Unmanned NASA missions on July 2, 2009, showing a region in the lunar highlands south of Mare Nubium ("Sea of Clouds"). Launched on June 18, 2009, in conjunction with the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), as the vanguard of NASA's Lunar Precursor Robotic Program, this is the first United States mission to the Moon in over ten years. LRO and LCROSS are the first missions launched as part of the United States's Vision for Space Exploration program. Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is a NASA mission to land and operate a rover named "Curiosity" on the surface of Mars. It was launched
NASA Earth Science chemistry, ocean and land ecosystems. It was a NASA scientist, Dr. James Hansen, who first alerted the world to the dangers of global warming due to greenhouse gases emitted by human burning of fossil fuels. Earth Science research also provides the foundations of understanding for the search for extraterrestrial life through the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI), in which the focus is often on the extreme conditions for life to survive. NASA Earth Science NASA Earth Science, formerly called the NASA Earth Science Enterprise (ESE), formerly called Mission To Planet Earth (MTPE), is a NASA research program "to develop a scientific