more directly
related to the object's size. By combining visible and infrared measurements, astronomers also can
learn about the compositions of the rocky bodies -- for example, whether they are solid or crumbly.
The findings will lead to a much-improved picture of the various asteroid populations.

NEOWISE took longer to survey the whole asteroid belt than WISE took to scan the entire sky
because most of the asteroids are moving in the same direction around the sun as the spacecraft
moves while it orbits Earth. The spacecraft field of view had to catch up to, and lap, the movement of
the asteroids in order to see them all.

"You can think of Earth and the asteroids as racehorses moving along in a track," said Amy Mainzer,
the principal investigator of NEOWISE at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
"We're moving along together around the sun, but the main belt asteroids are like horses on the outer
part of the track. They take longer to orbit than us, so we eventually lap them."

NEOWISE data on the asteroid and comet orbits are catalogued at the NASA-funded International
Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center, a clearinghouse for information about all solar system
bodies at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Mass. The science team is
analyzing the infrared observations now and will publish new findings in the coming months.

When combined with WISE observations, NEOWISE data will aid in the discovery of the closest
dim stars, called brown dwarfs. These observations have the potential to reveal a brown dwarf even
closer to us than our closest known star, Proxima Centauri, if such an object does exist. Likewise, if
there is a hidden gas-giant planet in the outer reaches of our solar system, data from WISE and
NEOWISE could detect it.

The first batch of observations from the WISE mission will be available to the public and
astronomical community in April.

"WISE has unearthed a mother lode of amazing sources, and we're having a great time figuring out
their nature," said Edward (Ned) Wright, the principal investigator of WISE at UCLA.

JPL manages WISE for NASA's Science Mission Directorate at the agency's headquarters in
Washington. The mission was competitively selected under NASA's Explorers Program, which
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages. The Space Dynamics Laboratory
in Logan, Utah, built the science instrument, and Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. of Boulder,
Colo., built the spacecraft. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared
Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. JPL manages
NEOWISE for NASA's Planetary Sciences Division. The mission's data processing also takes place at
the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center.

More information is online at http://www.nasa.gov/wise and http://wise.astro.ucla.edu and
http://jpl.nasa.gov/wise .

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