MANGALYAAN AT MARS: Artist’s concept of the ISRO Mars Orbiter Mission spacecraft at the Red Planet. Credit: Nesnad – Creative Commons
to reach Mars orbit, as well as the first nation in the world to achieve this
at its first attempt, and on a modest budget of only $73 million!
Mangalyaan is a technology demonstration project, aimed at devel-
oping the technologies needed for designing, planning and carrying
out interplanetary missions. The spacecraft also has a science payload,
consisting of a colour camera, which has returned many stunning and
detailed images, and other scientific instruments for studying the mor-
phology and composition of surface features, as well as the Martian
atmosphere.
While MOM has not delivered many new science results as yet, the
mission itself is considered a big success, as all of its engineering goals
have been achieved, and the spacecraft has outlived its expected
lifespan. ISRO will certainly be able to embark on future interplanetary
missions with confidence.
MAVEN – The search for
Mar’s lost atmosphere
Launched in November 2013, the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile
EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft is the first one dedicated to exploring
the Red Planet’s tenuous upper atmosphere. Its main aim is to try and
help scientists understand the climate history of the planet. Key goals
for investigation are the role of the solar wind in stripping away the at-
mosphere, its current state and rates of gas loss to space today. By then
extrapolating back through time, scientists will be able to determine
the evolution of Martian climate, the total atmospheric loss over Mars’
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