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March 2012 | Diese Seite in deutsch  |
| Index: | Links to Astronomy...  |
 Overview
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 Events
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 The Starry Sky in March Sunrise and Sunset The Phases of the Moon The Planets |
 Mars at Opposition | ||
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north top east left west right south bottom valid for: 1.3. 23h CET 15.3. 22h CET 30.3. 21h CET red line: celestial equator green line: ecliptic |
...with astronomical dusk/dawn for 52°31'30" north and 13°18'45" east at 3m above sealevel (StarryNight 2.0)
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1.: 04:49
11.: 04:36
21.: 04:09
31.: 03:41 (CET) | |
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1.: 06:54
11.: 06:31
21.: 06:08
31.: 05:45 (CET) | |
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1.: 17:44
11.: 18:03
21.: 18:20
31.: 18:38 (CET) | |
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1.: 19:40
11.: 20:00
21.: 20:19
31.: 20:42 (CET) |
 | 1.: 2:22 |
 | 8.: 10:39 |
 | 15.: 2:25 |
 | 22.: 15:37 |
| 30.: 20:41 (CET) |
Perigee (Moon close to Earth, distance Earth-Moon 362400km) 10.: 11:02 (CET)
Apogee (Moon far from Earth, distance Earth-Moon 405800km) 26.: 7:04 (CET)
 | in the 1st half of the month visible at the evening sky in Pisces | |
 | visible at the evening sky in Pisces/Aries/Taurus | |
 | visible at the nightly sky in Leo | |
 | visible at the evening sky in Aries | |
 | visible at the nightly sky in Virgo | |
 | invisible at the evening/daylight sky in Pisces | |
 | invisible at the morning sky in Aquarius | |
 | visible at the morning sky in Sagittarius |
Illustrations: StarryNight 2.0 & -- jd --
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This month at the 3rd of March Mars reaches his opposition position to the Sun and with this his best visibility of the year:
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At the opposition date his virtual size will be 13 arc seconds and his brightness will be -1m.26 (according to StarryNight). For comparison: at the 3rd of January his size was 9 arc seconds and his brightness -0m.30, at the 3rd of May his size will be again 9 arc seconds and his brightness -0m.42, at the 3rd of July the size will be shrinked to 6 arc seconds and the brightness will be dimmed to 0m.38, at the 3rd of September the size will be 5 arc seconds and the brightness will be 0m.75 and at the 3rd of November this year the size will be only 4 arc seconds and the brightness will be 0m.88. Therefore it will be especially interesting to visit Mars with a telescope these days.
Nevertheless the opposition this year is somewhat disappointing:
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In fact it is the "smallest" opposition of the last ten years and also the coming ten years. Even the somewhat "small" opposition two years ago at the 29th of January 2010 was a little bit "bigger" with 14 arc seconds of Mars in diameter. The reason for Mars seeming this small this year is because Mars is close to his greatest distance to the Sun on his orbit (aphelion at the 15th of February), while Earth is still somewhat close to its smallest distance to the Sun on its orbit (perihelion at the 5th of January). The difference in distance between Mars perihelion (207 million kilometer) and Mars aphelion (250 million kilometer) is nearly 43 million kilometer. The difference in distance between Earth perihelion (147 million kilometer) and Earth aphelion (152 million kilometer) is only 5 million kilometer. So the distance Earth-Mars at opposition position can vary for about 48 million kilometer. The distance Earth-Mars at oppostion this year is 100.8 million kilometer. Because of the elliptical orbit of Mars the real smallest distance between Earth and Mars will be reached two days later. At the opposition in 2018 Mars will be only 57.6 million kilometer away from us. At that opposition Mars will have a virtual diameter of 24 arc seconds and a brightness of -2m.85.
Also the Mars-Moon rendezvous in the following time are not than mentionable. In the night from the 7th to the 8th of March the Moon will be 9.8 degrees south of Mars:
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Mars Odyssey 2001, image: NASA |
Mars Express Orbiter 2003, image: ESA/DLR |
In June 2003 Mars Express (MEX) was launched, an ESA mission containing an orbiter and a lander (Beagle 2). In December 2003 Mars Express reached its destination and the lander was released to go down on Mars, but the lander remained silent and was abandoned. In the following month the orbiter has reached its final orbit around Mars and the scientific instruments were activated. One of the most important instruments was a camera developed at the DLR called High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC), which was already on board of the failed Russian mission Mars 96. Its a 3D camera for color pictures with a resolution of up to 10 meter. With this camera some of the most interesting regions of Mars were cartographed in 3D. With another scientific instrument of Mars Express, the so called Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface & Ionospheric Sounding (MARSIS) the discovery of water on Mars by Mars Odyssey 2001 were confirmed and enhanced. Originally the life span of Mars Express was terminated to about two years, but through to the success of mapping Mars the mission got prolonged several times, currently up to the end of this year with an option of prolongation up to the end of 2014. (For more see sci.esa.int/marsexpress.)
