NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander reached out and touched the Martian soil for the first time on Saturday, May 31, the first step in a series of actions expected to bring soil and ice to the lander's experiments.

Camera on Phoenix Arm Looks Beneath NASA Mars Lander. A view of the ground underneath NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander adds to evidence that descent thrusters dispersed overlying soil and exposed a harder substrate that may be ice.

Space shuttle Discovery rocketed into space safely this evening to begin a 14-day mission to attach a new scientific module to the International Space Station. Launch came at 5:02 p.m. EDT from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida and set Discovery on a trajectory to intercept the space station in two days.

Scientists leading NASA's Phoenix Mars mission from the University of Arizona in Tucson sent commands to unstow its robotic arm and take more images of its landing site early today.

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter successfully received information from the Phoenix Mars Lander Tuesday evening and relayed the information to Earth. The relayed transmission included images and other data collected by Phoenix during the mission's second day after landing on Mars.

Phoenix Mars Explorer at 7:54 PM EST successfully landed on planet Mars. Touchdown signal is detected right now as we write this report. NASA reports that "A signal has been detected from Phoenix indicating that the lander is on the surface of Mars."

Phoenix Mars lander is set to make a touch down on Planet Mars at 7:53 PM EST, reports NASA.

The historically less-than-50 per cent odds of success loomed heavily as NASA scientists readied for today's landing of the 420-million-dollar Phoenix spacecraft near the frigid north pole of Planet Mars.

NASA gathers a tremendous amount of data on the environment that can be helpful in understanding lung disease. In a session at the ATS 2008 International Conference called “Observations From Space:

- NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander is preparing to end its long journey and begin a three-month mission to taste and sniff fistfuls of Martian soil and buried ice. The lander is scheduled to touch down on the Red Planet May 25.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Science Mission Directorate (SMD) plans to release for community comment a draft Announcement of Opportunity (AO) for the third New Frontiers mission (NF-3) in September 2008.

NASA is extending the international Cassini-Huygens mission by two years. The historic spacecraft's stunning discoveries and images have revolutionized our knowledge of Saturn and its moons. UK researchers have played key roles in the mission instruments and the scientific discoveries.