Desolate Landscape

Results from Opportunity and Curiosity show Mars could have supported life.

This image shows engineers' refinements of where NASA's Curiosity rover will enter the atmosphere of Mars on Aug. 5 PDT (Aug. 6 EDT).

This color image from NASA's Curiosity rover shows an area excavated by the blast of the Mars Science Laboratory’s descent stage rocket engines

This video clip shows the larger of the two moons of Mars, Phobos, passing directly in front of the sun, in an eclipse photographed by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity. (No audio)

When the Martian Moon Phobos passed in front of the sun, from the perspective of NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, the rover recorded the eclipse in the sky as well as the shadow darkening the ground. (...

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, a mobile robot for investigating Mars' past or present ability to sustain microbial life, is in development for a launch opportunity in 2009.

Curiosity revealed a lot about Mars in her first year exploring Gale Crater. Learn more about some of her remarkable discoveries in this video from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Top of Mars Rover Curiosity's Remote Sensing Mast

At the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians, using an overhead crane, separate the two components of the aeroshell, an element of NASA's Mars ...

This global image shows seven possible landing sites for MSL.

This pair of images from the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity shows the rock target "Cumberland" before and after Curiosity drilled into it to collect a sample for analy...

This oblique, southward-looking view of Gale crater shows the mound of layered rocks that NASA's Mars Science Laboratory will investigate. The mission's selected landing site is just north of the m...

This stereo image from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity shows a rock outcrop called "Hottah," cited as evidence for vigorous flow of water in a long-ago Martian stream. The ...

These schematic drawings show a top view and a cutaway view of a section of the drill on NASA's Curiosity rover on Mars.

This image shows the landing site of NASA's Curiosity rover and destinations scientists want to investigate.

This is an artist's concept of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft during its cruise phase between launch and final approach to Mars.

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover took this selfie on May 12, 2019 (the 2,405th Martian day, or sol, of the mission). To the lower-left of the rover are its two recent drill holes, at targets called "Abe...

The location of a rock target called "Knorr" is indicated on this self-portrait of the Curiosity rover in the "Yellowknife Bay" area.

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity cut a wheel scuff mark into a wind-formed ripple at the "Rocknest" site to give researchers a better opportunity to examine the particle-size distribution of the materia...

The Mars Science Laboratory flight system will consist of four major elements in three distinct phases (from left): the cruise stage, the aeroshell (heatshield and backshell), the descent stage, an...

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover targeted the laser of the Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument with remarkable accuracy for assessing the composition of the wall of a drilled hole and tailings tha...

This drawing of the Mars Science Laboratory mission's rover, Curiosity, indicates the location of science instruments and some other tools on the car-size rover.

​ NASA's Curiosity rover used an instrument called SAM (Sample Analysis at Mars) to detect seasonal changes in atmospheric methane in Gale Crater. The methane signal has been observed for nearly...

This side-by-side comparison shows the X-ray diffraction patterns of two different samples collected from the Martian surface by NASA's Curiosity rover.

A Russian-built, neutron-shooting instrument on the Curiosity rover of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission will check for water-bearing minerals in the ground beneath the rover.