Estimating the Altitude of Martian Clouds at the Mars Science Laboratory Landing Site

Our second LPSC installment continues the focus on martian clouds, but this time, instead of looking at them from orbit, we examine them from the surface. The animated gif above shows a view from Curiosity. I, for one, find these animations quite relaxing. Over now to Charissa:

By Charissa Campbell

Clouds have been observed on Mars from the Curiosity rover's current location. This is interesting because it makes Mars seem more like another Earth and makes one wonder if this could possibly be our future home. However, as everyone knows, not all clouds are the same and have a variety of morphologies (shapes) and altitudes. Since Mars does not have a very thick atmosphere, in contrast to the Earth, the clouds are typically cirrus clouds which are the thin, high altitude clouds that are very wispy looking. One reason we want to study these clouds is to better understand the Martian climate.

Discerning the Details from the Big Picture: Determining the Geometry of Ice-Crystals in Martian Clouds Through Analysis of Orbiter Data

PVL is headed to Houston! Today nine of our group (!!) arrive at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) in The Woodlands, Texas. For many it will be their first international conference (and for others their first conference, period!). I remember my first LPSC ('04 - if you are counting) well and hope everyone has as much fun and learns as much as I did. To kick things off, here's undergraduate Brittney Cooper. She has provided a MARCI Composite Image of Mars, (Image: NASA JPL) reproduced above, to add some visual interest and context - enjoy, and come visit us in the poster sessions and in our talks!

By Brittney Cooper

This week will be my first time attending the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) just outside of Houston, Texas. I’m very excited to have the opportunity to not only go to what is known as the largest planetary science conference in the world, but to also be able to present a poster on my research.

            For about a year now, I’ve been working on project analyzing images taken by the Mars Colour Imager (better known as MARCI). MARCI is a camera fixed to the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) satellite, which as you may have probably gathered, orbits Mars. MRO reached Mars in 2006, and began its Primary Science Phase (PSP) in November of 2006, for about 2 Earth years.

The specific images that I’m looking at were taken during this phase, when MARCI was locked in a Sun-synchronous 3am-3pm orbit. This type of orbit is named as such because it’s a polar orbit in which MARCI sees all of MARS at essentially the same local solar time (LST), with MRO crossing Mars’ equator at an LST of 3 pm (or in other words, when the Sun is at a 45 degree angle from what it would be at noon). MRO also crosses Mars’ equator at 3am on what would be the dark side of Mars at that time, but of course MARCI does not image that part of the orbit.

Ultra-Violet, Ultra-Conference

A false colour image of Mars as imaged by the OSIRIS instrument in 2007. In this image the UV channel has been enhanced, which brings out the atmospheric cloud. Our research program here at PVL often leads us into ultra-violet territory, as Dr. Christina Smith details below!
(Image Credit: ESA & MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/RSSD/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA)

by Dr. Christina Smith

Last year I attended the 47th Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference (LPSC) in Texas for the first time. It was a very different conference to those I had previously attended. It is an enormous conference, around 1700 people attend each year, and covers many different facets of planetary sciences from dust and grains, comets and asteroids, moons, minor and major planets, and everything in-between. I really enjoy the variety of science that gets presented at this conference. In the morning you could be attending a series of talks about the Martian atmosphere and then in the afternoon you could be listening to talks about the giant planets' moons or about the surface of Pluto! It's impossible to get to see everything you'd like to see because there are 4 different sessions held simultaneously at most points of the conference, but by jumping in and out of the sessions you can get to most things!

This year I will be attending again, and I will be presenting a scientific poster of my work. Presenting your work to the community is an important part of scientific research, both for work that is in-progress and work that is completed and published. For work in the latter category, presenting your research allows you to publicize your work and get it "out there" in the community, which can only ever be a good thing. In the former case, presenting in-progress research allows you to get feedback from the community on the work you're doing at a stage where it can influence the direction that you take it in. For example, if you've encountered an issue with your analysis, if you've found something usual or you're looking for opinions or advice, presenting your work, especially in poster-format, is a great way of getting feedback, advice, having discussions and networking with other experts in the field.

My first conference

As we approach conference season, our new recruits at PVL are getting their first taste of what it is like to present your work in front of the scientific community and to interact with labs working on disparate problems. Look for more posts in this vein and details about what we'll be discussing in our nine abstracts at the upcoming 2017 Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, Texas in March. The image above is taken from the poster session at the American Geophysical Union's fall meeting, the largest conference on the Planetary Calendar.

By T. Giang Nguyen

As my third term rolls around as a graduate student, I’ve grown rather cozy of the little office where I generally spend most of my time. Aside from a summer short-course at Western University, I have not strayed far from York University since the fall term started. You can get pretty comfortable relying on daily routines but once in a while, it’s healthy to mix it up a bit. There had been discussions between the different events that we can attend and the group is heading to Houston, Texas for the 48^th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) in late March. Excitement and anxiety kicks in as this would be the first time that I would participate in a conference and it’s outside of Canada. Although this winter has not been as unforgiving as previous winters, I do enjoy the thought of escaping the ice and snow.

It is all about safety!

Dr. Abdelkrim Toumi has been reviewing our safety procedures in the lab as we work our planetary simulation chamber up for its first research use. This is something we take very seriously at PVL.

by: Dr. Abdelkrim Toumi

If you are working as a chemist, there are many potential dangers you can face. It is of your responsibility to be aware of the procedures that must be followed for working in safety. Different kinds of dangers exist in a laboratory such as chemical, physical, biological or radiological and each of them has its own safety procedures. During my research as a postdoctoral fellow here in the Planetary Volatiles Laboratory, we are working on a camera that would be able to detect water in some specific polar regions on the Moon. I have to deal with special environment, instruments and chemicals so I have to be very careful when I want to perform an experiment. Different safety procedures must be followed but it is not as easy as it sounds. In this post, you will find a non-exhaustive list of procedures that must be taken during my work.

Surfing the Rings: Using Small Spacecraft to Explore Saturn’s Rings

 

MIT's ion micro-thruster, (developed by the Space Propulsion Laboratory - Photo: M. Scott Brauer) is a technological development which has contributed to MSc student Eric Shear's conception of what a small satellite fleet might accomplish at Saturn. Find out more, below!

By Eric Shear

 

Over the last several months, I have been working on a CubeSat mission proposal to Saturn’s rings as part of my master’s thesis, now called “Saturn Ice Ring Exploration Network” or SIREN for short. I wrote about the science rationale in my blog post “The Ring Paradox.” The first draft should be completed by the end of this month, and I’d like to use this blog to reflect on my experience developing SIREN.

The Importance of Public Outreach for the Younger Generation

  A photo of my siblings and I during the holidays where I gave a talk at their school. This was during my sister’s grade 6 class where they are learning about space. Hailey is 10 here while Arden is 8.

 By Charissa Campbell

One good thing about being a scientist is not only trying to learn about how the world works but being a good role model for the younger generation to encourage them to study science as well. This can be done by taking part in public outreach or, as in my case, encouraging your younger siblings to always be interested in science. I could do both of those things due to the significant gap in the age between my siblings and I. I took part in a public outreach program with a local science center teaching kids about astronomy in an observatory. Nothing was more satisfying than seeing little kids say “wow” or just to see their eyes bright up when I would show them Saturn or even just the moon.