All that you need to know about the InSight mission:
- The InSight mission, short for "Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport," was NASA’s first attempt to explore Mars' deep interior.
- InSight was launched on May 5, 2018, from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, aboard an Atlas V rocket.
- The mission objective was to reveal how Mars formed and evolved over four billion years ago, offering insights into the formation of other rocky planets like Earth.
- InSight landed successfully on Mars on November 26, 2018, at Elysium Planitia, a flat and stable region suitable for its scientific objectives.
- The mission provided the first comprehensive data on Mars' seismic activity, confirming the presence of marsquakes and measuring the thickness of Mars' crust.
- Despite challenges, such as a persistent issue with the heat probe's inability to dig as deep as planned, the seismometer managed to detect over 1,300 marsquakes during its mission, including a major marsquake in May 2022, with a magnitude of 5.
- InSight also detected previously unexpected phenomena like strong magnetic pulses and rapid fluctuations in Mars' magnetic field at the landing site.
- Additionally, the mission had several key scientific instruments, including the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS), a highly sensitive seismometer, and the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3), designed to measure the planet's internal heat.
- Dust accumulation on InSight’s solar panels gradually reduced its power output, with the mission entering a low-power mode in mid-2022 to preserve energy.
- Despite attempts to clean the solar panels using wind and the robotic arm, the power levels continued to drop.
- On December 15, 2022, InSight lost contact with Earth, and NASA declared the mission over on December 21, 2022.
- InSight operated for over 4 years (1440 sols) on Mars, exceeding its initial planned mission timeline of two years.
- InSight contributed significantly to understanding Mars' interior, discovering that the planet's core is smaller and lighter than previously thought, and helping refine models of planetary formation.
- InSight's findings contributed to the understanding of planetary differentiation, the process by which planets form and develop distinct layers such as the core, mantle, and crust.
- The mission also provided a comparison between seismic data from Earth, the Moon, and Mars, offering new insights into planetary formation in the Solar System.
The data collected by InSight will continue to be studied by scientists for years, providing valuable information about the internal structure and activity of Mars.
