The Mars Pathfinder Mission

Abstract

Mars Pathfinder, one of the first Discovery‐class missions (quick, low‐cost projects with focused science objectives), will land a single spacecraft with a microrover and several instruments on the surface of Mars in 1997. Pathfinder will be the first mission to use a rover, carrying a chemical analysis instrument, to characterize the rocks and soils in a landing area over hundreds of square meters on Mars, which will provide a calibration point or “ground truth” for orbital remote sensing observations. In addition to the rover, which also performs a number of technology experiments, Pathfinder carries three science instruments: a stereoscopic imager with spectral filters on an extendable mast, an alpha proton X ray spectrometer, and an atmospheric structure instrument/meteorology package. The instruments, the rover technology experiments, and the telemetry system will allow investigations of the surface morphology and geology at submeter to a hundred meters scale, the petrology and geochemistry of rocks and soils, the magnetic properties of dust, soil mechanics and properties, a variety of atmospheric investigations, and the rotational and orbital dynamics of Mars. Landing downstream from the mouth of a giant catastrophic outflow channel, Ares Vallis at 19.5°N, 32.8°W, offers the potential of identifying and analyzing a wide variety of crustal materials, from the ancient heavily cratered terrain, intermediate‐aged ridged plains, and reworked channel deposits, thus allowing first‐order scientific investigations of the early differentiation and evolution of the crust, the development of weathering products, and the early environments and conditions on Mars.