aster cowart

@TerraSabaea
314 Followers
157 Following
203 Posts

she/her | space doctor | mars bit witch | professional backseat driver | i ask rovers to take photos and stuff

postdoctoral research scientist, planetary science institute

cohost!https://cohost.org/TerraSabaea
Websitehttps://jccwrt.neocities.org/
Flickrhttps://www.flickr.com/photos/132160802@N06/
githubhttps://github.com/AsterAphelion
aster cowartJun 9, 2024
Since it's Pride Month I want to say how positive my life has been since it clicked that I'm trans. April 26, 2020 was basically a second birthday for me, and for the first time it felt like I had a future. My anxiety is way down and I feel more mentally resilient even despite the occasional bad encounter. The good by far outweighs the bad.
aster cowartMar 9, 2024
If you're attending #LPSC2024, I will be handing out a zine discussing trans issues! I have an initial print run of 40 copies available - keep an eye out on the swag table, for me, or my Tuesday evening poster in the Planetary Spatial Data Infrastructure section!
aster cowartFeb 14, 2024

I wasn't interviewed for this one, but here's an Ars Technica article about early volcanism and proto-plate tectonic activity in the Eridania region of Mars!

https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/02/mars-experienced-a-precursor-to-plate-tectonics/

Mars experienced a precursor to plate tectonics

Pervasive volcanoes and distinct rock types may hint at key geological processes.

Ars Technica
aster cowartFeb 12, 2024

I was interviewed for an article on a new paper in Nature Geoscience that I'm on! Come read about an exciting form of pre-plate tectonic landscape formation on Mars!

Article: https://www.space.com/mars-volcanically-active-4-billion-years-search-for-life

Open-Access Paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-023-02191-7

Life on Mars could have thrived near active volcanoes and an ancient mile-deep lake

"At the very least, these findings give us a larger number of places we can look for evidence of life."

Space
aster cowartJan 8, 2024
#LPSC2024 Haiku
As rover wheels turn, // MARDI sees the landscape pass. // Rocks crowd the window.
aster cowartDec 21, 2023
#Curiosity is currently pulling a big wheelie on #Mars, and the drive on Sol 4041 to get a wheel back on solid ground faulted out after moving only a short distance. MARDI is helping turn lemons into lemonade, as the limited motion provided just enough offset for a stereo image. Here's a red-blue anaglyph of the ground under the rover processed from the publicly available raw imaging.
aster cowartDec 16, 2023
Welp, partner just tested positive for COVID after coming back from AGU. Basically started getting chills not long after walking back through the door this afternoon. Since I really don't have anywhere to isolate in our apartment there's a good chance I'll be laid out with it too in the next couple days.
aster cowartDec 14, 2023
Started work on my abstract for #LPSC2024 today! I've been slowly mosaicking frames from the MARDI drive videos #Curiosity collected while exploring #MarkerBandValley. Once they're georeferenced, I hope they'll be of major use to scientists working to piece together the environmental transitions taking place on Mars when the Marker Band was deposited! Here's a roughly 4 m x 1 m segment of the drive performed on Sol 3648 (November 10, 2022).
aster cowartDec 11, 2023
One of my favorite photos from the MARDI Marker Band Valley campaign, taken on Sol 3648. We got beautiful lighting during this video sequence, and I really like how this still was framed. #MSL #Curiosity
aster cowartDec 11, 2023
MARDI Sol 3631 final mosaic size is 34803 x 102220 px 😅 A bit of a pain to work with in Photoshop, but worth it to see a 90 cm x 58 m strip of Martian terrain.