lights as it utilizes the night time to recharge the batteries to drive and explore during the day thereby taking advantage of the day time. Since the temperatures at the landing site can vary from +30°C to −127°C the rover uses special fluid pumped through 60m of tubing to keep sensitive components at optimal temperatures. Two identical self-monitoring on-board rover computers, contain radiation hardened memory to tolerate the extreme radiation from space and safeguard the rover against power-off cycles. It has a total of 17 cameras and is equipped with significant telecommunication redundancy by several means. Curiosity communicates with Earth
directly at speeds up to 32 kbit per sec, but the bulk of the data transfer is relayed through the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Odyssey Orbiter. The rover is equipped with six 50cm diameter wheels in a rocker-bogie suspension system that also served as landing gear for the vehicle. Each wheel has cleats and is independently actuated and geared allowing the rover to roll over obstacles of about 65cm in height. Though it can travel up to 90m per hour its average speed is about 30m per hour. Curiosity is expected to traverse a minimum of 19km during its entire stay on Mars.
Part of the deck of NASA’s Curiosity rover on Mars, taken from one of the rover’s Navigation cameras looking toward the back left of the rover
This image shows the Curiosity rover landing and destinations scientists want to investigate.
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