Mars Gigapixel Panorama – Curiosity rover: Martian solar days 136-149 in The World
Source: Wired.com
Category: Space
Elon Musk says he was motivated to found SpaceX after learning NASA had no plans to send man to Mars. Musk considers space exploration one of the main areas that will “most affect the future of humanity.”
By the age of 12 Elon Musk had sold his first commercial software, a space game called Blaster. Sixteen years later he sold his first company, Zip2, to Compaq’s Alta Vista division for $341 million in cash and stock. His next act was as co-founder of PayPal, which was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in stock in 2002.
Musk then turned his energy toward two notable new ventures: SpaceX, developer and manufacturer of space launch vehicles, and Tesla Motors, developer of high-end electric automobiles – both of which were started in a downturn. What makes this visionary entrepreneur tick?
Musk speaks with Michael Malone about innovation for the future’s sake, business strategies to get there, how to make order out of chaos along the way, and more. – Churchill Club
Elon Musk is an entrepreneur and a co-founder of SpaceX.
He was an early investor in PayPal. View full article »
Curiosity’s landing Times in regarding time travel zones:
Aug 5, 2012 10:31 p.m. US Pacific
Aug 6, 2012 1:31 a.m. US Eastern
Aug 6, 2012 3:31 p.m. Hobart – Australia
Aug 6, 2012 5:31 a.m Universal (UTC)
Curiosity cost: A cool US$2.5 billion
Wheels Spinning
Engineers just installed six new wheels on the Curiosity rover, and rotated all six wheels at once on July 9, 2010. This milestone marked the first in a series of “tune ups” to get the rover ready for a drive in the clean room where it is being assembled at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
Note: Curiosity is a Mars rover launched by NASA on November 26, 2011. Currently en route to the planet, it is scheduled to land in Gale Crater on August 5, 2012 ( US Pacific time) . The rover’s objectives include searching for past or present life, studying the Martian climate, studying Martian geology, and collecting data for a future manned mission to Mars. It will explore Mars for 2 years.
What sets Curiosity apart from other Mars Rovers?
What is the SpaceX mission?
SpaceX develops rockets and spacecraft for missions to Earth orbit and beyond. We are committed to becoming the world’s premiere space services company by substantially improving both the reliability and cost efficiency of space transportation, ultimately by a factor of ten. SpaceX was founded with the long-term goal of enabling humanity to become a space-faring civilization.
Now that the Space Shuttle program has ended, the United States relies on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft for astronaut transport, costing American taxpayers as much as $62 million a seat. By comparison, Dragon is designed to carry seven astronauts at a time for an unparalleled $20 million per seat.
As with all SpaceX designs, increased safety and reliability are paramount. “Dragon’s integrated launch abort system provides astronauts with the ability to safely escape from the beginning of the launch until the rocket reaches orbit,” explained David Giger, co-lead of the DragonRider program. “This level of protection is unprecedented in manned spaceflight history.”
“The Google Lunar X PRIZE is igniting a new era of lunar exploration by offering the largest international incentive prize of all time. A total of $30 million in prizes are available to the first privately funded teams to safely land a robot on the surface of the Moon and have that robot travel 500 meters over the lunar surface and send images and data back to the Earth. Teams must be at least 90% privately funded, though commercially reasonable sales to government customers are allowed without limit.”
