Meet MarCO: Engineer Tests CubeSats for Better Communication at Mars

Growing up, NASA-JPL engineer Farah Alibay didn't have a role model who was an engineer and a woman of color. Now, she hopes she can play that role for the next generation as Mars Cube One (MarCO) - a pair of experimental CubeSats - attempt to get to Mars and help the InSight lander communicate with Earth.

NASA MarCO is a flyby technology demonstration that, if successful, will provide NASA the ability to quickly transmit status information about the Mars InSight lander as it descends to the Red Planet in November 2018. While InSight won't rely on MarCO for communications, MarCO will blaze a trail for a class of miniature spacecraft called CubeSats.

Learn more about MarCO at: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/cubesat/missions/marco.php

Keep up with InSight at: https://mars.nasa.gov/insight