NASA's InSight Lander Will Probe Mars, Measure Its Quakes

For the first time since launching the Curiosity rover in 2011, NASA is sending a spacecraft to the surface of Mars. Surface missions are sexy missions: Everyone loves roving robots and panoramic imagery of other worlds. But the agency's latest interplanetary emissary won't be doing any traveling (it's a lander, not a rover). InSight--short for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport--will be the first mission to peer deep into Mars' interior, a sweeping geophysical investigation that will help scientists answer questions about the formation, evolution, and composition of the red planet and other rocky bodies in our solar system. The mission is scheduled to launch some time this month, with a window opening May 5. When the lander arrives at Mars on November 26 of this year, it will land a few degrees north of the equator in a broad, low-lying plain dubbed Elysium Planitia.