Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

Lesson is for 2nd or 3rd graders Engage: The teacher will present the class with a fish tank full of water, and will begin to tilt it back and forth to make waves inside the tank. Students will be asked what is causing waves to form inside the tank? After the teacher has listened and responded to each student’s answer, the teacher will then ask multiple questions for class discussion before the lesson, such as what makes water tides? What is gravity? Does the moon or the sun affect the…

Mud Cracks on Mars: A Sign of Possible Ancient Alien Life? If you asked a scientist what the basic building block of life is, the answer would be water. Therefore, when NASA’s Curiosity Rover recently found evidence suggesting that the Red Planet (Mars) was not always completely dry, thoughts of previous life forms come to mind. According to Nathan Stein, who is a member of NASA’s Curiosity science team, the most likely scenario for the cracks on Mars’ surface is mud. Evidence of Ancient Lakes…

We researched Pluto’s orbit, physical properties, and history to give us a broad understanding of what Pluto is like and to see if a mission to Pluto would be feasible and beneficial to NASA. We found that Pluto has a unique orbit compared to other planets — it is both extremely elliptical and sometimes crosses Neptune's orbit. Pluto is also incredibly small and cold. It contains ice on it’s surface and was only discovered about 100 years ago. Because of what I learned, I believe that It would…

Activity 4: Egg Drop Lesson Objective: Students will design, build and implement a safe carrier in which to drop an egg (interplanetary rover). Set-Up: All supplies can be left on a communal table. Students will need to first come up with a design and supply list for their carrier. Once it has been approved by their facilitator they can start to choose what they will need. Demo and discussion: Because it is topical, start your discussion off with a brief synopsis of the New Horizons probe…

The S.E.T.I. Institute With there currently being an estimated amount of seventy-five billion tons of living things on this planet that we call Earth, there is a possibility that there are more living things out there in space, either in this galaxy, or in another. People like to refer to the beings that may or may not exist in space as “aliens.” This term does not fit the description well, because you can also refer to a person who is from a different country or nation as an alien. The term…

It's understood that films are viewed with our eyes and heard with our ears but, "Scavengers" is proof that you can also implement taste and smell into film even if the smells and taste are absolutely disgusting. The title, "Scavengers" flew over my head even after the opening summary that states that the main characters of the film were left stranded on a strange planet after communication from VESTA-1 (a spacecraft) was lost. As the animation takes place we learned that the VESTA-1 was…

the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s arrival to planet Mars, Deputy project scientist Dr. Leslie Tamppari presented a summary of NASA’s research and discoveries. Within the last decade, over two hundred and fifty terabytes of data have been sent home by the spacecraft, giving us insight about the Red Planet during the ongoing search of water and habitable zones. The idea of water on Mars has such high relevance because it is a necessity to any type of living organism. Although present day Mars…

The objects between 42 and 47 AU are in very stable orbits – not affected in any significant way by any of the planets. Like the “classical” planets, these objects are in nearly circular orbits, so were given the name “Classical KBOs” (CKBOs), by David Jewitt. Of the CKBOs, about one-third have a low orbital inclination of around 2o – these are the “Cold” CKBOs. The remaining two-thirds have a much higher inclination of up to 20o or more – the “Hot” CKBOs. Hot and cold do not have anything to do…

Thank you for choosing my school to select three artifacts for a time capsule that will be taken to Mars on your next space mission. I have chose three artifacts that would be significant to the future generation. These three artifacts consist of, a CD, a book, and a phone. I think these items would be significant because they were such monumental changes in our society today. The first artifact I chose is the CD, “Straight to DVD 2”. CD’s are disks that hold data, the data on the CD can be…

For my major paper I would like to discuss the ethnographic component of Lucian’s account of the moon people in his True Histories. This would cover both how Lucian’s describes these people and the significance of what he is describing. I would begin by discussing the influence of other authors in his description of the moon people. His account is similar to those of historical authors and their descriptions of non-Greeks and their unusual customs. I would use this section to explore any…