NASA Mars Rover Curiosity Begins Arm-Work Phase

Sept. 6, 2012

Dwayne Brown
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Guy Webster / D.C. Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-5011
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov / agle@jpl.nasa.gov

RELEASE: 12-312

NASA MARS ROVER CURIOSITY BEGINS ARM-WORK PHASE

PASADENA, Calif. -- After driving more than a football field's length
since landing, NASA's Mars rover Curiosity is spending several days
preparing for full use of the tools on its arm.

Curiosity extended its robotic arm Wednesday in the first of 6-10
consecutive days of planned activities to test the 7-foot (2.1-meter)
arm and the tools it manipulates.

"We will be putting the arm through a range of motions and placing it
at important 'teach points' that were established during Earth
testing, such as the positions for putting sample material into the
inlet ports for analytical instruments," said Daniel Limonadi of
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., lead
systems engineer for Curiosity's surface sampling and science system.
"These activities are important to get a better understanding for how
the arm functions after the long cruise to Mars and in the different
temperature and gravity of Mars, compared to earlier testing on
Earth."

Since the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) spacecraft placed Curiosity
inside Mars' Gale Crater on Aug. 5 (Aug. 6 EDT), the rover has driven
a total of 358 feet (109 meters). The drives have brought it about
one-fourth of the way from the landing site, named Bradbury Landing,
to a location selected as the mission's first major science
destination, Glenelg.

"We knew at some point we were going to need to stop and take a week
or so for these characterization activities," said Michael Watkins,
JPL's Curiosity mission manager. "For these checkouts, we need to
turn to a particular angle in relation to the sun and on flat ground.
We could see before the latest drive that this looked like a perfect
spot to start these activities."

The work at the current location will prepare Curiosity and the team
for using the arm to place two of the science instruments onto rock
and soil targets. In addition, the activities represent the first
steps in preparing to scoop soil, drill into rocks, process collected
samples and deliver samples into analytical instruments.

Checkouts in the next several days will include using the turret's
Mars Hand Lens Imager to observe its calibration target and the
Canadian-built Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer to read what
chemical elements are present in the instrument's calibration target.


"We're still learning how to use the rover. It's such a complex
machine -- the learning curve is steep," said JPL's Joy Crisp, deputy
project scientist for the MSL Project, which built and operates
Curiosity.

After the arm characterization activities at the current site,
Curiosity will proceed for a few weeks eastward toward Glenelg. The
science team selected that area as likely to offer a good target for
Curiosity's first analysis of powder collected by drilling into a
rock.

"We're getting through a big set of characterization activities that
will allow us to give more decision-making authority to the science
team," said Richard Cook, MSL project manager at JPL.

Curiosity is one month into a two-year prime mission on Mars. It will
use 10 science instruments to assess whether the selected study area
ever has offered environmental conditions favorable for microbial
life. JPL manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate
in Washington.

More information about Curiosity is online at:

http://www.nasa.gov/msl

and

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl

You can follow the mission on Facebook and on Twitter at:

http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity

and

http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity


-end-



To subscribe to the list, send a message to:
hqnews-subscribe@mediaservices.nasa.gov
To remove your address from the list, send a message to:
hqnews-unsubscribe@mediaservices.nasa.gov