Find a Missing Mars Lander!

Wondering what to do with all that free time you have? NASA scientists are hoping to enlist volunteers to comb through high-resolution images of Mars to locate whatever remains of Mars Polar Lander.

Pros: If you find it, you'll be the first to spot the craft since it likely crash-landed during the final phase of its descent on December 3, 1999. NASA, no doubt, will give you a Certificate of Appreciation, suitable for framing.

Cons:You'd be hunting through 18 enormous images that typically contain 1.6 billion pixels each. If your computer monitor has a 1,280-by-1,024 display, roughly 131,000 pixels, you'll be scanning more than 1,200 screens of bleak Martian terrain — per image.

More cons: Scientists don't exactly know what to tell you to look for. If the spacecraft landed more or less intact, it should stand out from the smooth terrain around it as a bright-and-dark smudge of pixels. Worst case, there could be a few tiny smudges here and there … or a small crater. Or you could look for the craft's outer shell and parachute.

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