Robots on Mars
Students trace robotic exploration from the first Moon rovers to Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity, Perseverance and the Ingenuity helicopter, focusing on the engineering problem each one solved and what it revealed about Mars.
Grades 5-8About 15 minutes of narrated flight, plus discussion stops8 stops
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What students will see and do
Students fly from the Moon to Earth's control rooms and then across six Mars stops, one for each rover era and a final wrap-up. Aetherion pauses for discussion at the Moon (choosing one tool for a rover) and at Earth (driving with a long signal delay).
Learning objectives
- Explain why the radio signal delay between Earth and Mars requires rovers to plan and act autonomously.
- Compare the landing methods (airbags and sky crane) and power sources (solar and nuclear) used by Mars rovers, and give a reason for each choice.
- Describe at least two pieces of rover evidence that Mars once had liquid water.
- Apply the engineering cycle of design, test and improve to a rover problem such as wheel damage or dust on solar panels.
NGSS connections
| MS-ETS1-1 | Students identify criteria and constraints for a Mars robot: mass, power, temperature, landing and signal delay. |
|---|---|
| MS-ETS1-3 | Students analyze how each rover improved on the last, combining the best features of earlier designs. |
| MS-ESS1-3 | Students use rover data to describe Mars as a world with a cold, thin atmosphere today and evidence of a wetter past. |
Stops on this journey
- The First Rovers (discussion stop)
- Driving From Far Away (discussion stop)
- Sojourner Bounces In
- Spirit and Opportunity
- Curiosity and the Sky Crane
- Perseverance on the Hunt
- Ingenuity Takes Flight
- Lessons Written in the Dust
Vocabulary
- rover
- autonomy
- signal delay
- sky crane
- hematite
- delta
- solar panel
- radioisotope power