MAVEN Spectrometer Preparing to Dive into the Red Planet’s Past

Later this year, NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolutions (MAVEN) mission will begin its journey to Mars, and on board will be a special instrument able to turn back time on the Red Planet.

The state-of-the-art instrument, the Neutral Gas and Ion Mass Spectrometer, is a network of electrically charged rods that will measure the charged gas particles, or ions, that make up Mars' upper atmosphere. It was designed and developed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland and will launch aboard MAVEN in November.

Once on Mars, the spectrometer will collect data on the ions above the Red Planet. According to Goddard's spectrometer principal investigator, Paul Mahaffy, the data can be used to build models showing how Mars has lost most of its atmosphere, one of the planet's greatest mysteries.

An artist's concept of MAVEN spacecraft. Image courtesy of NASA.

After the launch, the team will apply radio frequency and electrical voltages to the spectrometer's four metal cylinders. Each voltage will isolate ions based on their mass, allowing the instrument to build a profile, or mass spectrum, of the different gas particles in the Martian atmosphere.

The spectrometer can also create ions from neutral gas molecules by using an electron gun, which will fire a beam of electrons, breaking the gas molecules into smaller, charged particles. Then the spectrometer will be able to collect information on both neutral and charged gas particles present in the planet's upper atmosphere.

By measuring the composition of the current atmosphere and how variables such as the time of day and solar activities change the gas particles over time, simulations of the current Martian atmosphere and the atmosphere billions of years ago can be built. If the models can accurately portray the Red Planet's atmosphere from long ago, scientists might be able to understand whether the atmosphere was once substantial enough to sustain liquid on its surface and support life.

The spectrometer will be located on a platform below the spacecraft, keeping it away from its own gases and allowing it to face different directions. It will collect data when MAVEN is between 93 and 311 miles above Mars, storing it in the spacecraft's memory bank for several days before it's transmitted to NASA's Deep Space Network satellites around the world.

Story via nasa.gov.

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