how sputtering works

Space Missions

Mars Lost Atmosphere to Space

NASA’s MAVEN mission has confirmed that the solar wind stripped the Red Planet of its atmosphere.

Mars in UV

Solar System

MAVEN’s Mars: in Ultraviolet

NASA’s youngest Mars orbiter has watched clouds grow and detected an ozone accumulation on the Red Planet.

Mars's atmospheric loss

Astrobiology

Mars Losing Gas to Solar Wind

NASA’s Mars orbiter MAVEN has painted a detailed picture of how the solar wind robs the Red Planet of its atmosphere.

MAVEN detects aurora

Solar System

MAVEN Spots Dust Cloud, Aurora on Mars

NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft has detected dust high in Mars’s atmosphere and auroras across the planet’s northern hemisphere.

Space Missions

MAVEN Finds New Particles, Ion Plume

NASA’s MAVEN mission has discovered a new population of particles in Mars’s upper atmosphere. It’s also found a plume of particles escaping from the planet’s poles, confirming atmospheric loss is happening today.

Solar System

MAVEN Makes It to Mars

On September 21st, after a 33-minute-long rocket firing, NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft slipped into orbit around the Red Planet.

Space Missions

MAVEN Heads to Mars

NASA's next orbiter has successfully launched and is en route to the Red Planet. When it arrives, it will pry into the secrets of Mars's climate, both past and present, and hopefully reveal how the cold, dry world lost most of its ancient atmosphere.