Nasa news conference after the Curiosity rover lands on Mars

Curiosity - also known as the Mars Science Laboratory - has spent the past eight months travelling from Earth to Mars, covering more than 560 million km.

It is equipped with the most sophisticated science payload ever sent to another world.

Its mission, when it gets on the ground, is to characterise the geology in Gale and examine its rocks for signs that ancient environments on Mars could have supported microbial life.