Mission to Mars.....

You may not know this but 6 months ago NASA launched a space probe, named InSight Mission, headed for Mars. As I type the landing is expected in 1hr 40mins. It's main function will be to study 'marsquakes' & it's inner core hopefully giving us a better understanding of why & when Mars lost it's electro-magnetic field.
It may be a bumpy landing as we're in Mar's dust storm season.
More about the mission; https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/mission/overview/

Details, countdown & watch the landing; https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/

I saw a bit of that earlier today. 50 years on from first watching NASA at work, it still amazes me.

I've been interested in real Mars science since I was 11, when Viking I and II landed on its surface. That interest has never faded and I watched the InSight landing live on the BBC last night and seeing that first surface photo was just great.

Mars is currently residing low near the southern horizon here and I've been gazing at it for the past few weeks from my bedroom window.

Another cool thing is that my name, along with nearly 2.5 million others, is on a data file on Mars now.

Back in the late-70's the chairman of my department (Pathology) was dabbling in the first proof-of-concept tele pathology systems with robotic microscope stages and the original high-resolution imaging (SONY's money and technology). He processed images and read slides from the mid-Pacific and the Saudi desert.

Back then he was consulting with NASA to provide the telemedicine package on the first manned Mars mission. That was 40 years ago...

The lag between Chicago and the Arabian Peninsula was noticeable; Earth to Mars is another thing altogether.