SCIENCENVIRO : Curiosity Mars Rover

On Saturday, a car-sized rover named Curiosity rocketed off to Mars to seek further clues to that tantalising question — is there life out there?
Mariner spacecraft that flew past and orbited Earth's neighbour as well as the two Viking landers that touched down on its surface in 1976 sent back images of a cold, bleak, and barren land, with a thin atmosphere that was mostly carbon dioxide and no signs of life.
However, missions to the planet since the 1990s have raised exciting possibilities that scientists are eager to explore. There are indications that Mars was once a wetter, perhaps even warmer, place. Water may have flowed on its surface and could still exist below the surface.
Curiosity, NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, is expected to complete its 567-million-kilometre journey to the Red Planet in August 2012.
six-wheeled rover on the floor of the large Gale crater.
its task will be to find out if conditions favourable for life existed on the planet. It will seek additional evidence of water and how the Martian climate might have changed over time.
The rover will also look for organic molecules, a further sign that life could have arisen there. It will examine whether the traces of methane found in the atmosphere could have a biological origin.
what scientists would really like is a mission to bring back Martian soil and rock samples for detailed analysis in the lab.