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NASA Phoenix Mission to Mars: An Out-Of-This-World Content Management Challenge

When NASA's Phoenix Mars lander touches down and begins a historic mission on May 25, the images and video promise to be spectacular. Behind the scenes, an IT team must manage all that content: Here's an inside look at their mission, strategies and tools, from content management to hardware hosting.

By Laurianne McLaughlin

May 22, 2008 — CIO — On May 25, NASA's Phoenix Mars lander will enter the Martian atmosphere at nearly 13,000 miles per hour, complete a complex seven-minute series of events, then land on the red planet to begin a three-month mission to explore Martian soil and ice. Some 500,000 people are expected to watch this on the Web: Few of those people will be more interested than Jeanne Holm, chief knowledge architect for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and one of the IT leaders responsible for making sure all the images and video from this high-profile mission get managed and delivered to NASA staffers and the public without a hitch.

A NASA Artist's rendition of the Phoenix Mars
Lander close to touchdown

Few IT pros will ever work on a project as high-profile as a Mars landing. For Holm, this is round two: She also managed content for NASA's JPL during the last Mars mission in 2004.

Holm and some of her colleagues gave us a look at the massive amount of data and effort it will take to accomplish their IT mission, as well as the tools and strategies they're using, from content management to hardware hosting.

By the way, unlike many enterprises today, NASA is not afraid to go Web 2.0. This Mars landing will also be broadcast in its own area on Second Life.

Millions of Viewers, One Big Question

This Mars mission seeks answers to some huge questions, the biggest being whether the Martian arctic can support life. To answer that, the mission will ask what the history of water is in the area, and how polar dynamics shape the climate of Mars, for example. The scientists will make use of gadgets far more innovative than Apple could imagine, the coolest of which may be a robotic arm built by JPL that will dig, scoop and grab soil and ice for analysis. (For a more complete description of the mission and the equipment and team involved, see this primer from the University of Arizona.)

A unique robotic scoop arm will work with
the lander to dig into Martian soil

The mission team includes scientists from the University of Arizona, NASA engineers from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and flight systems experts from Lockheed Martin Space Systems. Holm works on the content management part of the mission along with colleagues including Carla Bitter, education and public outreach manager for the mission for the University of Arizona, and Charles White, JPL's expert on virtual world technologies, who heads up the Second Life work.

 

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