NASA astronaut Christina Koch, Artemis II mission specialist hugs the Orion spacecraft in the well deck of USS John P. Murtha, Saturday, April 11, 2026.
NASA/Bill Ingalls
NASA astronaut
Christina Koch
,
Artemis II
mission specialist, hugs the Orion spacecraft in the well deck of USS John P. Murtha, Saturday, April 11, 2026. NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen
splashed down
in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California, on Friday, April 10.
After splashdown, the astronauts were met by a combined NASA and U.S. military team that assisted them out of the spacecraft in open water and transported them via helicopter to the USS John P. Murtha for initial medical checkouts. On April 11, the astronauts returned to the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston for a
news conference
.
Artemis II is the first crewed mission in the program. Lessons learned from this test flight will inform our return to the lunar surface and future missions to Mars.
Learn more about the cadence for upcoming Artemis missions.
Image credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
Every month,
NASA Earth Observatory
features a puzzling satellite image. The April 2026 puzzler appears above.
Your Challenge
I
dentify the location shown in this satellite image. Share what clues you see, where you think it is, and what makes this place interesting or unique to you.
How to Answer
Submit your response using
this form
and select "Puzzler Answer" as the topic. Please include your preferred name or alias.
You can keep it simple and just guess the location. Want to impress us? Tell us which satellite and instrument captured the image, which spectral bands were used, or point out a subtle detail about the geology or history of the area. If something catches your eye, or if this is your home or means something to you, we'd love to hear about it.
The Prize
We can't offer prize money or a trip to space to see Earth like satellites and
astronauts do
. But we
can
offer something almost as rewarding: puzzler bragging rights.
About a week after the challenge, we'll post the answer at the top of this page, along with a link to an Earth Observatory
Image of the Day
story that explains the image in more detail. We'll recognize the first person who correctly guesses the location, and we may also highlight readers who share especially thoughtful or interesting answers. By submitting a response, you acknowledge that your comments may be edited, excerpted, and published on this page.
Until then, zoom in, look closely, and enjoy the challenge. See you at the reveal!
NASA astronaut Jessica Meir dines on fresh Mizuna mustard greens she harvested earlier that day aboard the International Space Station.
Credits:
NASA
No matter how far humanity aims to travel or how ambitious the mission, nutrition will play a key role for the crew members on distant worlds. Before planning long-term stays on the Moon, Mars, and beyond, humans must learn to grow and care for plants and other sources of nutrition like algae to keep the explorers taking part in these adventures fed.
To solve this problem, NASA and its partners are conducting research aboard the International Space Station to better understand how the space environment affects nutrition-relevant organisms. Several investigations aboard Northrop Grumman's 24th commercial resupply mission for NASA support efforts to maintain crew diets as humanity ventures deeper into the cosmos.
Studying plant-microbe interactions
Alfalfa plants in a growth chamber with LED lights during a preflight experiment at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Dr. Tom Dreschel
Certain plants have bacteria in their roots that can take nitrogen from the air and convert it into a form of food that plants can use for growth. NASA's
Veg-06
studies alfalfa (
Medicago sativa
), a model organism, to determine how the plant interacts with this bacterium in space. This study also examines the effects of reduced lignin, which reinforces cell walls and helps plants to grow upright against gravity. In microgravity, plants may not need lignin, and reduced levels could allow plant parts to be more easily recycled, facilitating the growth of future plant generations.
Improved algae cultivation
Preflight image of spirulina growth in plant experiment units as part of the Space Surface Spirulina investigation.
Chitose Laboratory Corporation.
Other forms of nutrition that could support crew health include spirulina (
Arthorospira
), a type of algae high in protein, B vitamins, and antioxidants. Spirulina also has an added benefit of converting carbon dioxide into oxygen, helping replenish a crew's air supply. While spirulina is typically grown in water tanks, a JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) experiment called
Space Surface Spirulina
is testing a method to grow the algae on a thin-film surface. This method allows more efficient production of this high-protein food while conserving water and producing fresh oxygen aboard spacecraft.
