Crazy Engineering: CubeSats

A zoomed in view of MAVEN’s orbit during a period of low solar wind.

The first demonstration of NASA's MAVEN Mars orbiter's capability to relay data from a Mars surface mission, on Nov. 6, 2014, included this and other images from NASA's Curiosity Mars rover. The im...

Images of Mars proton aurora.

The diagram explains the cause of Mars’ glowing nightside atmosphere. 

This image of the Mars night side shows ultraviolet emission from nitric oxide (abbreviated NO)

NASA's MAVEN spacecraft is quickly approaching Mars on a mission to study its upper atmosphere. When it arrives on September 21, 2014, MAVEN's winding journey from Earth will culminate with a drama...

This artist concept depicts NASA’s Space Launch System, which will be the most powerful rocket ever built. It is designed to boost the agency’s Orion spacecraft on deep space missions, including to...

Artist’s rendering of a solar storm hitting Mars and stripping ions from the planet's upper atmosphere.

This photo taken on March 3 shows the large hydrazine propellant tank prior to integration with the core structure of the MAVEN spacecraft at a Lockheed Martin clean room near Denver.

This artist's concept depicts the Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph (IUVS) on NASA's MAVEN spacecraft scanning the upper atmosphere of Mars. IUVS uses limb scans to map the chemical makeup and verti...

Mars is experiencing large regional dust storms over its northern hemisphere during the past week.

NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatiles Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft is seen inside the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility on Aug. 3. 2013 at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

This image shows an artist concept of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission.

The Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrograph (IUVS) is a part of the Remote Sensing (RS) Package and measures global characteristics of the upper atmosphere and ionosphere via remote sensing.

This animation depicts MAVEN orbiting Mars.

This is an artist's conception of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution MissioN (MAVEN) Mars orbiter.

In December 2022, NASA’s Mars-orbiting MAVEN mission observed the dramatic and unexpected “disappearance” of the solar wind, a stream of charged particles that continuously emanates from the Sun.

The Magnetometer (MAG) is a part of the Particles and Fields (P & F) Package and measures interplanetary solar wind and ionospheric magnetic fields.

Artist’s conception of MAVEN’s Imaging UltraViolet Spectrograph (IUVS) observing the “Christmas Lights Aurora" on Mars. MAVEN observations show that aurora on Mars is similar to Earth’s "Northern L...

The engineering model of the Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) sensor that is part of the Langmuir Probe and Waves (LPW)/EUV experiment on MAVEN and will measure the solar EUV input to the atmosphere.

MAVEN selfie composite, annotated

This is an artist's conception of Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission (MAVEN) Mars orbiter.

This graphic depicts paths by which carbon has been exchanged among Martian interior, surface rocks, polar caps, waters and atmosphere, and also depicts a mechanism by which it is lost from the atm...

The MAVEN spacecraft in Assembly, Test, and Launch Operations phase at Lockheed Martin.

The countdown is underway at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Space Launch Complex 41 where a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket stands ready to boost the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolutio...