Phoenix Mars Lander Digg Deeper

Navtej Kohli had welcomed already when the NASA officials had announced for its Phoenix mission extension and Phoenix is doing its study about Mars soil and environment. While there is no proof of life found yet on the Mars but Navtej Kohli said that its provides new ways for further study about Mars and other planet in our Solar System .

There are more updates released from Tucson, Arizona US about the Phoenix mission . Sample of Martin Soil for analysis is coming from a trench about three times deeper in comparison to previous trenches , which dug by Phoenix Mars Lander . While Phoenix mission had enjoyed its successful 90 days on Mars on date 26 August 2008 , he had took major steps for study about Mars soil .
Phoenix Mission Project Manager Barry Goldstein of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said "As we near what we originally expected to be the full length of the mission, we are all thrilled with how well the mission is going," Phoenix main work for during this mission , to take sample of soil from the bottom of trench “Stone Soup “ which is 18 centimeter or 7 inches deep . After that , Lander robotic arm will sprinkle soil from the sample into the cell of the wet chemistry laboratory. This deck-mounted laboratory, part of Phoenix's Microscopy, Electrochemistry and Conductivity Analyzer (MECA), has previously used two of its four soil-testing cells.
"In the first two cells we analyzed samples from the surface and the ice interface, and the results look similar. Our objective for Cell 3 is to use it as an exploratory cell to look at something that might be different," said JPL's Michael Hecht, lead scientist for MECA. "The appeal of Stone Soup is that this deep area may collect and concentrate different kinds of materials."
From where was Phoenix landed , polygon-shaped hummocks that characterize the arctic plain , but in reality stone Soup lies on borderline or natural trough , between two of the low . The trench towards the left or west of the robotic arm work area on the north side of the Lander. Phoenix Lander had to do much effort for digging near a polygon center , After hitting a layer of icy soil which was very hard just likes concrete , about 5 centimeters, or 2 inches, below the ground surface . In the Stone Soup trench at a polygon margin, the digging has not yet hit an icy layer like that
"The trough between polygons is sort of a trap where things can accumulate," Hecht said. "Over a long timescale, there may even be circulation of material sinking at the margins and rising at the center."
While the scientist team had finalist two sites for the next sample for its wet chemistry lab for analysis.This past weekend, Stone Soup won out. "We had a shootout between Stone Soup and white stuff in a trench called 'Upper Cupboard,'" Hecht said. "If we had been able to confirm that the white material was a salt-rich deposit, we would have analyzed that, but we were unable to confirm that with various methods."
While choosing the sampling areas scientist keep in mind to gain information about salt distribution in Phoenix work area and finally existence of liquid water on the Mars. Many team members are in same thinking that salt may be concentrate in the places that are wet now. When Phoenix is about to deliver samples from Stone Soup to wet chemistry laboratory, also using Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer for analyzing soil sample collected last week from another trench , at a depth intermediate between the surface and the hard, icy layer.
Peter Smith is leading the Phoenix mission from the University of Arizona with the prpject management at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif , and development partnership at Lockheed Martin, Denver. International contributions come from the Canadian Space Agency; the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the universities of Copenhagen and Aarhus in Denmark; the Max Planck Institute in Germany; and the Finnish Meteorological Institute. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.
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