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.
A NASA astronaut is back on Earth after a yearlong, record-setting spaceflight. He caught a Russian ride from the International Space Station on Wednesday with two cosmonauts.
Blue Origin is gearing up for its first launch of the year, set for March 31st, but it's not the only one. NASA is also days away from making history with its first private mission to the International Space Station. Three amateur astronauts, who have each paid about $55 million for their seat, will reach the ISS and spend eight days at the off-earth outpost. Jim Cantrell, CEO and co-founder of Phantom Space, joins Cheddar News to discuss what the future of space tourism may look like.
Andrew Chanin, CEO of investment management firm ProcureAM, joined Cheddar to break down the many industries in the space economy and discuss what trends are driving the most growth. "Right now there's been so much media focus on space tourism. Why? Because last year it really debuted itself to the world," he said. "However it's less than 1 percent of the overall space economy, and there are many other parts of space which are actually driving this area."
Plastic has become the face of global pollution. To date, humans have produced 8.3 billion metric tons of it. Once discarded, plastic doesn’t biodegrade. Instead, it fragments into microplastics smaller than the size of a sesame seed and further into nanoplastics.
These tiny particles of plastic end up everywhere, deep in the ice of Antarctic glaciers or even inside our bodies.
So how much plastic is inside of us? And what does it mean for our health? Let’s find out.
Catching you up on what you Need to Know on Mar 29, 2022, with updates on the snow squall in Pennsylvania that caused a pileup killing three, the teacher's strike in Sacramento heading into week two, Walmart no longer selling tobacco products in select stores, and what meme stocks are up to this week.
Catching you up on what you Need to Know on Mar 28, 2022, with peace talks resuming in Ukraine as early as today, Colorado wildfires causing evacuations, Shanghai, China, ramping up restrictions once again, the Oscars debacle between Will Smith and Chris Rock, and more.
The U.S. market value of the plant-based food industry reached an all-time high last year. According to a new report from the Plant Based Food Association, retail sales of plant-based foods reached $7.4 billion, but questions are arising over whether the industry can sustain the levels of growth it had in the past few years. Julie Emmett, senior director of marketplace development at the Plant Based Food Association, joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Bowery Farming's vertical growing process allows it to cultivate 13 types of greens — and now, strawberries — in a sustainable way that's also faster than traditional farming. Bowery focuses on sustainability from start to finish, using unique technology to provide plants with what they need at the right time while eliminating waste and cutting down on carbon dioxide emissions. Katie Seawell, Chief Commercial Officer of Bowery Farming, joins Closing Bell to discuss the company's vertical farming process, sustainability focus, fixing the food supply chain, and more.
Nexii, a company based in Canada, is getting some big backing for its sustainable, low-carbon concrete alternative. CEO Stephen Sidwell, joined Cheddar News to talk about the initiatives his company is taking to tackle climate change and scaling up production to meet demand. "Most people don’t realize it, but buildings are the number one contributor to CO2 emissions," he said. "So that's really what we're attacking, the overall CO2 emissions."
