When you navigate with a compass you can orient yourself thanks to Earth's global magnetic field. But on Mars, if you were to walk around with a compass it would haphazardly point from one anomaly to another, because the Red Planet does not possess a global magnetosphere. Scientists think that this lack of a protective magnetic field may have allowed the solar wind to strip away the Martian atmosphere over billions of years, and now NASA'S MAVEN SPACECRAFT will study this process in detail with its pair of ring core fluxgate magnetometers. MAVEN's dual magnetometers will allow scientists to study the interaction between the solar wind and the Martian atmosphere, giving us a better understanding of how Mars has evolved from a warm, wet climate to the cold, arid one we see today.
The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) will launch aboard at Atlas V booster rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida on November 18, 2013. The launch window is between November 18, 2013 and December 7, 2013 with orbital insertion in the fall of 2014.
Reference: chupacabra-digest.blogspot.com
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