Seed studies for better spaceflight plants
European Space Agency astronaut Tim Peake poses with arugula seed packets aboard the International Space Station during the European Space Agency-Education Payload Operation-Peake (ESA-EPO-Peake) investigation.
ESA/NASA
The ESA (European Space Agency) investigation
Seed Vigour
exposes seeds from several plant species to spaceflight conditions aboard the space station to determine if seed growth is affected. The research builds on a 2015
study
in which arugula seeds spent six months in orbit. After returning to Earth, the seeds were distributed to schools in the United Kingdom for further study. The data contributed to a
2020 publication
which found that the space-flown arugula seeds took longer to sprout and demonstrated signs of partial aging, but spaceflight did not compromise seed survival or seedling development.
This new study, flying aboard the resupply mission aims to determine whether these findings apply to other plant species and could help researchers find better ways to protect crop seeds during long-duration space missions.
Canadian Space Agency astronaut David Saint-Jacques holds a bag of thousands of tomato seeds.
CSA/NASA
The
Tomatosphere 9
investigation by the CSA (Canadian Space Agency) is exposing 1.8 million tomato seeds to microgravity conditions aboard the orbiting laboratory to give students an opportunity to study how the space environment affects plant growth. After the seeds return to Earth, they will be distributed to schools across the United States and Canada, where students can plant them alongside ground controls in a blind study to compare results.
Together, these studies aboard space station deepen researchers' understanding of nutrition in space and inform ways to better grow and maintain food sources that will keep crews healthy on future missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
NASA's Webb Redefines Dividing Line Between Planets, Stars
Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to directly image 29 Cygni b, which weighs 15 times Jupiter. They found evidence for heavy chemical elements like carbon and oxygen, which strongly suggests it formed like a planet by accretion within a protoplanetary disk.
Credits:
Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, William Balmer (JHU, STScI), Laurent Pueyo (STScI); Image Processing: Alyssa Pagan (STScI)
Planets, like those in our solar system, form in a bottom-up process where small bits of rock and ice clump together and grow larger over time. But the heftier the planet, the harder it is to explain its formation that way.
Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to examine 29 Cygni b, an object about 15 times as massive as Jupiter orbiting a nearby star. They found multiple lines of evidence that 29 Cygni b indeed formed from this bottom-up process, bringing new insights into how the heftiest planets come to be. A paper describing these findings published Tuesday in
The Astrophysical Journal Letters
.
The planet formation process is broadly understood to occur within gigantic disks of gas and dust around stars through a process called accretion. Dust gloms together into pebbles, which collide and grow larger and larger, forming protoplanets and eventually planets. The largest then collect gas to become giants like Jupiter. Since it takes more time for gas giants to form, and the disk of planet-forming material eventually evaporates and disappears, planetary systems end up with many more small planets than large planets.
In contrast, stars form when a vast cloud of gas fragments and each piece collapses under its own gravity, growing smaller and denser. A similar fragmentation process could theoretically occur within protoplanetary disks as well. That could explain why some very massive objects are found billions of miles from their host stars, in regions where the protoplanetary disk should have been too tenuous for accretion to occur.
Image: Exoplanet 29 Cygni b (NIRCam Image)
Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to directly image 29 Cygni b, which weighs 15 times Jupiter. They found evidence for heavy chemical elements like carbon and oxygen, which strongly suggests it formed like a planet by accretion within a protoplanetary disk.
Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, William Balmer (JHU, STScI), Laurent Pueyo (STScI); Image Processing: Alyssa Pagan (STScI)
29 Cygni b sits on the dividing line between what can be explained by these two different mechanisms. It weighs 15 times Jupiter and orbits its star at an average distance of 1.5 billion miles (2.4 billion kilometers), about the same as Uranus in our solar system. The research team targeted it because it could potentially result from either process.
"In computer models, it's very easy for fragmentation in a disk to run away to much higher masses than 29 Cygni b. This is the lowest mass you could plausibly get. But at the same time, it's about the highest mass you could get from accretion," said lead author William Balmer of the Johns Hopkins University and the Space Telescope Science Institute, both in Baltimore.
Balmer's
observing program
used Webb's NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) in its coronagraphic mode to directly image 29 Cygni b. This planet was the first of four objects targeted by the program, all of which are known to weigh between 1 and 15 times as much as Jupiter. The team also required their targets to orbit within about 9 billion miles (15 billion kilometers) of their stars.
The planets were all young and still hot from their formation, ranging in temperature from about 1,000 to 1,900 degrees Fahrenheit (530 to 1,000 degrees Celsius). This would ensure their atmospheric chemistry was similar to the planets of HR 8799, whose system Balmer
studied previously
.
By choosing appropriate filters, the team was able to look for signs of light being absorbed by carbon dioxide (CO
2
) and carbon monoxide (CO), which allowed them to determine the amount of those heavier chemical elements, which astronomers collectively call metals.
They found strong evidence that 29 Cygni b is enriched in metals relative to its host star, which is similar to our Sun in its composition. Given the planet's mass, the amount of heavy elements it contains is equivalent to about 150 Earths. This suggests that it accreted large amounts of metal-enriched solids from a protoplanetary disk.
Image: Exoplanet 29 Cygni b (Artist's Concept)
Exoplanet 29 Cygni b, seen in this artist's concept, is a gas giant weighing about 15 times the mass of Jupiter. Astronomers studied 29 Cygni b with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. They determined that it likely formed from accretion rather than disk fragmentation.
Illustration: NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI)
The team also used a ground-based optical telescope array called CHARA (Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy) to determine if the planet's orbit is aligned with the spin of the star. They confirmed that alignment, which would be expected for an object that formed from a protoplanetary disk.
"We were able to update the planet's orbit, and also observed the host star to determine its orientation with respect to that orbit," said Ash Messier, co-author and a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University. "We showed that the inclination of the planet is well-aligned with the spin axis of the star, which is similar to what we see for the planets of our solar system."
"Put together, this evidence strongly suggests that 29 Cygni b formed within a protoplanetary disk through rapid accretion of metal-rich material, rather than through gas fragmentation," said Balmer. "In other words, it formed like a planet and not like a star."
As the team gathers data on the other three targets within their program, they plan to look for evidence of compositional differences between the lower-mass and higher-mass planets. This should provide additional insights into their formation mechanisms.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the world's premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).
To learn more about Webb, visit:
The following sections contain links to download this article's images and videos in all available resolutions followed by related information links, media contacts, and if available, research paper and Spanish translation links.
Related Images & Videos
Exoplanet 29 Cygni b (NIRCam Image)
Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to directly image 29 Cygni b, which weighs 15 times Jupiter. They found evidence for heavy chemical elements like carbon and oxygen, which strongly suggests it formed like a planet by accretion within a protoplanetary disk.
Exoplanet 29 Cygni b (Artist's Concept)
Exoplanet 29 Cygni b, seen in this artist's concept, is a gas giant weighing about 15 times the mass of Jupiter. Astronomers studied 29 Cygni b with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. They determined that it likely formed from accretion rather than disk fragmentation.
Laura Betz
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
laura.e.betz@nasa.gov
Christine Pulliam
Space Telescope Science Institute
Baltimore, Maryland
Super Typhoon Sinlaku spins over the North Pacific Ocean in this image acquired on April 13, 2026, with the
VIIRS
(Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) on the
Suomi NPP satellite
.
NASA Earth Observatory/Michala Garrison
In mid-April 2026, a powerful typhoon bore down on the Mariana Islands in the North Pacific Ocean. The storm, Super Typhoon Sinlaku, was notable for reaching such exceptional strength so early in the year.
The
VIIRS
(Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) on the
Suomi NPP satellite
captured this image at about 03:30 Universal Time (1:30 p.m. local time) on April 13, 2026, as Sinlaku approached the islands. At the time, the storm carried sustained winds of around 280 kilometers (175 miles) per hour. That places it as a violent typhoon-the highest intensity on
the scale
used by the Japan Meteorological Agency and equivalent to a category 5 storm on the
Saffir-Simpson wind scale
.
The storm continued along its northwest track toward the Marianas on the morning of April 14, as storm bands began to bring heavy rain to the islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota, according to an
update
from the National Weather Service.
