How JPL keeps the 13-year-old Curiosity rover doing science

Discussion (8 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

rented_mule•about 1 hour ago

The total cost of Curiosity to date is well under 5% of the cost of the recent trip humans took around the moon (something like $3B vs. $90B, or $20 vs. $600 per US taxpayer). Imagine the amount of science that could get done if we gave even half the budget of crewed spaceflight to rover / probe style exploration.

andyjohnson0•12 minutes ago

> Curiosity [...] has traveled nearly 37 kilometers, drilled into and sampled 42 different rocks, and as of publication has snapped nearly 763,000 photos.

Without in any way minimising the amazing scientific and engineering achievements of the team and the rover: we need crewed space exploration because people on Mars would be able to do the above in significantly less than thirteen years. Or, to put it another way, would do much more science in the same amount of time.

zbendefy•about 1 hour ago

Maybe we would get a microphone on mars. Just kidding i know air pressure is vastly different, but still it would be cool to listen to ambient sound from there

boxfire•about 1 hour ago

Mars 2020 has a microphone. You can probably find audio out there but here’s some:

https://science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-2020-perseverance/soun...

ceejayoz•41 minutes ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHenFGnixzU

ezst•about 2 hours ago

Curiosity is a teenager now? Damn, I didn't need to feel this much older today..

beastman82•26 minutes ago

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, for those who are missing basic writing standards.

MinimalAction•about 1 hour ago

I am happy to know this emblem of knowledge stream keeps coming until 2035. It is wonderful to know our innovations have flown 200 odd million miles and work for so long!

How JPL keeps the 13-year-old Curiosity rover doing science

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Discussion (8 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews