United States: The latest Mars satellite launched by the US space agency Nasa has arrived successfully in orbit above the planet.
Traveling through space for the past 10 months, the Genius craft (Maven) slammed on the brakes by firing with its forces.
The 33-minute burn removed sufficient speed to allow the satellite to be captured by Mars’ gravity.
Maven has been sent to study the Red Planet’s high atmosphere with an intention to understand the processes going on there.
Today, the air pressure is so low that free water at the surface would instantly boil away.
Maven’s data will enable scientists to build better models of current and past climate conditions on Mars.
According to the principal investigator Bruce Jakosky, previous spacecraft have made measurements and provided a lot of knowledge about the upper-atmosphere of the planet. But the scientists haven’t put the end to end picture together.
A researcher from the Colorado University added that Maven is considered as a mission of discovery, that almost everything observed would lead to fundamental new insights about the Mars current environment and how it has evolved over time.
Video on the mars satellite
