Monday 8th October Sol 62

The first of our scoops is going well with the soil vibrated in the scoop to remove any excess.  As part of the planned characterisation of the scoop area, the instrument team has identified and is double checking a tiny object to the side of the scooped area.  Its origin and significance are not certain yet. 

There is a video of the scooping process here:

http://1.usa.gov/RaFPcm

As the soil scoops progress  I have time to do some spreadsheet work comparing our analyses to martian meteorite and previous lander results.

I am also reading Charles Darwin’s work ‘Volcanic Islands’ about igneous rocks he studied during his voyage on HMS Beagle around South America in the mid 1830s. Igneous rocks were one of his early interests and although best known for his theory of evolution through natural selection he also had some important insights into the origin of basalts through deep melting and crystal growth deep within the Earth.  Darwin was interested in uniformitarianism – that is the idea that the processes like basaltic volcanism which shape the surface of today’s Earth have operated throughout its history (‘the present is the key to the past’).  I think Darwin would have been at home in planetary science with a mission like MSL, comparing the composition of the Jake_ Matijevic sample in Gale to the processes that have shaped the Earth.  In MSL we use the insights of Darwin and his contemporaries to help piece together the origin of Mars.