What Happened to Mars? A Planetary Mystery

Billions of years ago when the planets of our solar system were still young, Mars was a very different world.  Liquid water flowed in long rivers that emptied into lakes and shallow seas. A thick atmosphere blanketed the planet and kept it warm. In this cozy environment, living microbes might have found a home, starting Mars down the path toward becoming a second life-filled planet next door to our own.

But that's not how things turned out.

Today, Mars is bitter cold and desiccated. The planet's thin, wispy atmosphere provides scant cover for a surface marked by dry riverbeds and empty lakes. If Martian microbes still exist, they're probably eking out a meager existence somewhere beneath the dusty Martian soil.
What happened? This haunting question has long puzzled scientists. To find the answer, NASA is sending a new orbiter to Mars called MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution).

MAVEN will launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, during a 20-day period that begins on November 18, 2013. The trip to Mars takes 10 months, and MAVEN will go into orbit around Mars in September 2014. It will take 5 weeks for the spacecraft to get into its final science-mapping orbit, test
the instruments, and test science mapping sequences. After this commissioning phase, MAVEN has a 1-Earth-year primary mission during which it will make its key measurements.

Check out the latest NASA ScienceCast... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etL2ZhqGNCs