Holden Crater

The two main parts of the ChemCam laser instrument for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission are shown in this combined image.

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has clocked more than a decade of service at the Red Planet and has yielded scientific discoveries and magnificent views of a distant world. These images taken by...

A NASA Mars Science Laboratory test rover called the Vehicle System Test Bed, or VSTB, serves as the closest double for Curiosity in evaluations of the mission's hardware and software.

The Mars Science Laboratory mission team prepares for entry, descent and landing at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Space Flight Operations Facility in Pasadena, Calif., as Curiosity is hours from l...

A view from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on April 8, 2015, catches sight of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover passing through a valley called "Artist's Drive" on the lower slope of Mount Sharp.

On Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the 197-foot-tall United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket rolls to the launch pad at Space Launch Complex 41.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover captured this view of a sulfate-bearing region using its Mastcam on May 2, 2022, the 3,462nd Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Dark boulders seen near the center are ...

This view of grains from a sand dune near Christmas Lake, Ore., was taken by a testing twin of the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory.

This May 11, 2016, self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows the vehicle at the "Okoruso" drilling site on lower Mount Sharp's "Naukluft Plateau." The scene is a mosaic of multiple images...

This global map of Mars was acquired on Aug. 2, 2012, by the Mars Color Imager instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

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...

In the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, sections of an Atlas V rocket payload fairing engulf NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) as they close in aro...

This view of the twilight sky and Martian horizon taken by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover includes Earth as the brightest point of light in the night sky

This sped-up movie from the Curiosity rover shows Phobos (the larger of Mars' two moons) passing in front of smaller Deimos. (No audio)

Mars Science Laboratory team member Jessica Samuels gives a progress report on Curiosity's first days on Mars.

This image from NASA's Curiosity rover shows the great diversity of grains found on the surface of a Martian rock.

This view from the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on the arm of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows a combination of dark and light material within a mineral vein at a site called "Garden City" on low...

This look back at a dune that NASA's Curiosity Mars rover drove across was taken by the rover's Mast Camera (Mastcam) during the 538th Martian day, or sol, of Curiosity's work on Mars (Feb. 9, 2014).

This image shows inclined beds characteristic of delta deposits where a stream entered a lake, but at a higher elevation and farther south than other delta deposits north of Mount Sharp. This sugge...

This map shows the route driven by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover (blue line) and locations where the rover's ChemCam instrument detected the element boron (dots, colored by abundance of boron accordi...

A section of the Mars Science Laboratory's Gale Crater landing site is shown, with a representative path from the landing location toward the layered mound to the south.

The sand dunes on Earth sometimes resemble those on Mars. However, Martian dunes are many times larger than those we see on Earth. This image shows engineers seeking out the best place to test dr...

This computer-generated view based on multiple orbital observations shows Mars' Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft northwest of the crater.

This photograph of the NASA Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, was taken during testing on June 3, 2011. The location is inside the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at NASA's Jet Propulsion Labo...

Engineers test the rover’s driving skills on soft sand ripples in this latest desert-driving trip on June 5, 2014, in the Dumont Dunes in California's Mojave Desert, near Death Valley.