Unlike many other groups around the world who are going green, NASA has decided to go red - or at least to the red planet.

On May 25, NASA put the Phoenix Mars Lander into space. Currently, the Mars Lander's legs have earned their footing despite a few delays in retrieving Martian soil samples to test in its onboard lab. The Phoenix is testing the samples and will send the results back to Earth.

"On this particular mission, everything has gone wildly right," said Patrick Wiggins, the Utah Ambassador for NASA.

This is good news considering the conditions on Mars. With average temperatures at 80 degrees below zero and huge, red dust storms, the Phoenix has its work cut out.

Information gathered from the last few missions to the red planet led scientists north to the Martian arctic circle, where it is permanently day. For the Pheonix lander this is a good thing because it runs on solar energy.

When the sun finally goes down, however, Wiggins said the Phoenix will quit working because of the lack of sun and because temperatures will be so low, the air will actually freeze to the ground. Wiggins said he hoped after a long Martian winter, the sun will reawake Phoenix and continue to gather data.

"Some rovers should have only lasted 90 days and have ended up lasting 4 years," Wiggins said.

While other missions to Mars have often been ended before they've even began, the Phoenix is still going strong and is currently one of five missions on Mars.

Wiggins said this mission is not about finding life on Mars.

"The only life literally that this particular space craft could discover," Wiggins said, "would be if a Martian walked in front of the camera and had its picture taken."

Instead, the Phoenix's main job is to locate evidence of conditions that either are now or were in the past suitable for life. One of the key players in determining those conditions is the location of water.

"We are looking for present or past water evidence," Wiggins said. "Life is always dependent on water."

Wiggins said NASA scientists are 99 percent sure they will find water because of what they know about Mars' past. Though there's no advanced life on Mars now, Wiggins said in the distant past Mars was warmer, had a thicker atmosphere and could have sustained life.

"The Big dream is going to be someday watching humans standing on Mars," Wiggins said.

While Wiggins said he knows many do not share his dream, people should still get involved.

"This certainly is not the beginning but is nowhere near the end," he said.

There are others who contend with Wiggins and ask why they should get involved or why NASA spends hundreds of millions of dollars - 420 million on the Phoenix Lander alone - on a program many people don't seem interested in.

Nicholas Herrick, president of the BYU Astronomical Society said space travel and exploration is incredibly important. Not exploring space would be like not exploring an amusement park in our own backyard, Herrick said. Space exploration has also given advances to modern day life such as computers, Velcro and microwaves.

Cornelius Gillespie, a senior majoring in exercise science said while he doesn't have much time to keep up with space exploration, he can see why it is important.

"It expands our paradigm of what is possible," Gillespie said.

Space exploration reveals more about the way God works and the order to the universe, Gillespie said.

"Hopefully people will believe more in a higher power because of advances made in space exploration," Gillespie said.

Even if space exploration doesn't lead to understanding more about how God has ordered the universe, it still promotes other important values, Gillespie said.

"It promotes a spirit of progress, limitless possibilities," Gillespie said.



Copyright Brigham Young University 16 Jun 2008