Holden Crater

On Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the 197-foot-tall United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket rolls to the launch pad at Space Launch Complex 41.

Decades of work preparing a miniaturized laboratory for identifying minerals on Mars have also yielded spinoff versions with diverse applications on Earth and, possibly, the moon.

This computer-generated view based on multiple orbital observations shows Mars' Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft northwest of the crater.

Thick stacks of clay minerals indicate chemical alteration of thick stacks of rock by interaction with liquid water on ancient Mars.

Mars Science Laboratory mission team members ran mobility tests on California sand dunes in early May 2012 in preparation for operating the Curiosity rover, currently en route to Mars, after its la...

As of June 2012, the target landing area for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission is the ellipse marked on this image of Gale Crater.

This mosaic of images from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity shows Mount Sharp in raw color as recorded by the camera.

This graphic shows the flux of radiation detected by NASA's Mars Science Laboratory on the trip from Earth to Mars from December 2011 to July 2012.

NASA's Curiosity rover captured its highest-resolution panorama of the Martian surface between Nov. 24 and Dec. 1, 2019.

The 197-foot-tall United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket seems surrounded by lightning masts as it arrives at the launch pad at Space Launch Complex 41 on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida...

Two parallel tracks left by the wheels of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover cross rugged ground in this portion of a Dec. 11, 2013, observation by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) ...

This map shows the route on lower Mount Sharp that NASA's Curiosity followed between April 19, 2015, and Nov. 5, 2015. During this period the mission investigated silica-rich rock targets includin...

This image shows inclined beds characteristic of delta deposits where a stream entered a lake, but at a higher elevation and farther south than other delta deposits north of Mount Sharp. This sugge...

A sweeping panorama combining 33 telephoto images into one Martian vista presents details of several types of terrain visible on Mount Sharp from a location along the route of NASA's Curiosity Mars...

Happy birthday song for Curiosity

This close-up view shows NASA's Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars. The image was captured by the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbite...

This map shows the route driven by NASA's Curiosity Mars in its approach to and April 1, 2014, arrival at a waypoint called "the Kimberley," which rover team scientists chose in 2013 as the locatio...

Mars Science Laboratory team member Jessica Samuels gives a progress report on Curiosity's first days on Mars.

This image shows the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft is suspended in a dark chamber, awaiting an environmental test.

This image from the Navigation Camera on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows wheel tracks printed by the rover as it drove on the sandy floor of a lowland called "Hidden Valley" on the route toward M...

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover, known as Curiosity, arrives at the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida aboard an Air Force C-17 cargo plane.

This graphic compares the radiation dose equivalent for several types of experiences, including a calculation for a trip from Earth to Mars based on measurements made by the Radiation Assessment De...

A sample of basaltic rock from a lava flow in New Mexico serves as a calibration target carried on the front of NASA's Mars rover Curiosity for the rover's Canadian-made Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectr...

This image from the NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows an impact scar on Mars made by pieces of the NASA Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft that the spacecraft shed just before entering the Mar...

One priority target for a closer look by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity before the rover departs the "Glenelg" area east of its landing site is the pitted outcrop called "Point Lake," in the upper hal...