Lockheed Martin and NASA completed the final static test for a heat shield intended to protect the Mars 2020Â rover from extreme thermal conditions on its mission toward the red planet.
Lisa Pratt, recently appointed planetary protection officer at NASA, has said her near-term priorities include the Mars 2020 rover mission and InSight Mars lander mission that is set to take off May 5, SpaceNews reported Monday. Pratt, an astrobiologist and former professor at Indiana University’s department of Earth and atmospheric sciences, said she aims to […] More
NASA has tested the future Mars rover’s camera-based navigation system aboard a rocket-powered test platform built by Masten Space Systems. The agency said Tuesday Xombie carried a prototype of the Mars 2020 rover’s Lander Vision System 1,066 feet into the air to perform a precise landing at a predesignated target. LVS works to direct a spacecraft to land at a target site or divert […] More
A division of Space Systems Loral will design and build camera focus mechanisms for NASA and a program teammate to use on one of the space agency’s Mars exploration instruments. MDA US Systems developed the focus mechanism for NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory partner Malin Space Systems to be integrated on the Mars 2020 Rover instrument, SSL said Friday. Malin is a space camera systems company […] More