NASA's InSight Survived the Trip to Mars ー Now Comes the Wait for Results
*By Conor White*
The Curiosity rover is no longer alone on Mars.
NASA's InSight lander successfully touched down on the Red Planet Monday afternoon, but spectators will have months to wait before any results arrive.
"It's a 26-month mission," said Sarah Lewin, an associate editor at Space.com said. The first results from InSight's experiments are expected sometime in the spring.
InSight marks NASA's first mission to Mars since Curiosity began its journey in 2011. The launch was originally scheduled for 2016 before officials discovered a leak in the rocket's vacuum chamber. As a result, InSight missed its launch window. The delay and necessary repairs added almost $154 million to the mission's price tag, bringing it to a total cost of $814 million.
And even those years of planning didn't guarantee a success.
"Mars missions have like a 40 percent success rate across the world," Lewin said. "NASA is a little bit higher, so there was a definite chance it wouldn't work."
Now that it has safely landed, the probe will be responsible for drilling into Mars ー largely to determine the planet's composition. The robot will also monitor the planet for "Marsquakes."
"We've put a lot of things on Mars that are either orbiters, which are looking down on it, or rovers like Curiosity exploring the surface, but we really don't know what's going on inside," Lewin said.
Amazon is betting that ammonia could be the fuel of the future, participating in a Series A round for the Brooklyn-based company Amogy in December. Amogy aims to de-carbonize transportation with a clean energy system that uses ammonia as a renewable fuel. Amogy is partnering with Amazon on its first commercial product - an ammonia-powered cargo-shipping vessel. Amogy CEO Seonghoon Woo joins Cheddar Climate to discuss.
Cryptocurrency is expected to become a part of our daily lives — but what sort of environmental impact does it have? As the U.S. becomes the crypto mining capital of the world, climate advocates are worried about mining companies reopening old coal plants, using massive amounts of energy, wasteful hardware, and more. Congressional Democrats led by Senator Elizabeth Warren are demanding answers from mining firms about their electricity use and waste levels. John Belizaire, CEO of Soluna Computing, joins Cheddar Climate to discuss the congressional letters, how crypto mining can become a green industry, and more.
Driver assistance monitoring systems are meant to keep the driver's eyes on the road, but according to a report from AAA, different ways of monitoring provide significantly different results. The study found that direct camera-based systems that scanned the driver's eye movements were faster and more reliable than those indirect systems that looked at steering-wheel input. Megan McKernan, the manager of automotive services for the Automobile Club of Southern California, joined Cheddar to discuss the findings. "Triple-A is recommending that automakers include both direct and indirect systems just to really prevent consumers from trying to misuse these systems," she said, noting that neither system on its own is not foolproof.
Wave Neuroscience is a neurological health tech company that specializes in clinical and at-home personalized brain stimulation technology. Erik Won, president and chief medical officer and Fred Walke, CEO, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss their company's hopes for allowing patients to identify and treat unique brain disorders while empowering them to understand their unique neurological makeups — including for the high-stress positions of professional athletes. "We have a mobile device that provides a very light stimulation that gives them a therapy that gives them confidence so there's a just knowing that they're doing something for it," said Walke. "But it also helps them get back into a rhythm. It helps their brain synchronize around certain frequencies that that we target, and it helps them really understand that they've done everything they can to get to their highest level of success."
Democratic lawmakers are now calling on Bitcoin mining companies in the U.S. to assess how much electricity they use and how it could all potentially impact residents and the environment in the near future. Since its conception, crypto mining has been at the center of a debate. The question is: Is crypto mining playing a key role in renewable energy or could it totally derail U.S. climate goals? Host of The Wendy O show Wendy O, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
Nutritional supplement beverage company Athletic Greens has achieved unicorn status. The company announced a new $115 million funding round, bringing its valuation to $1.2 billion. The company's flagship product AG1 combines 75 different vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients into one daily serving. Athletic Greens says it is poised to reach the millions of consumers who are currently driving the health and wellness market's exponential growth. Athletic Greens founder and CEO Chris Ashenden joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
A powerful winter storm hit the Northeast over the weekend leaving 100,000 New Yorkers in the dark as well as snowfall up to 30.9 inches in parts of Massachusetts. The nor'easter hit with blizzard conditions of wind speed and poor visibility.
