Phoenix Mars Lander Successfully Lands On Mars

The Phoenix Mars Lander has successfully touched down on the Martian surface. Quoted from the Phoenix Lander Blog, "Phoenix is now on the surface of Mars, much to the joy of everyone here in Mission Control. As icing on the cake, we've found that the lander is tilted only one quarter of a degree, which means we've landed nearly perfectly level."

The 'Seven Minutes of Terror' are over, so from here on out, it should be a lot easier and less stressful for the team at NASA. Hopefully there will be some awesome discoveries made.

Happy Birthday to the Laser

On May 16th, 1960, the first laser was demonstrated. Google has a neat little image today for the laser, so if you haven't seen that yet, check it out. Wired has a collection of cool pictures and information of some lasers and uses of them, and a little background on the laser as well.