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NASA launched its MAVEN probe to Mars on November 18, 2013. Its main mission was to find out how Mars changed from a planet with a thick atmosphere that kept it warm, and rivers, lakes and seas. Today's Mars is cold and arid with a very thin atmosphere.

Results released earlier this month show that the transformation began 4.2 billion years ago. That's when the planet's magnetic field was lost. Earth's magnetic field protects us from damaging particles from the Sun, but more importantly it prevents the solar wind from stripping away our atmosphere. Once Mars lost this protection, over a period of 500 million years, it gradually lost its atmosphere.

Once a protective atmosphere is lost, surface water evaporates and is also lost.

Here is an artist's rendering of a solar storm stripping gas particles from the Martian atmosphere.

We have aurorae on Earth when charged particles from the Sun are funnelled down to the poles along magnetic field lines. But unlike Earth, Mars isn't a giant magnet and doesn't have a planetary magnetic field. Once upon a time it did, and some of the rocks that formed from magma at the time have remnant magnetic fields in them. These are mostly – but not exclusively – in the older surface rocks of the Martian southern hemisphere.

In 2005 the European Mars Express orbiter detected aurorae in the southern hemisphere where the magnetic remnants are. But NASA's MAVEN has detected an aurora over the northern hemisphere which lasted five days.

On Earth occasionally we're treated to lively auroral displays, but the Martian ones have been just a diffuse glow. In addition, since their detection is in the ultraviolet, we wouldn't see them even if we were on Mars.

Mars has two small rather shapeless moons, Deimos and Phobos. They're probably captured asteroids.

The larger one, Phobos, is being slowly pulled towards Mars, though at 3-6 feet per century, we're not going to be around to get impact photos from Mars probes via social media. It's at least 30 million years in the future. But the news is that Phobos may not last that long. It looks as though Phobos is starting to fall apart, according to research presented at a recent planetary sciences meeting.

Phobos has noticeable grooves on its surface and formerly, astronomers thought they were fractures from a massive asteroid impact. It left a 6-mile wide crater, near half the width of the moon. But the new study, which has used computer modeling, proposes that the grooves are evidence of the gravitational effect of Mars. Tidal forces are pulling it apart.

Have you seen the film "The Martian"? Or even read the book? I saw the movie today and quite enjoyed it. I understand that the book's author was very keen on authenticity and as for the movie, the Jordanian desert made a good Mars.

The spacecraft was pretty fancy - can't see NASA coming up with anything like that in the near future. And I couldn't believe in the ending. But all very watchable, with snappy dialog. Must be rather impressive in 3D.

On the rim of Schiaparelli Crater. The picture was taken from orbit by ESA's Mars Express orbiter.

The basin was named for Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli who thought he saw "canale" on Mars, i.e., straightline features. That got translated into English as "canals" suggesting that they were artificial.

The entry, descent and landing demonstrator module of the joint ESA–Roscosmos ExoMars 2016 mission also honours the astronomer with the name Schiaparelli.

When Mars's moon Phobos breaks up, Mars will become a ringed planet (Image: Tushar Mittal/Celestia Development Team) But it's not expected to happen for around forty million years, so I guess we're not going to see that.

Wow! Trees and bushes on Mars! Oh. No, apparently not. They're just dark brown streaks from dark sand on the lighter pink sand. There would be shadows if the dark bits were anything upright.

Dark Sand Cascades on Mars

(Image Credit: HiRISE, MRO, LPL (U. Arizona), NASA)

Here is a 1700 km long view taken in a south-north direction across the Valles Marineris of Mars, an enormous canyon system. It was taken by ESA's Mars Express, and is the first image of this size that shows the surface of Mars in high resolution (12 metres per pixel), in colour and in 3D.

It was taken ten years ago today on 14 January 2004.

(Copyright ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum))

NASA's Curiosity rover has found much higher concentrations of silica at some sites in the past seven months than anywhere else it's been on Mars 40. Silica makes up nine-tenths of the composition of some of the rocks. Silica is a rock-forming chemical that combines silicon and oxygen. It's seen on Earth in many minerals, most commonly as quartz.

