Venus Express

European Space
Agency (ESA)
mission

Launched
November 9, 2005

Link on Web

Arrives April, 2006

Assignment…
… due in a week:
Explore the Venus Express web site found
linked under the Course Links section of
WebCT
 Write a 1 to 2-page, typed discussion of
the objectives of this mission, including…
 … how it relates to the Magellan mission,
especially with respect to trying to answer
questions left unanswered by Magellan.

Mars Global
Surveyor
Imaging Mars from an orbit around it
 Recent image of delta-like fans

Other probes…




Mars Exploration Rover
Spirit and Opportunity
landed in January, 2004
Still exploring!
Found a lot of evidence for
water as well as interesting
geology
(no life seen!)
Mars Odyssey continues
to map Mars in
infrared
Asaph Hall
Discovered
two moons
in 1877
favorable
opposition
using the
26-inch
refractor at
the USNO, in
Washington,
DC
150 years before the were
“predicted” in Gulliver’s Travels
“They have likewise discovered two lesser Stars, or
Satellites, which revolve about Mars; whereof
the innermost is distant from the Center of the
primary Planet exactly three of his Diameters,
and the outermost five; the former revolves in
the space of ten Hours, and the latter in Twentyone and an Half; so that the Squares of their
periodical Times, are very near in the same
Proportion with the Cubes of their Distance from
the Center of Mars; which evidently shows them
to be governed by the same Law of Gravitation,
that influences the other heavenly Bodies. “
Phobos
Phobos is nearer and larger, P = 7:39! – rise to set in 5h!
Not spherical – why not?
Deimos
Almost Marsynchronous -- appears to take 3 days horizon to horizon.