MAVEN Launches

MAVEN selfie composite, annotated

This animation first shows Curiosity working to understand Mars as a past habitat, with a cut to MAVEN arriving at Mars to study the upper Martian atmosphere. (Audio: music and mechanical sounds only)

The MAVEN spacecraft is loaded into the belly of a C-17 Globemaster at Buckley Air Force Base in Aurora, Colorado on its way to Cape Canaveral, Florida, where it will be prepared for a November 18t...

Mars's thick early atmosphere was likely lost to space, and the Sun is a potential culprit. When high-energy solar photons strike the upper Martian atmosphere they can ionize gas molecules, causing...

Download a PDF of the Explore Mars Sticker.

This illustration shows the MAVEN spacecraft and the limb of Mars.

The MAVEN spacecraft in Assembly, Test, and Launch Operations phase at Lockheed Martin.

A transporter moves NASA's MAVEN spacecraft, inside a payload fairing, to the Vertical Integration Facility at Launch Complex 41 where it will be hoisted atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocke...

MAVEN selfie composite, unannotated

Inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, engineers and technicians perform a spin test of the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, spa...

Two days before the scheduled launch to Mars, the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket and NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft rolled out of the Cape Canaveral Air For...

This is an image of the ultraviolet “nightglow” in the Martian atmosphere. Green and white false colors represent the intensity of ultraviolet light, with white being the brightest.

Artist’s rendering of a solar storm hitting Mars and stripping ions from the planet's upper atmosphere.

The MAVEN Solar Wind Ion Analyzer will study ions in the Martian atmosphere, a key component for better understanding the planet's evolution.

NASA officials discuss the launch and the mission.

The MAVEN Electra UHF Transceiver Flight Model is shown here.

The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket with NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft launches from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41, Monday, N...

This artist concept depicts NASA’s Space Launch System, which will be the most powerful rocket ever built. It is designed to boost the agency’s Orion spacecraft on deep space missions, including to...

MAVEN positioned atop Atlas V rocket.

Comet Siding Spring is about to fly historically close to Mars. The encounter could spark Martian auroras, a meteor shower, and other unpredictable effects. Whatever happens, NASA's fleet of Mars s...

NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) mission reached a milestone in September 2011.

NASA Goddard hosted a live Google+ Hangout on Wednesday, Nov. 13 at 4 p.m. EST about MAVEN, NASA's next mission to Mars.

How can you communicate with Mars spacecraft when the Sun is in the way? Learn more about 'solar conjunction' in this 60-second video.

NASA | MAVEN Mission to Mars

How did Mars, a once wet planet, lose its early atmosphere? One possibility is through a process called "sputtering," in which atoms are knocked away from the atmosphere due to impacts with energet...