Forecasts
called for typhoon conditions to affect Saipan and Tinian from April 14 into April 15 before subsiding to tropical storm conditions.
Though Super Typhoon Sinlaku occurred in the troposphere, the lowest layer of the atmosphere, it formed gravity waves that were visible much higher. The
VIIRS
(Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) on the
NOAA-20
satellite captured this
nighttime image
of the concentric waves
made visible
in the mesosphere by
airglow
.
Sinlaku is the second category 5 tropical cyclone of 2026,
following Horacio
, which churned over the South Indian Ocean in late February. Meteorologists
note
that Sinlaku is also one of only a handful of category 5 typhoons-a
tropical cyclone
that occurs in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean-known to have occurred so early in the year.
Meanwhile, several other storms spun over the planet's oceans. On April 10, Tropical Cyclone Maila rotated in the
opposite direction
across the equator, and on April 12, Tropical Cyclone Vaianu
crossed New Zealand's North Island
.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Michala Garrison, using VIIRS data from NASA
EOSDIS LANCE
,
GIBS/Worldview
, and the
Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership
. Story by Kathryn Hansen.
Pictured above is the top four-fifths of the SLS (Space Launch System) core stage - the section containing the liquid hydrogen tank, liquid oxygen tank, intertank, and forward skirt. NASA will roll the largest section of the agency's SLS rocket that will launch the second crewed Artemis mission under the Artemis III mission out of NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility on Monday, April 20.
Credit: NASA
NASA will roll the largest section of the agency's SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, which will launch the second crewed Artemis mission, out of the agency's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans on Monday, April 20. What's called the top four-fifths of the SLS core stage - the section containing the liquid hydrogen tank, liquid oxygen tank, intertank, and forward skirt - will be loaded on the agency's Pegasus barge for delivery to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Media will have the opportunity to capture images and video, hear remarks from agency and industry leadership, and speak with NASA subject matter experts and Artemis industry partners as crews move the rocket stage to the Pegasus barge.
This event is open to U.S. media, who must apply by Wednesday, April 15. Interested media must contact Jonathan Deal at
jonathan.e.deal@nasa.gov
and Craig Betbeze at
craig.c.betbeze@nasa.gov
. Registered media will receive confirmation and additional information about the event by email. The agency's
media credentialing policy
is available online.
Once at NASA Kennedy, teams will complete the stage outfitting and vertical integration before handing the hardware over to the agency's Exploration Ground Systems Program that will handle stacking and launch preparations. The Artemis III SLS engine section and boat-tail, which protects the engines during launch, moved from the Space Systems Processing Facility at NASA Kennedy to the Vehicle Assembly Building in July 2025. The four core stage RS-25 engines are scheduled to ship from NASA's Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi no later than July 2026 for integration into the engine section.
The rocket stage with its four RS-25 engines will provide more than 2 million pounds of thrust to send astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft for the Artemis III mission. Artemis III currently is scheduled for launch in 2027, following the successful Artemis II test flight mission around the Moon that concluded April 10.
Building, assembling, and transporting the core stage is a collaborative process for NASA, Boeing, the core stage lead contractor, and lead RS-25 engines contractor L3Harris Technologies. The core stage is the backbone of the SLS rocket. All five major structures for the rocket stage are manufactured at NASA Michoud. By optimizing space at NASA Kennedy and NASA Michoud for production, integration, and outfitting, NASA and industry can streamline production for a standardized SLS configuration for NASA's Artemis program.
The Artemis III mission will launch to Earth's orbit American astronauts in the Orion spacecraft on top of the SLS rocket to test rendezvous and docking capabilities between Orion and commercial spacecraft needed to land astronauts on the Moon in 2028. The SLS rocket is the only rocket capable of sending Orion, astronauts, and supplies to the Moon in a single launch.
Artemis III is the second crewed mission under the agency's Artemis program, where NASA is sending astronauts on increasingly difficult missions to explore more of the Moon for scientific discovery, economic benefits, establish an enduring human presence on the lunar surface, and build on our foundation for the first crewed missions to Mars.
