The northern border of Nepal is the Himalayas, including Mt. Everest and other 8,000-meter-class peaks. You can see part of the white Himalayas covered by snow and ice at the upper part of the image. Most climbers of the Himalayas approach from the Nepal side and set their base at Kathmandu. The Langtang Valley, a popular trekking course, is located 50 kilometers north of Kathmandu.

This is one of the things that came out during LPSC last week and all I could do at the time was Tweet it, which doesn't serve most of my readers, I realize. So here it is in blog form: the most unbelievably spectacular 3D animation of a bit of Mars I've seen yet, produced by Adrian Lark. The flight takes us through part of Candor Chasma, one of the largest sub-canyons in the Valles Marineris complex. I've embedded it here at low definition; ....

The ice at the planet's north pole may be moving on a bed of salty sludge, which one day could be handy for fuel.

The Goddard Space Flight Center has a Flickr account showcasing a series of images of our own home planet. Called "Blue Marble," these spectacular images are the most detailed true-color image of the entire Earth to date. Using a collection of satellite-based observations, scientists and visualizers stitched together months of observations in 2001 of the land surface, oceans, sea ice, and clouds into a seamless, true-color mosaic of every square kilometer (.386 square mile) of our planet . Your tax dollars at work, these images are freely available to educators, scientists, museums, and the public. This record includes preview images and links to full resolution versions up to 21,600 pixels across.

Mosaic of microscopic images of Spirit underbelly on Sol 1925 (June 2009) showing the predicament of being stuck at Troy with wheels buried in the sulfate-rich martian soil. The sulfate deposits formed by aqueous (water-related) processes when this area dubbed “Home Plate’ was volcanically active. This false color mosaic has been enhanced and stretched to bring out additional details about the surrounding terrain and embedded wheels and distinctly show a pointy rock perhaps in contact with the underbelly. Spirit fortuitously discovered extensive new evidence for an environment of flowing liquid water at this location on Mars adjacent to ‘Home Plate’, an eroded over volcanic feature. Credit: Marco Di Lorenzo, Ken Kremer - NASA/JPL/Cornell

The plucky Mars rover ‘Spirit’ may yet rove again !

Yes, I'm totally not kidding, that is the headline in the Sun: "'Gorilla' seen in Nasa Snap from Mars." The article goes on to quote a Mr. Nigel Cooper, "who has studied thousands of photos taken by Nasa rovers and posted online" as saying that "It's definitely a creature of some sort." Riiiiight. You and I both know this is just silly. But there are lots of people out there who do not, so I am grateful for the efforts of Mr. Doug Ellison to ....

As expected, NASA’s February 2010 listening campaign for the Phoenix Mars Lander has failed to detect any signals emanating from the long silent vehicle. NASA’s attempts to reestablish contact with Phoenix were restarted in January 2010 and timed to coincide with the onset of springtime and disappearance of ice at her location in the martian north polar regions. In theory, the return of abundant sunshine striking the twin energy producing solar arrays could again power up the science lander sufficiently to revive itself and ‘phone home’ to Earth.

Microbes similar to those on Earth would have a tough time surviving the harsh environment of Mars, but it is not inconceivable that they could persist there given a little protection, according to a new study. The finding supports similar, previous work and lends credence to the theory that if microbial life ever arose on Mars, it could exist below the planet's surface to this day.

The good news, the Milky Way could be abundant in intelligent life forms. The bad news, we may never hear from them. At last week’s meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in San Diego, California ...

[This article discusses the "inhumanity" of imprisoning cetaceans in miniscule enclosures driving them to madness - a view I agree with completely and passionately, it is a sad expression of our contempt for other intelligent life.]

Remember the amazing image of an avalanche on Mars back in 2008, captured by the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter? Bernhard Braun from UnmannedSpaceflight.com has now created several different 3-D views of the event, providing never-seen-before, ground-level observations by using special software he developed that can create three dimensional images from one 2-dimensional picture. Normally, to create a 3-D image you need at least two images, or you have to combine images with data from an instrument such as a laser altimeter. But Braun's single-image photoclinometric 3D reconstruction algorithm, also known as "shape from shading" allows the shape of three dimensional objects to be recovered from shading in a two-dimensional image. Braun told Universe Today that since developing the software, one of the areas he has wanted to "visit from the ground" is the famous dust avalanche caught live in action by HiRISE. His images provide an entirely new — and stunning — view of Mars.

Science editor Alan Boyle's Weblog: Fifty years after NASA began grappling with the idea of life beyond Earth, it's in the midst of planning missions to bring potential traces of Martian life back to Earth ... again.

This image lies on the eastern edge of a candidate landing site in the northeastern part of Syrtis Major, a huge shield volcano, and near the northwestern rim of Isidis Planitia, a giant impact basin. This region exposes Early Noachian bedrock, more than 4 billion years old, and contains a diversity of hydrated minerals. This would be an excellent place to explore early Mars, when the environment may have been conducive to life. HiRISE images will aid geologic interpretations and help determine if this spot is sufficiently safe for landing--not too many boulders or steep slopes. If it is sufficiently safe, it may be considered for the 2011 Mars Science Laboratory or the 2018 rovers from Europe and the USA.

Mars - January 13 to February 17, 2010 by Efrain Morales Rivera Date: 01/13/10 to 02/17/10  Location: Aguadilla, Puerto Rico

Equipment: LX200ACF 12 in. OTA, CGE mount, DMK21AF04 Ccd, TeleVue 3x barlows, Astronomik LRGB filter set.

This is a composition of images taken (Parcial) from January 13th upto February 17th, 2010. Consisting when the planet was closest to Earth (Jan.27th) and to the Sun (Jan.29th) and a visible storm at the North Polar Hood region (Feb.2nd).

NASA's long-lived Mars rovers share tales of their journeys via data turned into audio files.

Bangalore, India (PTI) Feb 23, 2010 - The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) plans to send two astronauts to space within six to seven years, ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan said.

A dramatic 3D Mars view based on terrain modeling from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter data shows "highs and lows" of Mojave Crater.

As shuttle Endeavour coasted through Central Florida’s balmy skies last night, what may become the astronauts’ next ride to space was poised on a launch pad a few miles away.

Over the weekend, Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, hoisted its first Falcon 9 rocket at a new launch complex just south of the Kennedy Space Center, where Endeavour touched down

Huntsville AL (SPX) Feb 22, 2010 - Last week, on Feb. 11th, the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) lifted off from Cape Canaveral on a five-year mission to study the sun. Researchers have called the advanced spacecraft the "crown jewel" of NASA's heliophysics fleet. SDO will beam back IMAX-quality images of solar explosions and peer beneath the stellar surface to see the sun's magnetic dynamo in action. (Video is not embedded, you can download and view it.)