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It’s hard to see Mars from Maryland, but 100 local middle school students will learn how scientists from The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel plan to explore the Red Planet during Comcast-Discovery Space Academy: Mission Mars at APL on Friday, May 10, starting at 9:30 a.m.

The “Space Academy” series — sponsored by APL, Comcast Cable and The Discovery Channel — takes students behind the scenes of actual space missions and introduces them to engineers and scientists who conduct some of NASA’s most exciting projects. Mission Mars will focus on and the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (), a powerful camera APL is building to search for chemical traces of past water on the Martian surface. CRISM will fly aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft, set for launch in 2005.

The event is open to the media and offers several photo, video and interview opportunities — including a student press conference with space scientists and a tour of the Applied Physics Lab’s spacecraft design and testing facilities. , a division of , manages several missions and has built 60 spacecraft over the past four decades.