You can now explore Mars from Earth

WASHINGTON: NASA and Microsoft launched an interactive website on Tuesday that allows Web surfers to become Mars explorers.

The "Be a Martian" website (beamartian.jpl.nasa.gov) invites members of the public to help scientists perform such research tasks as improving maps of the red planet, the US space agency and US software giant said.

"We're at a point in history where everyone can be an explorer," Doug McCuistion, director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, said in a statement.