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PSI scientists are working in the field this week designing and testing rover operations to optimize scientific returns for missions on distant planets.
PSI’s R. Aileen Yingst, Michelle Minitti and Becky Williams, as well as other researchers, are working at a site near Green River, Utah that is the site of an ancient inland sea, as part of NASA’s GeoHeuristic Operational Strategies Tests (GHOST) program.
Beginning Tuesday the team is testing rover science operations protocols, to determine best practices for a future sample cache and return mission to Mars planned for 2020. The testing will take place in a Mars analog environment – specifically an environment that may have once been habitable. Lessons learned on Earth can improve efficiency, and scientific results, when rovers are used to explore Mars and other distant worlds.

The team is testing two scenarios: a linear scenario where the rover never backtracks – the method usually used on Mary by the two NASA MER rovers and the Mars Science Laboratory; and a walkabout-first scenario similar to what Mars Science Laboratory rover used at Pahrump Hills, where the rover goes over the same ground at least twice, first to gain context with remote instruments and then once more to a subset of those sites, to do more in-depth science.
Sarah Black will be posting updates from the research site. Visit sarahrblack.com to see what the team is doing.