Dunes Obstacle Course

Richard Cook has twice held the position of project manager of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory project at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Seasons change even on Mars and NASA's fleet of explorers are helping scientists learn more about the effects on the Red Planet.

The right Mast Camera (Mastcam) of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover provided this view of the lower stratigraphy at "Yellowknife Bay" inside Gale Crater on Mars.

Curiosity wraps up an investigation at Pink Cliffs while trying out a style of exploration used by geologists on Earth called "the walkabout."

This artist's concept shows the sky crane maneuver during the descent of NASA's Curiosity rover to the Martian surface.

On June 24, 2014, NASA's Curiosity rover completes her first Martian year (687 Earth days).

This side-by-side comparison shows the X-ray diffraction patterns of two different samples collected from the Martian surface by NASA's Curiosity rover.

On Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the 197-foot-tall United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket moves away from the Vertical Integration Facility (VIF) during the vehicle's rollout to the l...

This mosaic of images from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) instrument on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows a series of sedimentary deposits in the Glenelg area of Gale Crater, from a perspective in Yello...

This image shows the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on NASA's Curiosity rover, with the Martian landscape in the background.

After spending six weeks doing science investigations at Rocknest, NASA's Curiosity Mars rover is on the move again to Point Lake and a place to try out the drill.

Lozenge-shaped crystals are evident in this magnified view of a Martian rock target called "Mojave," taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) instrument on the arm of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover.

With the addition of four high-resolution Navigation Camera, or Navcam, images, taken on Aug. 18 (Sol 12), Curiosity's 360-degree landing-site panorama now includes the highest point on Mount Sharp...

This diagram and the one at PIA16916 illustrate how the Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons (DAN) instrument on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover detects hydrogen in the ground beneath the rover.

This view combines several frames taken by the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, looking into a valley to the west from the eastern side of a dune at the eastern end of the valley.

This mosaic of images from the Navigation Camera (Navcam) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity shows the scene from the rover's position on the 376th Martian day, or sol, of the mission (Aug. 27, 2013).

This image shows part of the small pit or bite created when NASA's Mars rover Curiosity collected its second scoop of Martian soil at a sandy patch called "Rocknest."

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has clocked more than a decade of service at the Red Planet and has yielded scientific discoveries and magnificent views of a distant world. These images taken by...

The Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover captured this mosaic as it explored the "clay-bearing unit" on Feb. 3, 2019 (Sol 2309).

This oblique view of the mound in Gale crater shows several different rock types of interest to the Mars Science Laboratory mission.

This Dec. 17, 2015, view combines multiple images from the telephoto-lens camera of the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover to reveal fine details of the downwind face of "Namib Du...

Mars is experiencing large regional dust storms over its northern hemisphere during the past week.

This sequence of images shows a blast zone where the sky crane from NASA's Curiosity rover mission hit the ground after setting the rover down in August 2012, and how that dark scar's appearance ch...

This mosaic image with a close-up inset, taken prior to the test, shows the rock chosen as the first target for NASA's Curiosity rover to zap with its Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument.

This stereoscopic anaglyph image was created from a left and right stereo pair of images of the Mars Science Laboratory mission's rover, Curiosity. The image was taken May 26, 2011, in Spacecraf...