India became the FIRST country to reach Mars in its first attempt in 2014. India’s Mars Orbiter Mission, MOM has been collecting valuable data for more than a year as it revolves around Mars. Though MOM has been beaming pretty color pictures from Mars, it is only in the last week that the first science result has been accepted by the prestigious Geophysical Research Letters. MENCA (Martian Exospheric Neutral Composition Analyser), a quadrupole mass spectrometer has been successful in collecting valuable neutral composition species from 260-500 km altitude on Mars. MENCA is almost on the similar lines as that of CHACE (CHandra’s Altitudinal Composition Explorer) built by Dr. S.M. Ahmed and his team at VSSC, ISRO; presently here at University of Hyderabad (UoH) as Principal scientific Officer, Central Instruments Laboratory (CIL).
Dr. S.M. Ahmed got an invitation to write a blog by Planetary Science Society, USA, a powerful body which does not only a public outreach program across the globe; but also has great say as far as US congressmen in White house.
Please see the link:http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/2016/0225-menca-brings-divine-wealth.html