Mars on Earth

Engineers work on Opportunity (in its cruise configuration) in a cleanroom at Kennedy Space Center. A very important part of planetary protection is keeping contaminants from humans from riding abo...

The descent stage of NASA's Mars Sciecnce Laboratory spacecraft is being lifted during assembly of the spacecraft in this photograph taken inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA Ke...

A sweeping panorama combining 33 telephoto images into one Martian vista presents details of several types of terrain visible on Mount Sharp from a location along the route of NASA's Curiosity Mars...

Half of the Atlas V payload fairing for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission, encased in plastic, is lifted from its transportation pallet in the airlock of the Payload Hazardous Servicing ...

This series of images shows the Martian moon Deimos as it crossed in front of the Sun, as seen by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on Sunday, March 17, 2019 (the 2,350th Martian day, or sol, of the miss...

Climbing "Vera Rubin Ridge" provided NASA's Curiosity Mars rover this vista of the interior and rim of Gale Crater, including much of the rover's route since its 2012 landing and features up to abo...

This graphic shows the pattern of winds predicted to be swirling around and inside Gale Crater, which is where NASA's Curiosity rover landed on Mars.

This illustration shows the instruments and subsystems of the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) suite on the Curiosity Rover of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Project.

As the Curiosity rover hurdles toward Mars on the last leg of its journey, the Mars Science Laboratory Mission Operations Team assemble in Mission Control at the Space Flight Operations Facility at...

This view from the Curiosity Mars rover's Mastcam shows a dark mound, called "Ireson Hill," which rises about 16 feet above redder layered outcrop material on lower Mount Sharp, Mars, near a locati...

This selfie was taken by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on Feb. 26, 2020 (the 2,687th Martian day, or sol, of the mission). The crumbling rock layer at the top of the image is the Greenheugh Pediment,...

An outcrop visible as light-toned streaks in the lower center of this image has been chosen as a place for NASA's Mars rover Curiosity to study for a few days in September 2013.

Testing of the cruise stage for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory in August 2010 included a session in a facility that simulates the environment found in interplanetary space.

This is a view of the third (left) and fourth (right) trenches made by the 1.6-inch-wide (4-centimeter-wide) scoop on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity in October 2012.

This pair of images shows a "bite mark" where NASA's Curiosity rover scooped up some Martian soil (left), and the scoop carrying soil.

A selfie taken by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on Sol 2291 (January 15) at the "Rock Hall" drill site, located on Vera Rubin Ridge.

In this image from NASA's Curiosity rover, a rock outcrop called Link pops out from a Martian surface that is elsewhere blanketed by reddish-brown dust. The fractured Link outcrop has blocks of exp...

This set of images shows a modern terrestrial analog to the "Yellowknife Bay" area that NASA's Curiosity rover is exploring.

This animation shows the position of NASA's Curiosity rover as it journeyed through "the clay-bearing unit" on Mars between May 31 and July 20, 2019. The HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance...

This March 25, 2014, view from the Mastcam on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover looks southward at the Kimberley waypoint. In the foreground, multiple sandstone beds show systematic inclination to the so...

This stereo view of terrestrial rocks combines two images taken by a testing twin of the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory. It appears three-dimensional when vi...

NASA's Curiosity has determined the age of a Martian rock and provided first readings of radiation on the surface of Mars.

At Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, workers guide an overhead crane as it lifts the Centaur upper stage for the United Launch Alliance Atlas V in the Vertical Integ...

The finished heat shield for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, with a diameter of 4.5 meters (14 feet, 9 inches), is the largest ever built for descending through the atmosphere of any planet. This i...

Clay minerals are composed of layers. Water and cations (positive-charged ions) can be stored between these layers.