Learn more about NASA's Artemis program:
NASA's 32nd annual Human Exploration Rover Challenge, one of the agency's longest-standing student challenges, culminated April 10-11 with its final excursion event at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center near NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Spanning nine months, the challenge tasks student teams from around the world to design, build, and test a lunar rover powered by either human pilots or remote control. The annual competition concluded with an awards ceremony recognizing the top-performing teams.
This video highlights student teams from around the world that competed in NASA's 2026 Human Exploration Rover Challenge, held April 10-11 at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center near the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Teams navigated a challenging obstacle course and completed complex mission tasks using human-powered and remote-controlled rovers.
NASA
In the human-powered division, Parish Episcopal School in Dallas, Texas earned first place in the high school division, while the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg, Missouri, won the college and university title. In the remote-control division, Gould Academy in Bethel, Maine, earned the top award in the middle and high school division, and The University of Alabama in Huntsville in Huntsville, Alabama, secured the college and university title.
More than 500 students representing 42 teams from around the world participated in the 32nd annual competition. Teams included students from 28 colleges and universities, 13 high schools, and one middle school across 18 U.S. states, Puerto Rico,
Teams were scored on their ability to navigate a half-mile obstacle course, complete mission-specific task challenges, and pass multiple safety and design reviews conducted by NASA engineers, with awards presented across human-powered and remote-control divisions.
"This challenge gives students a hands-on opportunity to think like engineers and problem-solvers, applying real-world design principles to complex exploration scenarios," said Vemitra Alexander, who leads the Human Exploration Rover Challenge for NASA's Office of STEM Engagement at Marshall. "By encouraging innovation and teamwork, we're helping prepare the next generation to contribute to missions that will take us farther into space."
Here is the full list of winners:
Human-Powered High School Division
First Place: Parish Episcopal School, Dallas, Texas
Second Place: Kealakehe High School, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
Third Place: Debbie Smith Career and Technical Education Academy, Reno, Nevada
Human-Powered College/University Division
First Place: University of Central Missouri, Warrensburg, Missouri
Second Place: Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island
Third Place: The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama
Remote-Control Middle School/High School Division
First Place: Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
Second Place: SoulPhamm, South Plainfield, New Jersey
Third Place: Space and Engineering Technologies Academy, San Antonio, Texas
Remote-Control College/University Division
First Place: The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama
Second Place: South Dakota State University, Brookings, South Dakota
Third Place: Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, Florida
Rookie of the Year
Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
Task Challenge Award
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
College/University Division: The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama
Human-Powered
High School Division: Parish Episcopal School, Dallas, Texas
College/University Division: Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island
Ingenuity Award
Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada
Phoenix Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Parish Episcopal School, Dallas, Texas
College/University Division: Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
College/University Division: University of the District of Columbia, Washington, D.C.
Project Review Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Parish Episcopal School, Dallas, Texas
College/University Division: University of Central Missouri, Warrensburg, Missouri
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: SoulPhamm, South Plainfield, New Jersey
College/University Division: The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama
Industry STEM Engagement Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Erie High School, Erie, Colorado
College/University Division: Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
Community STEM Engagement Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Debbie Smith Career and Technical Education Academy, Reno, Nevada
College/University Division: Universidad Aeronáutica en Querétaro, Coyote, Mexico
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Chaminade High School, Mineola, New York
College/University Division: ATLAS SkillTech University, Mumbai, India
Social Media Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Albertville Innovation Academy, Albertville, Alabama
College/University Division: Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Space and Engineering Technologies Academy, San Antonio, Texas
College/University Division: ATLAS SkillTech University, Mumbai, India
Team Spirit Award
Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Crash and Burn Award
The University of Alabama in Huntsville (Human Powered), Huntsville, Alabama
Most Improved Performance Award
Human-Powered
High School Division: Kealakehe High School, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
College/University Division: The University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama
Remote-Control
Middle School/High School Division: Gould Academy, Bethel, Maine
College/University Division: Campbell University, Buies Creek, North Carolina
Safety Award
High School Division: Parish Episcopal School, Dallas, Texas
College/University Division: University of Central Missouri, Warrensburg, Missouri
Pit Crew Award
High School Division: Erie High School, Erie, Colorado
College/University Division: Campbell University, Buies Creek, North Carolina
Featherweight Award
Campbell University, Buies Creek, North Carolina
The rover challenge is one of NASA's four
Artemis Student Challenges
reflecting the goals of the Artemis program, which will land Americans on the Moon while establishing a long-term presence for science and exploration, preparing for future human missions to Mars. NASA uses such challenges to encourage students to pursue degrees and careers in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
The competition is managed by NASA's
Office of STEM Engagement
at NASA Marshall. Since its inception in 1994, more than 15,000 students have participated - with many former students working at NASA, or within the aerospace industry.
