The space snowman that was the focus of a close encounter with NASA's New Horizons probe last year is helping scientists answer a cosmic question: How did the building blocks of the solar system get their start?
"This is a game-changer," said Alan Stern, a planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute and principal investigator for the New Horizons mission.
It's been a dream of scientists for generations: actually studying samples of Martian soil for signs of life. With Monday's announcement of President Donald Trump's 2021 budget for NASA, that dream appears likely to be funded and on the cusp of becoming reality.
The more than $25 billion budget is a 12% increase from last year's and would be NASA's largest in decades, investing in a variety of ongoing scientific, technological and aerospace goals. It is in contrast to the proposed deep cuts that would hit domestic programs, like food stamps, federal housing assistance, and Medicaid, federal disability and student loan programs.
When the newest Mars rover departs Earth this summer, it will carry a relatively small piece of new technology that could potentially transform the way humans explore space. On Monday, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge will present details on its exploration goals, including a new technology that could help humans breathe on the red planet.
Roughly the size of a fancy toaster oven, MOXIE, which stands for the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Equipment, essentially produces oxygen from the thin Martian atmosphere, which is primarily made up of carbon dioxide, at a rate of about 10 grams of oxygen per hour. That's roughly enough oxygen to keep a small cat or dog alive.