Driving Over Sandy Ripples

This map shows the route driven by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover from where it landed in 2012 to its location in early March 2016, approaching 'Naukluft Plateau.' As the rover continues up Mount Shar...

This raw-color view from Curiosity's Mastcam shows the rover's drill just after finishing a drilling operation at "Telegraph Peak" on Feb. 24, 2015. Three days later, a fault-protection action by t...

The pale rocks in the foreground of this fisheye image from NASA's Curiosity Mars rover include the "Bonanza King" target under consideration to become the fourth rock drilled by the Mars Science L...

This image shows the first holes drilled by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity at Mount Sharp.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover used its black-and-white navigation cameras to capture panoramas of this scene at two times of day. Blue, orange, and green color was added to a combination of both pano...

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity carries five cylindrical blocks of organic check material for use in a control experiment if the rover's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) laboratory detects any organic com...

Engineers work on Opportunity (in its cruise configuration) in a cleanroom at Kennedy Space Center. A very important part of planetary protection is keeping contaminants from humans from riding abo...

This rock encountered by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover is an iron meteorite called "Lebanon," similar in shape and luster to iron meteorites found on Mars by the previous generation of rovers, Spirit...

This Dec. 17, 2015, view combines multiple images from the telephoto-lens camera of the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover to reveal fine details of the downwind face of "Namib Du...

This diagram presents some of the processes and clues related to a long-ago lake on Mars that became stratified, with the shallow water richer in oxidants than deeper water was.

This image from NASA's Curiosity Mars rover, taken on April 3, 2014, includes a bright spot near the upper left corner. Possible explanations include a glint from a rock or a cosmic-ray hit.

Mars rover Curiosity at the end of a drive of about 135 feet (41 meters) during the 329th Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (July 9, 2013).

Standing atop a payload transporter, the Atlas V rocket payload fairing containing NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) spacecraft rolls out of the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at Kennedy S...

This full-resolution color image from NASA's Curiosity Rover shows the gravel-covered surface of Mars. It was taken by the Mars Descent Imager (MARDI) several minutes after Curiosity touched down o...

Pictured here are Jennifer Trosper, MSL Deputy Project Manager and Grace Tan-Wang, Strategic Uplink Lead. The image was taken in the "Mars Yard" where the ground test model of the Curiosity rover ...

Mawrth Vallis

This mosaic from the Mast Camera on NASA's Curiosity rover shows a close-up view looking toward the "Glenelg" area, where three different terrain types come together.

Technicians at the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, put the instrument mast and science boom on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover, known as C...

The first stage of the Atlas V rocket for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission is lifted into an upright position for placement inside the Vertical Integration Facility at Space Launch Comp...

This instrument, shown prior to its September 2010 installation onto NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, will aid future human missions to Mars by providing information about the radiation environment on ...

Details such as the shadow of the mast on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity appear in an image taken Aug. 17, 2012, by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconn...

This view from the wide-angle Hazard Avoidance Camera on the front of NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover shows the rover's drill in position for a mini-drill test to assess whether a rock target called "M...

Scientists are overjoyed after seeing the Curiosity rover’s first initial images showing a wheel resting on the Martian soil.

This March 25, 2014, view from the Mastcam on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover looks southward at the Kimberley waypoint. In the foreground, multiple sandstone beds show systematic inclination to the so...

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity used a new technique, with added autonomy for the rover, in placement of the tool-bearing turret on its robotic arm during the 399th Martian day, or sol, of the mission.