Software upgrade set to give Mars Rovers a new lease on life.

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The doughty Mars rovers will celebrate their third anniversary on the Red Planet with new software that will make them smarter and more independent. The upgrades with give Spirit and Opportunity improved navigation capabilities that will allow them to spot hazards and figure out how to avoid them without help from controllers on Earth, along with improved image processing capabilities that will help them search out dust devils and other weather patterns. Up until now when the rovers encountered obstacles all they could do was bach up and try a different direction, and sometimes they could not find a solution. John Callas, the project manager for the Mars Exploration Rovers at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif, said, "With this new capability, the rover could find its way through a maze." Some key discoveries by the rovers have shown us that there is water on Mars, and Opportunity found rock layers showing that wind blown dunes came and went while the water table fluctuated. As they begin their fourth tear of work, they have greatly outlived expectations, when they landed in June 2004, experts hoped that they would last through their planned mission of 90 Martian days, which are 37 minutes longer than Earth days. The rovers have taught us alot about the planet in the three years they've been woking, and with these new upgrades, hopefully they will last another three years and show us alot more