Spaceflight Insider
Theresa Cross
August 2nd, 2021
NASA’s InSight lander deployed its Wind and Thermal Shield on sol 66 — Feb. 2, 2019. The shield covers the lander’s seismometer, which was set down onto the Martian surface on Dec. 19, 2018. Over 2.5 years later, data from the seismometer have shown Mars’ center to be molten. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Using data collected by NASA’s Mars InSight lander, which has been on the red planet since 2018, researchers have confirmed the planet’s center to be molten.
This comes from three papers published in “Science” on July 22, 2021, that used data collected by InSight’s seismometer to provide details previously unknown about the composition of Mars’ crust, mantel and core, confirming the planet has a molten center, whereas Earth’s outer core is molten and its center is solid.