Red Planet Day

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

Commemorating the day one of the most significant space missions to Mars was launched, November 28 is marked as Red Planet Day. On this day in 1964, the United States launched the space probe Mariner 4 on a course towards Mars, which it flew past in July 1965, sending back pictures of the red planet.

• This was the first time that a spacecraft undertook the first flyby of the red planet, becoming the first-ever spacecraft to take close-up photographs of another planet.

About the Mars

• In the late 19th century, Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli claimed to have observed linear patterns on the surface of the planet that he called canali. 
• This was mistranslated into English as canals, leading some to believe canals were built by intelligent beings on Mars an early instance of Mars being thought to have life, similar to Earth.

1964: Mariner 4

• After an eight-month voyage to Mars, the Mariner 4 helped humans see images showing lunar-type impact craters, some of them touched with frost. 
• A television camera onboard took 22 pictures, covering about 1% of the planet. These photos were transmitted to Earth in four days.

Viking missions of the 1970s and the 1980s

• The Viking missions in the mid-seventies carried out the first chemical analysis of Martian soil, as well as four biology experiments to detect biological activity.
• In the early 1980s, scientists hypothesised, based on mineralogic composition and rock texture, that certain meteorites might have a source region in Mars. 
• In 1984, a study showed that the isotopic composition of rare gases (Xenon, Krypton, Neon and Argon) matched the isotopic ratios of the Martian atmosphere measured by the Viking spacecraft. 
• This discovery provided a way for geochemists to study Martian samples – and provided a huge boost to our understanding of the geochemical evolution of Mars.

Odyssey, 2001 and water on Mars

• In 2001, the Gamma Ray Spectrometer on board the Mars Odyssey spacecraft detected a fascinating hydrogen signature that seemed to indicate the presence of water ice. 
• But there was ambiguity – this was because hydrogen can be part of many other compounds as well.
• NASA’s Phoenix landed on the Martian North Pole in May 2008, and survived for about 150 days. 
• The robotic arms of Phoenix scooped soil and ice from the surface, heated the material in eight ovens, and measured the composition of the gases with a mass spectrometer. 
• The Phoenix mission established conclusively that the initial discovery of hydrogen by Mars Odyssey in 2002 was indeed water ice.

Mars Missions

• NASA has a lander (Mars Insight), a rover (Curiosity), and three orbiters (Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Mars Odyssey, MAVEN).
• India has an orbiter (Mangalyaan-1).
• The EU has 2 orbiters (Mars Express and ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter)
• China and UAE will have an orbiter each (Hope and Tianwen-1 respectively).
• The UAE mission will study the Martian atmosphere, and will seek to address the billion-dollar question of how and why Mars lost its atmosphere. 
• India’s Mars Orbiter Mission : A technology demonstration venture carried five scientific payloads (total 15 kg) collecting data on surface geology, morphology, atmospheric processes, surface temperature and atmospheric escape process.

Question: Discuss the evolution of Mars missions with special reference of Mars Orbiter Mission.