By Laszlo P. Kestay, R. Greg Vaughan, Lisa R. Gaddis, Kenneth E. Herkenhoff and Justin J. Hagerty, U.S. Geological Survey
A self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity rover, taken with the Mars Hand Lens Imager on its robotic arm, October 31, 2012. NASA/JPL-Caltech/Malin Space Science Systems (PIA16468).
How it began
| Year | |
|---|---|
| 1960 | Eugene Shoemaker and a small team found the field of astrogeology, to develop tools and methods for astronauts studying the geology of the Moon and other planetary bodies |
| 1962 | the USGS Branch of Astrogeology is established in Menlo Park, California |
| 1963 | it moves to Flagstaff, Arizona, near the young lava flows of the San Francisco Volcanic Field and Meteor Crater — the best-preserved impact crater in the world. These were good stand-ins for the Moon, for research and astronaut training |
From Flagstaff, the USGS has supported NASA's space program with science and mapping for more than 50 years.
Eugene Shoemaker training astronauts at Meteor Crater, Arizona, May 1967. USGS.
Apollo
In its early years, the branch gave Apollo mission planners critical scientific and cartographic information. Shoemaker made geology a major focus of the missions, and the USGS was at the heart of teaching astronauts to see the Moon through a geologist's eyes. The only geoscientist to walk on the Moon so far, Harrison "Jack" Schmitt, came from the USGS Branch of Astrogeology.
Harrison "Jack" Schmitt on the Moon during Apollo 17, December 13, 1972. NASA (AS17-140-21496).
What it does now
Now the Astrogeology Science Center, it supports U.S. and international robotic missions across the solar system — to Mercury, Venus, the Moon, Mars, asteroids, Jupiter and its moons, Saturn and its moons, Pluto and the Kuiper Belt.
- Earth too: its scientists use satellite and aircraft remote sensing, with fieldwork, to study natural hazards, possible resources, and features on Earth that resemble those on other worlds.
- Missions: scientific expertise, instrument design, spacecraft operations, software, cartography, photogrammetry, and access to mission data archives. Its scientists advise NASA on where missions should go and which instruments they should carry.
- Maps: it leads NASA's planetary geologic mapping program — setting standards, tracking national digital mapping of the planets, and producing geologic and topographic maps of possible landing sites. USGS maps are widely considered the highest quality.
The Geologic Map of Mars, published in 2014 (USGS Scientific Investigations Map 3292). USGS.
- Driving cameras: staff help operate cameras on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Mars Exploration Rovers (Spirit and Opportunity), Curiosity, and missions to asteroids — analyzing new data, choosing sites, and writing the commands that point the cameras.
Curiosity's tracks on Mars. NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS.
- Software: its Integrated Software for Imagers and Spectrometers (ISIS) is the leading free software for mapping images from NASA spacecraft onto the surfaces of planets and moons — an essential step in turning data into knowledge.
- Names: its planetary nomenclature project handles requests to name features through the International Astronomical Union, keeps the database of approved names of features, satellites and rings, and publishes them in the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature.
- Archives: it hosts the Cartography and Imaging Sciences node of NASA's Planetary Data System and a node of NASA's Regional Planetary Image Facility network — about 1 petabyte of storage, two large compute clusters, web services, and more than 100,000 printed lunar and planetary images and maps, with a library, artifacts, and an archive of the center's own history.
Sunrise over the central peak of Tycho Crater, from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera, June 10, 2011. NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Arizona State University.
Funding
More than 95 percent of the center's funding comes from NASA, through agreements that never last more than 5 years. So it must keep showing that it meets NASA's current needs and gives good value — and its lasting place in the exploration of the solar system is a credit to generations of its staff.
Vision: a national resource that brings together planetary geoscience, cartography and remote sensing, to support the continued exploration of the solar system for humankind.
Contact: USGS Astrogeology Science Center, 2255 N. Gemini Dr., Flagstaff, AZ 86001 — astrogeology.usgs.gov.
Sources
Based on The U.S. Geological Survey Astrogeology Science Center, by Laszlo P. Kestay, R. Greg Vaughan, Lisa R. Gaddis, Kenneth E. Herkenhoff and Justin J. Hagerty, USGS Fact Sheet 2017–3038, U.S. Geological Survey; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The opening history and the six images, with their credits, are taken from the fact sheet's PDF, which the import had left out.
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from pubs.usgs.gov
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