NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has ingested its first solid sample into an analytical instrument inside the rover, a capability at the core of the two-year mission.

The rover's Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument is analyzing this sample to determine what minerals it contains.

 › Latest Video: 'Mars Soil Sample Delivered'

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Expedition 33/34 NASA Flight Engineer Kevin Ford, Soyuz Commander Oleg Novitskiy and Flight Engineer Evgeny Tarelkin are scheduled to launch in their Soyuz TMA-06M spacecraft at 6:51 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, Oct. 23, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

NASA TV launch coverage will begin at 5:30 a.m., and include video of activities leading to the crew boarding its spacecraft.

A comprehensive study of hundreds of galaxies observed by the Keck telescopes in Hawaii and NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has revealed an unexpected pattern of change that extends back 8 billion years, or more than half the age of the universe.

Researchers say the distant blue galaxies they studied are gradually transforming into rotating disk galaxies like our own Milky Way.

Taking the guess work out of long-duration exploration is one of the benefits of the International Space Station. This orbiting laboratory serves as a test bed for technology and helps researchers understand how to prepare for extended trips in space.

Other benefits of this on-orbit testing include greater efficiency, design improvements to reduce equipment mass, and accelerated technology developments thanks to longer trial periods in microgravity.

On Oct. 15, NASA's Operation IceBridge resumed Antarctic survey flights. Over the next two days, IceBridge scientists carried out two more high priority land-ice flights, one over the Foundation Ice Stream and one over Thwaites Glacier. As earlier, plans to survey sea ice were put on temporary hold due to unfavorable weather conditions in the region.

 › Operation IceBridge Blog