NASA’s latest mission on the Red Planet ended after five months of rigorous studies and amazing discoveries. The Phoenix Lander ceased all communications with Earth on November 2, as tougher weather conditions and less sunlight forced it to enter decline. The mission specialists will continue to monitor the mission, in case Phoenix might be able to respond, although that is quite unlikely to happen.

Over the past weeks, the NASA engineers in charge of the Phoenix mission have witnessed increasingly difficult conditions, which forced the Mars lander to enter safe mode and stop communicating with base for longer periods of time. This was not unexpected, considering the mission had already entered its 5th month of exploration.

“This is a precarious time for Phoenix,” Phoenix Project Manager Barry Goldstein of JPL said at the end of last month. The Phoenix team was aware that the rover was already in its second extension-month, and that it might stop all activities in a matter of weeks. The engineers said at the time they were doing everything in their power to keep Phoenix alive, but its survivability depended on elements that were beyond their control, such as the weather and the temperatures on Mars.

The outcome was inevitable, but it’s reassuring to know that this mission in particular has been more than satisfactory for scientists. The Mars lander reached farther north than any other previous mission, and according to Phoenix Principal Investigator Peter Smith of the University of Arizona, Tucson, they “will be pulling more gems from this trove of data for years to come.”

Phoenix started its mission on May 25, 2008, and since then, it has constantly returned data that for many scientists was the confirmation of years of hard work. By the end of June, Phoenix had discovered chunks of bright material in the soil that were first believed to be salt deposits, but turned out to be water ice.

Soon after that, Phoenix’s MECA instrument which analyzed soil samples on Mars revealed that the soil was actually quite similar to the upper dry soils in Antarctica. Once inch into the surface layer, the soil proved to be very basic, with a pH of between 8 and 9.

One month later, Phoenix “touched and tasted water” in one of the soil samples analyzed: with the help of the Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer instrument onboard, Phoenix obtained water vapors after heating the samples.

Shortly after scientists got their hopes high for possibly confirming the theory of life on Mars, Phoenix revealed a troubling fact: the presence of perchlorate, a highly oxidizing substance that suggested an unfriendly environment for life forms.

The result provided by the instruments onboard proved exciting and contradictory at the same time: an initial MECA analysis suggested an Earth-like soil, but further analysis revealed un-Earth like elements in the Martian soil.

This got everyone wondering if this indeed meant the end of the Mars habitability theory. As the influence of perchlorate still remained unclear, scientists however pointed out some aspects that leave a door open for the life theory: although known to be toxic to human health in case of long exposure, perchlorate is an element that is naturally found on Earth, where it does not necessarily destroy organic material.

Just as it entered its 101 Martian day of mission, Phoenix reached another milestone, as it witnessed an unexpected phenomenon on Mars: snowfall. With the help of its weather instruments, the Mars lander detected snow 4 kilometers above its landing site; however, the snow did not reach the Mars lander as it evaporated before reaching the ground.

During its mission, Phoenix returned over 25,000 pictures, and precious information for further uncovering the mysteries of Mars. “Phoenix not only met the tremendous challenge of landing safely, it accomplished scientific investigations on 149 of its 152 Martian days as a result of dedicated work by a talented team,” Barry Goldstein said.