Learn more
about the Human Exploration Rover Challenge.
NASA has selected Development Seed of Washington to provide research and development services to the Office of Data Science and Informatics (ODSI) at the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
The award is a performance-based, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract with a maximum potential value of $76 million. A phase-in period begins on May 15, 2026, followed by a two-year base ordering period, with three one-year options to extend services through June 2031.
Under the contract, Development Seed will provide scientific research and development support services for ODSI projects, including system architecture expertise, operations and maintenance of ODSI-developed tools and platforms, and systematic approaches to data curation, management, and stewardship. The contractor also will provide subject matter expertise in informatics, data science, and information management, as well as develop and deploy artificial intelligence and machine learning solutions to advance science data systems.
For information about NASA and agency programs, visit:
Curiosity Blog, Sols 4852-4858: When Data Take Their Time...
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity acquired this image using its Mast Camera (Mastcam), showing polygons and other interesting textures that characterize the terrain beyond the boxwork area. Curiosity captured the image on April 3, 2026 - Sol 4855, or Martian day 4,85 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission - at 12:26:28 UTC.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Written by Susanne P. Schwenzer, Professor of Planetary Mineralogy at The Open University, UK
Earth planning date: Friday, April 3, 2026
I was the geology science team lead on Monday for planning Sols 4852-4853, when our data did not arrive on time for planning. Thus, we got creative as a team thinking what we could do, not knowing where exactly our rover might be. And for that we first thought about AEGIS, the capability of the rover to
find a target for ChemCam LIBS measurements
on its own.
We normally use this capability after drives, before we have seen the data here on Earth, to get an extra LIBS measurement. This time, we put two of those observations into the plan, and added many atmospheric and environmental observations, such as dust-devil movies, too. It's an interesting planning session that always makes the team talk more than normal, because there are no routines for those days! I find it both tense and rewarding at the same time. Anything that isn't quite as expected adds levels of complexity that require more focus and more thinking, hence making me tense. But it is also really nice when we've succeeded in making the best of those days. My colleagues also seem to have lots of energy and are especially supportive of each other. That said, like everyone else I prefer the routine days where everything goes right and we focus on the science.
All our data arrived perfectly fine in time for planning on Wednesday and we found ourselves in a terrain with many blocks that have polygons on their top surface. Do
check out the images
, it's a wild terrain that reminded me of some boulder-rich terrains we have seen back on the margins of the Gediz Vallis Channel. It is interesting to see the distribution of the blocks, and I am curious how they might change along the traverse up Mount Sharp. For now, we have an activity that we call "MARDI sidewalk" in the plan. This means the MARDI camera takes images while the rover is driving, on Sol 4855. Those image sequences give great insights into changing terrains, and we are looking forward to the data reaching us!
Over the course of the week, ChemCam did three AEGIS observations and four human-pointed observations on the targets "Las Petas," "Punta Negra," "Pampa del Molle," and "Los Condores." We were trying to measure the normal-looking bedrock and all the different features, some of which you can see in the image above. We want to find out what the higher-standing materials are that form those prominent polygons. APXS is getting four targets in the plan, also looking at the diversity of rocks. These are called "Rio Espiritu Santo," "La Escalera," "Los Condores," and "Tropico de Capricornio." It's all focused on understanding what forms the polygons, because any differences in chemistry could tell us a lot about what happened and how the polygons came to be. By extension, this will then allow the team to deduce the environmental conditions at the time the polygons formed.
