LANDING SITE

SELECTION FOR THE

MARS SCIENCE

LABORATORY AND

IMPLICATIONS FOR

MARS SAMPLE RETURN

Horton Newsom, Ann Ollila, Nina Lanza, Institute of Meteoritics and Dept. of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Univ. of New Mexico

MiyamotoLandingSite

ROLE OF MSL LANDING SITES

AND MARS SAMPLE RETURN

The current search for landing sites for the Mars Science

Laboratory (MSL) raises important questions about selection of the

site for the Mars sample return and the ability to return the sample

cache that is planned for MSL.

This contribution describes some of the current work on the

Miyamoto landing site by our group and implications regarding

MSR for some of the other proposed landing sites.

Miyamoto Crater landing site

Spectroscopy (Wiseman, Arvidson, Roush, Marzo) 5 new CRISM cubes

Phyllosilicates (Fe-Mg phyllosilicates, e.g. saponite)

Olivine, Low calcium pyroxene, high calcium pyroxene, variability of indices identified. Detailed spectral analysis underway

Geology (Newsom, Wiseman, Tornabene, Crumpler) 5 HiRISE images in ellipse, no useful CTX images

Noachian – ancient cratered crust, buried and later exhumed with deltaic deposits north edge of ellipse (Newsom and others)

High correlation between geology and CRISM mineral signatures (Crumpler, Wiseman)

Evidence for habitable environments from geological setting (low area along extensive channel network)

Engineering (Wiseman, Ollila, Golombek, Dobrea) – Not a go-to site

Latitude near equator – no thermal issues!

Larger safe-haven site available (-1800 m elevation)

Locations in Miyamoto Crater

(newly assigned name)

Miyamoto

crater

Landing Site

Site in SW Meridiani

Phyllosilicates,

sedimentary geology,

This crater was recently

named for Shotaro

Miyamoto (1912-1992), an

expert observer of Mars,

professor of astrophysics

at Kyoto University, and

director of the Kwasan

and Hida Observatories.

Opportunity

Night

THEMIS IR

—

Proxy for

Thermal

Inertia (TI)

Higher TI

Lower TI

Miyamoto crater new sites

Eastern area-

Safe Haven site

Prime site – CRISM

hi res phyllosilicates

Evaporite or

chlorides high

thermal inertia?Meridiani

Planum –

sulfates and

hematite

Regional geological history

Landing Site

Opportunity

1. Early crust and impact

structures

2. Fluvial and lacustrine period

3. Deposition in landing site of

layered sediments (with

phyllosilicates) and river

channel deposits

4. Deposition of Meridiani

Planum materials

5. Exhumation revealing

inverted channel deposits,

and phyllosilicates in landing

site

HRSC perspective view looking West,

8X vertical exaggeration

Flat area

with

complex

geology

Floor of

150 km

diam.

crater

Inverted

channel

deposits

Sinuous

inverted

channel

deposit?

Stereo anaglyph – ―Channel deposit‖

HiRISE

images

Note the linear positive relief

feature near the bottom of the

image that continues to the

NE as a negative relief

feature (see next figure for a

full resolution close up.

HiRISE Image, image width 6

km.

Portion of HiRISE image

Close up of inverted channel. Note

the fracturing at the top of the channel.

HiRISE image, 27.3 cm/pixel, image

width 435 m.

Comparison with Eberswalde delta

. Miyamoto crater floor positive relief

remnant. HiRISE image, 27.3

cm/pixel, 350 m across image.

Eberswalde crater

deltaic inverted channel

deposits. HiRISE

image, 26.8 m/pixel,

260 m across image.

Relationship to Mars Sample Return

Types of landing sites for MSL

Landing sites with prime targets in the landing site

ellipse

Go-to landing sites with prime targets in terrains

surrounding the landing site ellipse. For go-to sites

the rover must travel to reach the prime sites

Go-to landing sites with prime targets in terrains

outside the landing site ellipse, but only on restricted

azimuths from the center of the ellipse

The much smaller proposed ellipse for the Mars

Sample return (~3 km diameter) can alleviate

some of the constraints from MSL go-to sites,

but not all

Nili

Fossae

―go to

site‖

MSR

Landing

ellipse

size

MSL

Landing

ellipse

size

Miyamoto crater (SW Meridiani) -

geomorphology

Exhumed

crater floor

deposits

Inverted

channel

deposits

Bedrock

materials with

phyllosilicates

Width 12 km

MSR

Landing

ellipse

size

MSR implications

Some Go-to sites are problematic for sample

cache on MSL or sampling as part of the MSR

mission, depending on the size of the MSR

landing ellipse

MSL will have to drive back to a safe MSR

landing area if the cache is to be returned

Precision landing for MSR may allow access to a

go-to site and/or to recover the MSL cache

However, some of the current MSL go-to sites

(e.g., Nili and Holden) may not have large

enough MSR landing areas