Description
This wine barrel-size chamber at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California is used to simulate the temperatures and air pressure of other planets – in this case, the carbon dioxide ice found on the southern hemisphere of Mars. The experiment shown here simulated how Martian spider-like formations called araneiform terrain are created.
Called the Dirty Under-vacuum Simulation Testbed for Icy Environments, or DUSTIE, the chamber was used to test a prototype of a rasping tool designed for NASA's Phoenix lander, which touched down on Mars' northern hemisphere in 2008.
