Mars InSight Robot
Nasa has launched an insight robot to mars 7 months ago. It has successfully landed on mars surface after a dramatic seven-minute plunge to the surface of the Red Planet.
Mars Insight robot entered atmosphere at a higher velocity, so the heat generated by the atmosphere was protected by the heat shield. Then a parachute was deployed to slow down the robot and then landed gently to the ground with rockets.
InSight is now sitting on a vast, flat plain known as Elysium Planitia, close to the Red Planet’s equator.
The first picture came quickly within minutes, the picture was taken from camera positioned on the underside of the lander.
A later picture captured by a camera on InSight’s topside was much clearer.
Purpose of the mission
Its goal is to understand the mars interior. This robot will perform three experiments to achieve the goal.
Franco-British seismometers will be used to understand the quakes on the martian surface. The vibration by these quakes will reveal the position of the layer of rocks and their making.
A German-led “mole” system will dig up to 5 meters to get the planet’s temperature, this will give a sense of how active mars still is.
Insight will use radio transmissions to determine how the planet is wobbling on its axis. Deputy project scientist Suzanne Smrekar uses this analogy: “If you take a raw egg and a cooked egg and you spin them, they wobble differently because of the distribution of liquid in the interior. And today we really don’t know if the core of Mars is liquid or solid, and how big that core is. InSight will give us this information.”
First this robot will deploy the solar panels for powering the mission. The onboard camera will snap pics so that the engineers can decide the place where the digging could be done. It will take around 3 months before all the instruments are fully deployed.
This new mission will help us understand the core of the mars better and we will be able to understand what is the core made off. This will give us the knowledge about what is present under the surface, though NASA will not revel whatever they find directly. But we can expect some exciting findings. This will help us for future colonizing of mars.
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