Friday, April 11, 2025 at 12:15 pm

JILA Foothills Room

Kyle Webster, UCLA

"The History of Mars Missions Through the Lens of Magnetism"

Abstract:

Since the first attempted Mars mission in 1960 by the Soviet Union, there have been 49 Mars missions from eight space agencies. The history of Mars missions is checkered; there have been many successful Mars missions over the years, but also many failures. I will attempt to trace Martian mission history through the lens of magnetic field investigations and answer three main questions:

1. Why did it take 58 years after the first Mars mission to successfully land a magnetometer on the surface of Mars? 2. How has the investigation of Martian magnetism stacked up against other important Martian science objectives over the years? 3. How important is the study of Martian magnetism?

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