Several of the trenches dug by NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander are displayed in this approximately true color mosaic of images from the lander’s Surface Stereo Imager camera. The component images were taken on various dates during the five months that Phoenix studied its surroundings after landing on a Martian arctic plain on May 25, 2008. The Phoenix Mission was led by the University of Arizona, Tucson, on behalf of NASA. Project management of the mission was by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. Spacecraft development was by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/Texas A&M University)

ScienceDaily (July 3, 2009) — Scientists offer new details about the history of water on Mars, gleaned from the 2008 NASA Phoenix Mars Mission that was operated from The University of Arizona.

Four papers on the topic have been published in the journal Science on June 3, 2009.

Peter H. Smith, a scientist with the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory is the mission’s principal investigator. There are 35 co-authors from six countries on the paper. Smith and his group of scientists and students used the lander to investigate the role of water and ice on Mars, as well as the changing weather patterns.

The popular mission launched in early August 2007. In May, 2008, early 10 months later, its landing trajectory was spectacularly captured by the HiRISE camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

For the next five months, the UA Science Operations Center clattered with researchers gearing themselves to follow the Martian diurnal phases, which are about 40 minutes longer than day and night on Earth and enough to throw off human sleep schedules in short order.

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