Digging Mars: Mars Science Lab Set to Blast Off (preview)

This month NASA plans to launch its latest and most sophisticated mission ever to the Red Planet: the Mars Science Laboratory. After a dramatic landing in Gale Crater using a skycrane for the final descent, the nuclear-powered rover will drive around one of the richest deposits of clays and sulfates on the planet–the remains of a water-rich era when rivers carved out valley networks. The size of a small car, the rover (named Curiosity) will spend a Martian year exploring the base of the central peak in the crater, thought to be the oldest section

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Digging Mars: Mars Science Lab Set to Blast Off (preview)