NASA’s Mars InSight spacecraft, scheduled to launch on Saturday, might be heading to a seemingly uninteresting spot on the red planet, but it has an incredibly important job to do there. The spacecraft will land at Elysium Planitia, a spot that will likely be flat as far as the eye could see, which is precisely what scientists want. That’s because InSight’s goal is to discover what lies deep underground Mars’ surface and help answer geophysical questions about the planet’s structure, composition, and how it formed, reports The New York Times.
In 2003, scientists concluded that the core of Mars must still be at least partially molten, similar to Earth’s core. But many other details remain unknown, such as how frequently are there marsquakes, or the thickness of its crust, or how much heat is flowing.
“We know some, but we don’t know a lot,” Dr. Banerdt said to The Times. NASA’s latest mission to Mars aims to provide “foundational information of the planet’s history and its activity,” he added. “I’m looking forward to making the first map of the inside of the planet.”
The InSight is set to launch at 4:05 a.m. PDT on May 5 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. After it lands on Mars, the $814 million spacecraft will take a few months to deploy two instruments, writes The Times. One is a dome-shaped package containing seismometers. The other is a heat probe that will dig itself about 16 feet into the Red Planet’s soil.
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