A Curiosity science team member said,

Acidic water would tend to carry other ingredients away and leave silica behind. Alkaline or neutral water could bring in dissolved silica that would be deposited from the solution. These findings on Mount Sharp are linked to what the Spirit rover found a long way away. There, signs of sulfuric acidity were observed.

There's one Mars mission to be launched this year, the European Space Agency's ExoMars. It's due to be launched from Baikonur in Russia on a Proton rocket on March 14. It consists of two parts: the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) and the Sciaparelli lander which is an entry, descent and landing demonstrator module (EDL). The two parts have now been configured ready for launch. Photo Credit: ESA – B. Bethge

“The main objectives of this mission are to search for evidence of methane and other trace atmospheric gases that could be signatures of active biological or geological processes and to test key technologies in preparation for ESA’s contribution to subsequent missions to Mars,” says ESA.

ESA's Schiaparelli will touch down on Mars on 19 October 2016 the solid ellipse marked on this topographical image. The size of the ellipse doesn't mean that they're a bit vague about where it will land. The launch window is 14-25 March and the ellipse takes account the landing ellipses that would arise from all of those dates.

The landing site is on Meridiani Planum and it's relatively smooth and flat. The higher plains are shown in brown, with lower altitudes in pale yellow and green. The largest crater on the right (east) is Endeavour which NASA's Opportunity rover has been exploring.

A beautiful full-disk image of Mars captured by MOM, India's Mars Orbiter Mission. (Image: ISRO/MOM)

MOM is taking readings of different aspects of the Martian atmosphere. This is important because the results can confirm (or question?) data from other missions.

ExoMars is a joint project between the European Space Agency (ESA) and Roscosmos (Russian space agency). It's the first phase of a mission to search for biochemical indicators of past or present life on Mars.

The TGO (Trace Gas Orbiter) probe was launched today (March 14) on a Proton-M rocket from Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

It's designed to detect methane to try to answer the question of what is the origin of methane previously detected on the red planet - biological or geological?

This mid-afternoon 360-degree panorama of Mars- is made up of dozens of images of lower Mount Sharp inside Gale Crater. [Be warned! It's a fantastic picture, but it can take quite a while to load.]

This mid-afternoon panorama was acquired by NASA's Curiosity rover early in April. You can see the rim of Gale Crater – it fills the horizon in the center of the image. Mount Sharp is on the horizon to the right.

There has been some color adjustment of the science to make it resemble how the scene would appear in daytime lighting on Earth.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

A key scientific goal for Curiosity is to better assess when and where conditions on Mars were once suitable for life, in particular microbial life. To further this goal, Curiosity was directed to cross the rugged terrain of Nautkluft Plateau (visible foreground left in the image).

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS

A recent colorful photo of the Nili Fossae region of Mars. It's on the northwest rim of Isidis impact basin and is full of intriguing geology. It stands out from other parts of Mars because large areas of bedrock are exposed. The HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbit took the picture in February. Pretty cool.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona

Teachers and parents, here's something your kids might enjoy. Paxi - the Red Planet is a little video in which Paxi isn't a little green man from Mars, but a space alien that ends up on Mars. It's made by ESA (European Space Agency). It gives some facts about Mars and Mars exploration without getting technical or being overly long.

But Paxi does have a British accent, so I don't know if that would be a problem for North American children. You can turn on captioning, but it's so awful that I blush with embarrassment on ESA's behalf. No one would understand the video from that. A few examples, with caption words followed by what was actually said.

I'm Pike see I'm Paxi

My spaceship glad keep navigation system My spaceship galactic navigation system

I'm lost without it there's a positive ahead I'm lost without it. Look. There's a planet up ahead

I hope they're friendly ice at the polls I hope they're friendly. There's ice at the poles

Mars was at opposition on May 22. That means the Sun, the Earth and Mars are in a direct line with Mars and the Sun on opposite sides of the Earth. Mars is closest to the Earth at opposition.

This Hubble Space Telescope image of Mars was taken on May 12, close to opposition. Details as small as 20 – 30 miles across can be seen.

I spotted Mars the other night. Wow! It's very bright and was quite red-looking. Although seems bigger than usual, it'll never look as big as the full Moon.

Here is a set of pictures showing how Mars's apparent size changes throughout this year.

If you get a clear night, go out and have a look.

On 2 June 2003, ESA's Mars Express, Europe's first mission to the Red Planet, was launched from Baikonur cosmodrome. Since beginning science operations in 2004, the orbiter has been helping to answer fundamental questions about the geology, atmosphere, surface environment, history of water and potential for life on Mars.

Artist's view of Mars
Credit & copyright: ESA/D. Ducros

Not only was Mars Express launched on June 2, 2003, but it carried Beagle 2. Beagle was meant to be an astrobiology lander, but after its release there was only silence. It never deployed.

Here's the story of Beagle 2 - Lost and Found.

I like this image of a nameless crater on Mars. It's surprising that it hasn't been named, as it's about 4 km (2.5 mi) deep and 50 km (30 mi) across.

ESA released this image which was made using data from the Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera.

HIRISE is the high resolution camera carried by NASA's Mars Reconaissance Orbiter (MRO). It can resolve objects less than a meter across. Over fifty pages of HIRISE images have been released recently. If you're interested in Mars or just like to see interesting pictures, have a look.

Here's a sample, Channels in Crater Northeast of Hellas Planitia.

ESA's Mars lander Schiaparelli is on it's way to Mars with the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter. The launch was on March 14, and it's expected to reach Mars in mid October. Schiaparelli should separate from ExoMars on October 16 and arrive on the Martian surface three days later. Here is a picture of the landing elipse on Meridiani Palum.

Image credit & copyright: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin

Curiosity has been on Mars for four years now. Her primary destination is Mount Sharp, which is some 5.5 km (3.4 mi) high. Curiosity has now reached the Murray Buttes formation which will give access to the planned route up the lower reaches of Mount Sharp.

Here is a 360-degree Murray Buttes panorama taken using the Mastcam (mast camera). You can use your mouse – or mobile phone – to see the whole panorama. It includes “eroded mesas and buttes that are reminiscent of the U.S. Southwest.”

If there were ever any doubt, this certainly convinces me that I do NOT want to go to Mars. But I'm glad that Curiosity is there – I'm ok with being an armchair explorer.

Yesterday there were a new video on Live Leak with new images (just pictures) from Mars.

ESA ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter flight controllers are very busy today working on the final onboard command sequence for Schiaparelli (the Entry, Descent and Landing Demonstrator Module of the joint ESA/Roscosmos ExoMars 2016 mission). Only 13 days to Schiaparelli separation and 16 days to arrival at Mars.

How the landing is supposed to work.

A picture of a crumbling layered butte courtesy of the Curiosity rover. An "ancient water-deposited layers in relatively dense -- but now dried-out and crumbling -- windblown sandstone tops the 15-meter tall structure. The rim of Gale crater is visible in the distance."

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS; Compilation & Processing : Kenneth Kremer, Marco Di Lorenzo

That is an amazing picture!

ESA's Schiaparelli entry, descent and landing module is due to land on Mars on October 19th.

Tweeted question: “There's a global dust storm forecast on Mars; Would such a storm compromise the safety of the lander?”

Answer: Nah, bring it on! Or in their words

Yet they wouldn't want loads of dust during the landing because there wouldn't be anything for the descent camera to photograph. Probably if a global dust storm appears, it will develop a few weeks after the landing.

SIX minutes to Mars!
Three days before arriving at Mars on 19 October, the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) will release its entry, descent and landing demonstrator, Schiaparelli , towards the Red Planet. This video covers the landing and orbital manoeuvres, including the use of aerobraking - which ESA is using for the first time at Mars.

NASA’s Opportunity rover explores Spirit Mound after descending down Marathon Valley, and looks out across the floor of vast Endeavour crater. This photo mosaic was assembled from raw images taken on Sol 4505 (25 Sept 2016) and colorized. (A Sol is a Martian day.)

Credit: NASA/JPL/Cornell/ Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo

Opportunity was expected to last 90 Sols on Mars, but has so far been there 50 times longer than that. And there's more to come. Another mission extension is sending the rover to "an ancient gully where life giving liquid water almost certainly once flowed on our solar systems most Earth-like planet."

WOW, it's like you are standing right there. What a photo.

So far mixed news for ESA's ExoMars mission.

The Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) was successfully inserted into its correct orbit. Unfortunately the fate of the Schiaparelli lander is still unknown. It was successfully tracked to just above its final destination when the signal was lost. They don't yet know whether the landing was successful or not.

Let's hope tomorrow brings more good news for the mission.

The latest news from ExoMars is pretty much that there isn't any. The orbiter is orbiting, which is good. But there's still no sign of the lander Schiaparelli which was supposed to land like this. All went well in the descent until the actual touchdown when the signal was lost.

Thierry Blancquaert, manager of the European Space Agency's Schiaparelli lander, said,

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has imaged Schiaparelli's landing site and it's most probable that the lander crashed and was destroyed. The dark patch and white spot magnified on the right of the photograph are likely the impact site and parachute

Data transmitted from the probe before it lost contact indicated that its descent systems did not work properly. Its parachute was jettisoned too early and its retrorockets, designed to slow the robot to a hover just above the surface, fired only for a few seconds. They should have operated for half a minute.

A sad outcome, but these things are always tricky.

Here is an unusual view of the Earth and the Moon.

What's unusual - and why it's in a thread about Mars - is that it's combined from two images acquired in November by the HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. (The brightness was adjusted separately for Earth and the moon to show details on both bodies.) The pictures were taken for calibration purposes.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona.

An image of the mouth of the mouth of Kasei Valles is color-coded. White and red represent the highest terrain and blue the lowest.

The Kasei Valles channel system extends around 3000 km from its source region in Echus Chasma – which lies east of the bulging volcanic region Tharsis and just north of the Valles Marineris canyon system – to its sink in the vast plains of Chryse Planitia.

Copyright ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Here is Arsia Mons, one of the largest shield volcanoes on Mars. It's located on the Tharsis plateau, whose elevation is twice that of the Tibetan Plateau on Earth. NASA reports that new research indicates that it


Image Credit: NASA/JPL/USGS (Viking 1 orbiter)

Fantastic! Every single pictures taken out of Earth always amaze me!

I'm sheepishly admitting that at first glance I thought I was looking at a picture of some sort of sea creature. However it is, in fact, Hebes Chasma on Mars. It's an enclosed trough with a flat-topped mesa in the center. "It's nearly 8 km deep and stretches "315 km in an east–west direction and 125 km from north to south at its widest point."

It's a mosaic made up of eight single images that were taken with the High Resolution Stereo Camera on ESA's Mars Express orbiter.

Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum), CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Looks like crystals.

Fascinating!

Here's an image that looks as though it could have been taken on Earth. But NASA's Curiosity rover took it on Mars in 2014.

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

It is like this was taken on Earth!

What created this unusual hole in Mars/, Astronomy Picture of the Day asks.

Image Credit: NASA, MRO, HiRISE, JPL, U. Arizona

Here is a splendid picture of Vera Rubin ridge on Mars. Breathtaking panorama and if you click to enlarge, amazing detail. It's hard to believe that it's another world.

Looks like our desert.

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover examined a mudstone outcrop area called 'Pahrump Hills' on lower Mount Sharp, in 2014 and 2015. Blue dots indicate where drilled samples of powdered rock were collected for analysis.

Scientists learned a good deal about past Martian environments here. For example, in the "Confidence Hills" and "Mojave 2" samples, they found clay minerals. These generally form in the presence of liquid water with a near-neutral pH, and therefore suggest past environments that were conducive to life. However the other mineral discovered here was jarosite, a salt that forms in acidic solutions. The jarosite indicates that there were acidic fluids at some point in time in this region.

One of Curiosity's navcams took the picture of Curiosity Leaving Tracks in the Martian Sand. The rover is headed back to the path leading to the Vera Rubin Ridge access ramp. Each wheel track is 40 cm wide.

Credit: NASA/JPL-CalTech

Mona, I wonder if making changes like that on the surface cause climate change or other changes?

Mars is not likely to be much disturbed by the rovers.

As of yesterday, Curiosity had driven 18,786 meters since arriving on Mars in August 2012. That's less than 19 km (about five and half miles). So any effects would be limited to a pretty small area over nearly five years.

In addition, the rover's tire marks are very shallow. Think of an earthly equivalent and it could only affect perhaps plants or animals or vulnerable surfaces - but again over a very small area.

This is not a picture of Mars looking like Earth. It's more of a picture of Earth that might make you think of Mars. It's the Danakil Depression, one of the hottest and most hostile places on earth. It exists where three tectonic plates come together in northeastern Ethiopia - an other-worldly and sunken plain. The heat quivers here. Rock formations are colored by minerals in oozing volcanic psychedelia. Not much can survive in Danakil. The average year-round temperature is 34.4 degrees Celsius and the area gets about 100 mm of rain per annum.

The extreme environment makes it a good place to see what things are like in such hostile conditions. (I wouldn't want to be one of those doing fieldwork there!)

[credit: Chris Giles, for CNN]

Young volcanoes in the Coprates Chasma region of Mars’s enormous Valles Marineris canyon system have been imaged by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. When geologists talk about young, they mean mere millions of years old - in this case 200-400 millions of years old. Since most of the Martian volcanic activity took place a few billion years ago, I guess millions is young.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

Now here's something quite cool. A stereo view of the valleys of Coprates Chasma. It was created using stereo image data from a camera on board the European Space Agency’s (ESO) Mars Express spacecraft.

Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC-BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Feast your eyes on this panorama made from images Curiosity's mast cam took. It shows the last rays of the Sun on the hills of Mt Sharp. (The colors were adjusted for a more natural look.)

Credit image: NASA/JPL-Caltech. Image processing: Thomas Appéré

Everybody takes selfies - even the Mars Curiosity rover that took its own selfie in mid-2015. It wasn't just one snap, but another of smaller images that were combined to make one detailed image. It was taken in front of the light-colored peak of Mt Sharp, dark layered rocks and rusting red sand. (There's even a small rock stuck in one of Curiosity's wheels.)

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS

The rover Curiosity, which has been on Mars since August 2012, took a selfie at the south rim of Vera Rubin Ridge on January 23 this year. It isn't, of course, one selfie, but a mosaic of a number of images taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager. (Frames containing the imager's arm were edited out.) The background panorama was taken the previous month by the Rover's Mastcam. Distant Mount Sharp is obscured by the ChemCam at the top of the mast housing.

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS - Panorama: Andrew Bodrov
Commentary adapted from: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)

Have you seen this reference to Mars? That's an interesting way of looking at it. There have been times when the Venus would have qualified - but only briefly, because nothing lasts for long on Venus.

On January 25, 2004 (UTC time) the Opportunity rover landed on Mars to carry out a mission that was expected to last for about three months. More precisely, the aim was for 90 sols, a sol being one Martian day. A day on Mars is about forty longer than an Earth day. NASA didn't think that it's solar-powered rover would survive a Martian winter. But it did, and followed it up by surviving several more. The rover is still hard at work, currently investigating the processes that shaped the Perserverance Valley outcrop.

Amusing story from space.com by Jeanna Bryner, LiveScience Managing Editor | March 22, 2018

Astronomer Peter Dunsby just made a groundbreaking discovery, after noticing a very bright "star" pop up in his field of view at an observatory at the University of Cape Town that was not present two weeks prior.

Too bad Dunsby was perhaps thousands of years late … the bright object was the planet Mars.

Before realizing his marvelous mistake, Dunsby posted a note on the Astronomer's Telegram, a publication for very short reports by astronomers, detailing his observations, in which he described the bright object had shown up between the Lagoon and Trifid nebulas, both nestled in the constellation Sagittarius.

About 40 minutres later, the Telegram issued a correction: "The object reported in ATel 11448 has been identified as Mars. Our sincere apologies for the earlier report and the inconvenience caused."

And, not to let Dunsby go quietly into the night, the Telegram also sent out a cheeky tweet: "For Discovery of Mars. Congratulations, Prof. Peter Dunsby!"

What's that bright red spot between the Lagoon and Trifid Nebulas? Mars. This gorgeous color deep-sky photograph captured the red planet passing between the two notable nebulas -- cataloged by the 18th century cosmic registrar Charles Messier as M8 and M20. M20 (upper right of center), the Trifid Nebula, presents a striking contrast in red/blue colors and dark dust lanes. Across the bottom right is the expansive, alluring red glow of M8, the Lagoon Nebula. Both nebulae are a few thousand light-years distant. By comparison, temporarily situated between them both, is the dominant "local" celestial beacon Mars. Taken last week, the red planet was only about 10 light-minutes away.

Image Credit & Copyright: Sebastian Voltmer
Text: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)

Kevin Gill processes NASA data. NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mapped out craters on Mars. Gill used the data to create a 3D image of this Martian crater. Wow!

The Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover captured this view of "Vera Rubin Ridge" about two weeks before the rover started ascending this steep ridge on lower Mount Sharp. The view combines 13 images taken with the Mastcam's right-eye, telephoto-lens camera, on Aug. 19, 2017, during the 1,790th Martian day (sol) of Curiosity's work on Mars.

It shows details of the sedimentary rocks that make up the "Vera Rubin Ridge" located on the lower slopes of Mount Sharp (Aeolis Mons). They're characterized by the presence of hematite, an iron-oxide mineral. Scientists on the mission are using such images to determine the ancient environment these rocks were deposited in.

The panorama has been white-balanced so that the colors of the rock materials resemble how they would appear under daytime lighting conditions on Earth.

The ridge was informally named in early 2017 in memory of Vera Cooper Rubin (1928-2016), whose astronomical observations provided evidence for the existence of the universe's dark matter.

Mars Exploration Program

What has the HIRISE camera of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured here? These are polar dunes. The white areas show carbon dioxide frost. The frost has sublimated from the darker areas, i.e., gone from frozen to vapor without melting.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona.

Here is a gigapan of Gale Crater on Mars, by Curosity with some image processing by Neville Thompson. Wow!

Here is a map of the Tharsis region of Mars. It straddles the boundary between Mars’ southern highlands and northern lowlands.

And here is a picture of Tharsis region taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera aboard Mars Express last October.

On 10 June 2006, ESA's Mars Express took this image of mysterious ridges at the mouth of the Tiu Valles channel system on Mars.

Visible in the lower part of the image are remnants of a once 'streamlined' island.

The upper part of the scene covers the mouth of the Tiu Valles nearly in its entire width, approximately 55 km. Its winding, meandering ridges, bound by depressions are eye-catching. The processes that formed these odd structures are unknown. Possibly, during flooding events, water or water-rich surface layers came in contact with lava from the surrounding areas, which then might have led to the formation of these mysterious ridges.

The Opportunity rover is being menaced by a growing dust storm. The map was produced by the Mars Color Imager (MARCI) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft. The blue dot indicates the approximate location of Opportunity. [Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS]

A June 12th report from NASA says that it seemed likely that

In 2001 Mars was engulfed in a planet-wide dust storm.

Text: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)

There's another big one brewing now on Mars.

Image Credit: J. Bell (ASU), M. Wolff (Space Science Inst.), Hubble Heritage Team (STScI / AURA), NASA