This product includes five classroom activities related to the discovery of water ice on Mars. In 2001, the Mars Odyssey spacecraft discovered significant amounts of water ice buried in the high latitude regions of Mars. This discovery, based upon data from the Mars Gamma Ray Spectrometer, helped motivate the development of the Mars Phoenix Lander mission, which arrived in the Martian arctic in 2008 ... Full description.

During the first of two landings in the Mars Exploration Rover mission, scientists and engineers were full of anticipation and anxiety the night that the rover 'Spirit' was due to land. Would the rover land safely and be able to complete its mission to find out about the geological history of the planet? This video segment shows the range of emotions experienced by NASA scientists and technicians ... Full description.

This set of classroom activities presents the challenges of operating a planetary rover, how to construct a scale model of the Earth-Moon system, how Martian surface core samples can be identified and what they tell us about Mars. Each activity comes with clearly delineated instructions, associated standards, guides and worksheets, and enhancement materials. Full description.

Water on Mars is a Windows to the Universe Exploratour and provides information and images about Mars' atmosphere, polar caps, Martian fog, clouds, Martian storms, possible rain, running water, outflow channels, river valley networks, tributaries, map of valleys and networks, lakes and floods, possible shorelines, Mars Pathfinder, Martian rocks, Mars cryosphere, and the water cycle. Windows to the ... Full description.

Since landing on Mars in January 2004, Spirit and Opportunity, the Mars Exploration Rovers, have helped scientists learn an amazing amount about the red planet. The sophisticated rovers far exceeded expectations with the geological clues they have dug up about the planet's past. In this video tour of the rover landing sites, the mission's principal science investigator, Steve Squyres, describes some ... Full description.

The Atmosphere of Mars is a Windows to the Universe Exploratour and provides information and images about composition of the Martian atmosphere, atmosphere layers, temperature, weather, clouds on Mars, clouds at the polar caps, fronts, temperature, storms on Mars, global wind, global dust storms, The Viking Mission, and the Mars Pathfinder. Windows to the Universe is a user-friendly learning system ... Full description.

The Surface of Mars is a Windows to the Universe Exploratour and provides information and images about different features found on the surface and the geography of the planet, continents on Mars, altimeters, Valles Marineris, Tharsis Ridge, craters, dune fields, polar caps, ice cliffs, volcanoes, Olympus Mons, water features, and soils on Mars. Windows to the Universe is a user-friendly learning system ... Full description.

Life on Earth is a Windows to the Universe Exploratour and provides information and images about life, kingdoms, heterotrophs, autotrophs, animals, fungi, plantae, monera, and evolution. Windows to the Universe is a user-friendly learning system pertaining to the Earth and Space sciences. The objective of this project is to develop an innovative and engaging web site that spans the Earth and Space ... Full description.

This activity uses an image of landslides and craters at the wall of Valles Marineris on Mars to teach students how the notion of superposition can help to determine the sequence of events in a planet's geologic history. Full description.

Earth provides a comfortable and temperate environment for a wide variety of living organisms. However, in the past few decades, scientists have discovered unusual life forms thriving in areas where the majority of living things on Earth could never survive, such as near deep sea vents, in dry deserts, or on frozen ice sheets. This video segment explores life forms that survive in extreme conditions ... Full description.