Mars Exploration Rover 2003, image: NASA/JPL |
Also in mid 2003, that was on June 10, 2003 and on July 7, 2003, NASA launched a double mission Mars Exploration Rover (2003), with which two solar powered mobile roboter (rover) should be dropped on Mars. Both rover reached the Martian surface successfully in January 2004. The first one called Spirit landed in the Gusev crater on January 4, the second one called Opportunity landed at the Maridiani Planum plane on January 24. There both should discover their environment for at least ninety Martian days and send pictures and measuring data to Earth. Both rover have a stereo panorama camera, a thermal emission spectrometer, a Mößbauer spectrometer for analyzing iron containing minerals, an alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS) for detecting the concentration of elements, and a microscope camera. With these instruments countless images and measurements were conducted. After three Martian winter the rover Spirit got stuck in a sand trap in April 2009. The next Martian winter it didn't survived. Opportunity on the other hand has roamed more than 33 kilometer on Mars and still works after more than 2700 Martian days. For more see marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov.)
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter 2005, image: NASA/JPL |
At the 12th of August 2005 the NASA probe Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) was launched to Mars. At the 10th of March 2006 it rearched the red planet and fired its breaking engines for going into an orbit. But this orbit was far from being the final. To reach this the probe used a series of aerobreak manoeuvres, where the upper athmosphere layers of Mars were used to break down the probe. At the end of August 2006 the destined height above Mars was reached the the scientific instruments were activated. One of them is the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) which is a high resolution (800 megapixel) color camera with a Cassegrain telescope in front of it, able to make pictures in 300km height where one pixel pictures 20-30cm on the ground. Also part of the probe is a Shallow Radar Experiment (SHARAD), with which also can be looked out for water in the shallow ground of Mars. One obvious feature of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is its big full slewable high gain antenna with a diameter of three meter with which it is possible to a data rate to Earth of six MBit/s. With this antenna the probe can be used as a powerful communication relay between the Earth and a lander of rover on the surface. (For more see mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mro.)
Mars Phoenix Lander 2007, image: NASA/JPL |
In August 2007 the NASA probe Mars Phoenix Lander was shot to Mars. In May 2008 the lander successfully touched down on Mars in the northern region Vastitas Borealis. It had a stereo camera and a electronical weather station on its working plattform and also a grabber with which soil probes could be taken like for the Viking lander. Until the beginning of November 2008 the Mars Phoenix Lander sent data and images from the Martian ground, then the lander got silent. (For more see phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu.)
Mars Science Laboratory 2011,
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November 2011 the mission Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) gets launched. On board of the probe there is the rover Curiosity which is planned to go down on Mars in August this year in the Gale crater. The rover is nearly five times as heavy as one of the Mars Exploration Rover and will carry ten scientific instruments. Also Curiosity won't be powered by solar panels like Spirit and Opportunity but has a plutonium isotope battery. This should maintain the rover with electricity for at least one Martian year. Main goal of Curiosity is finding carbon resp. organic compositions on Mars and therefore to indicate that Mars was convenient for the evolution of life. One of the scientific instruments is a mast camera containing two camera systems which shall examine the environment in visible and infrared light. Another instrument is the Rover Environmental Station, which will collect weather data in the surrounding of the rover. The most heavy and for the mission most important instrument is called Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM), with which air and soil samples can be analyzed chemically. Additionally Curiosity has an instrument to measure cosmic radiation at the ground and like the Mars Exploration Rover an alpha particle X-ray spectrometer (APXS). (For more see mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl.)
Also planned for a launch in November 2011 was the Russian probe Phobos-Grunt. It should has carried the Chinese micro satellite Yinghuo-1 (Mars-1) and release of into a Martian orbit in October 2012. Phobos-Grunt itself should has approached the Martian moon Phobos and land on it to explore Mars from there. Additionally Phobos-Grunt contained of a return unit which should has collected material from the moon and bring it back to Earth. At the start of the probe one of the rocket stages failed and Phobos-Grunt stayed in Earth orbit. At January 15 this year the probe fell into the Pacific ocean.
For the end of 2013 the launch of the Nasa probe Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) is planned, which should examine the Martian atmosphere out of the orbit. The orbit insertion is planned on fall 2014.
For more informations see also en.wikipedia.org, where the German version of it was the main source of information about the Mars probes.
created: 2011-09-21 from German version
modified: 2011-09-26 translated
modified: 2012-01-23 Phobos-Grunt fell to Earth
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