NASA’s InSight spacecraft lands on red planet after six-month journey

Science Affairs Space

InSight, a NASA spacecraft designed to burrow beneath the surface of Mars has landed on the red after a six-month, 482 million-km journey.
It was NASA’s ninth attempt to land at Mars since the 1976 Viking probes. All but one of the previous U.S. touchdowns was successful. NASA last landed on Mars in 2012 with the Curiosity rover.

About InSight Mission:

InSight stands for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport
The aim of NASA’s InSight Mission is to gather information about Mars kind of like a thorough medical checkup. This will be the first time in the Red Planet’s formation where Mars’ interior will be studied to this level of detail.
The planet’s core, mantle and crust will be explored allowing scientists to find out more about the formation of the rocky planets in our Solar System and measure its’ tectonic activity.a
The InSight Lander is 5 ft 1 inch (1.56 m) wide and 19 feet 8 inches (6 m) long and weighs 794 pounds (360 kg) which is roughly the weight of about 5 people.

Instruments:

SEIS: A seismometer that can provide information on internal vibrations or Marsquakes occurring within the Red Planet. Depending on the material the vibrations propagate through will change the way the seismic waves travel which when detected can tell scientists what the materials are.
HP3: A heat probe that will burrow almost 16 feet (5 m) into Mars’ surface – the deepest to date. The probe will help scientists measure Mars’ temperature and work out whether Mars was formed from the same materials as Earth or not.
RISE: A radio wave instrument that can help scientists work out the size of Mars’ core as well as its composition by sending out a signal and seeing how it changes in frequency via the Doppler shift.
Instrument Deployment and Instrument Context Camera: The former being a camera that offers a 360-degree panoramic view of the Martian land in color. The latter being a camera that will take ‘fisheye’ field of view of the Lander’s workspace.

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