As you may guess, imaging is very important in a landscape as varied as this! Mastcam is looking in many directions in the near-field and further up the road - our projected drive path. In addition, ChemCam is taking long-distance images with its Remote Micro Imager (RMI) to get a closer look at the walls around us. The butte called "Mishe Mokwa" is still one of the RMI and Mastcam favorites because it gives us many insights into its structure as we are driving past and also somewhat around it.
Atmospheric and environmental observations occur all across the plans and include atmospheric opacity measurements, dust-devil searches and, in Friday's plan, also an APXS atmospheric measurement. The DAN instrument is monitoring water in the subsurface across all plans. So, it's three full plans, despite the little extra wait on the data!
And while I am writing this, four astronauts in the Orion capsule are on the way around the Moon. I am very excited! When Apollo 8 was the very first mission to ever fly around the Moon in December 1968, I wasn't born yet. In fact, I arrived a few months after Apollo 11 had landed on the Moon for the first time. Now being able to witness these lunar missions myself, to hear the voices between the Integrity spacecraft and the control room in Houston, and to see the pictures as they arrive ... magnificent! Go, Artemis II!
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity acquired this image, showing the polygonal sulfate unit currently being investigated by the rover after leaving the boxwork terrain. Curiosity captured the image using its Left Navigation Camera on March 27, 2026 - Sol 4848, or Martian day 4,848 of the Mars Science Laboratory mission - at 10:43:16 UTC.
NASA/JPL-Caltech
Written by Lucy Thompson, APXS Strategic Planner and Planetary Geologist at the University of New Brunswick, Canada
Earth planning date: Friday, March 27, 2026
Last weekend's drive took us just over the southernmost contact of the boxwork terrain with the surrounding layered sulfate unit. This was our third time crossing this contact, providing an excellent opportunity to look for any changes across it. We have acquired multiple observations (chemistry and imaging for textures) of the boxwork-bearing bedrock close to the contact. We are also interested in determining whether the layered sulfate unit to the south of the boxwork terrain has the same depositional setting as that encountered to the north. Is the composition the same as the typical layered sulfate unit we encountered prior to the boxwork, or could there be a change associated with a different depositional environment, source sediment, or potential alteration along the contact with the boxwork?
Unfortunately, although the weekend drive was successful, Curiosity was not on stable enough ground coming into planning Monday to brush the dusty bedrock, although we were able to get MAHLI imaging of a block within the workspace. The rover engineers repositioned the rover so that we could safely unstow the arm, brush, image with MAHLI, and analyze with APXS the layered sulfate unit bedrock just across the contact ("Santa Rosa") in Wednesday's plan. We also looked at a concentration of granules with APXS and MAHLI ("Piedra Colgada"). They appear to be a collection of fine nodules that eroded from the bedrock, thereby allowing us to obtain chemical and textural data on these nodules.
The drive planned on Wednesday took us another 50 meters (about 164 feet) away from the boxwork, to a stunning sulfate unit workspace. The bedrock contained abundant resistant ridges forming a polygonal pattern. We wanted to compare these current exposures with polygonal textures observed previously, for example, within the boxwork, the sulfate unit before the boxwork, and the clay-sulfate transition. We are brushing two spots on the bedrock in front of us ("Ocharaza" and "Nevado Tres Cruces") and analyzing them both with APXS and MAHLI for chemistry and texture.
Across the three plans, Mastcam imaging was acquired of the boxwork terrain behind, the sulfate unit ahead, and the rocks immediately in front of us. In particular, this weekend's plan was jam-packed full of mosaics to capture the amazing polygonal textures surrounding the rover. The planned 30-meter drive (about 98 feet) should keep us in this same terrain.
The environmental group has also been busy planning multiple observations to monitor atmospheric opacity, optical depth and aerosol scattering properties, clouds, wind direction, and potential dust-devil activity. Navcam and Mastcam are utilized to make these observations. As usual, our plans this week included the standard DAN, REMS and RAD activities.
