In February, NASA’s Perseverance rover touched down on Mars and went to work. The rover has seen the primary flight of a Martian robotic, gotten its drill bit soiled and begun traversing the ground of Jezero crater, considered the stays of an historic lake (SN: 4/30/21).
And what Perseverance is discovering isn’t precisely what scientists anticipated. “The crater flooring is tremendous attention-grabbing,” says planetary scientist Briony Horgan of Purdue College in West Lafayette, Ind., one of many mission’s long-term science planners. “We didn’t actually know what we have been stepping into from orbit.”
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Perseverance is getting views of monumental boulders that will have been transported by historic floods, superb rock layers that appear to be they settled in calm waters, and rocks with giant crystals that look volcanic. The rover’s touchdown website could embrace a volcanic lava move from way back, or indicators of an earlier episode of water — or one thing else.
“It’s not as apparent as we thought,” Horgan says. “No matter it’s, it’s cool.”
Listed below are among the picture highlights from the rover thus far.
Taking the lengthy view
Earlier than the rover landed, the Perseverance crew knew that Jezero crater appeared just like the dry basin of an historic lake, with a river delta flowing into it. The prospect of discovering preserved lake flooring sediments made the positioning good for looking for previous life, one of many mission’s main targets.
This image, taken March 17, is a mosaic of 5 photographs taken with Perseverance’s Distant Microscopic Imager digicam. The tilted layers of sedimentary rock (arrows) and different textures on this escarpment have been in all probability fashioned by interplay between an historic river and a lake.JPL-Caltech/NASA, LANL, CNES, CNRS, ASU, MSSS
Perseverance took this snapshot March 17 of a steep slope in part of Jezero’s delta, from greater than two kilometers away. The rover in all probability received’t attain that spot till someday subsequent 12 months. However already, the rover’s Distant Microscopic Imager digicam is uncovering particulars that might reveal new perception into the crater’s watery previous.
For instance, the tilted layers of sedimentary rock and cementlike mixtures of coarse sand and pebbles on this rock function, nicknamed “Delta Scarp,” affirm the delta’s moist historical past. There are additionally particular person giant boulders cemented into the entrance of the scarp, suggesting that the area noticed excessive floods, says Perseverance deputy mission scientist Katie Stack Morgan of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, Calif.
Nearer to dwelling
Even eroded outcrops near Perseverance’s touchdown website appear to be that they had a watery historical past. This picture of a remnant of a part of the delta rising out of the crater flooring was taken with Perseverance’s Mastcam-Z digicam February 22.
Perseverance’s Mastcam-Z digicam took this picture (proven in false shade) February 22 of a comparatively close by escarpment, which in all probability preserves historic lake sediments. Click on to enlargeJim Bell/ASU, Mastcam-Z
“Many people anticipated these outcrops to be fairly uninteresting, based mostly on orbital knowledge,” Stack Morgan says. However photographs from the bottom confirmed lovely layers, identical to what you’ll discover in a deep lake deposit.
“We weren’t anticipating to search out them right here, however possibly they’re proper subsequent door to our touchdown website,” she says. These outcrops may very well be remnants of the sting of the lake that used to fill Jezero crater or may symbolize a good older lake that was changed.
Even nearer
Perseverance is taking close-ups of the rocks round it too. This picture of a rock nicknamed “Foux” was taken July 11 utilizing the WATSON digicam on the top of the rover’s robotic arm. The world within the picture is barely about 4 centimeters by 3 centimeters.
This close-up picture was taken with Perseverance’s WATSON digicam, a part of the SHERLOC instrument on the rover’s robotic arm. It exhibits textured rocks with an attention-grabbing coating which may point out interplay with water. JPL-Caltech/NASA, MSSS
The textures on this picture are fascinating, as are the “loopy pink coatings” which can be extra purple than typical Mars mud, Horgan says. “What rocks are these?” The coatings in all probability suggest alteration by water, and the purple shade means that they comprise some iron, she provides.
Volcanic grains?
Perseverance has additionally discovered proof of igneous or volcanic rocks on Jezero’s crater flooring. That wasn’t stunning — observations from orbit urged that volcanic rocks needs to be there, and scientists hoped to choose up some to assist researchers again on Earth determine the rocks’ absolute ages. Proper now, the timing of previous occasions on Mars relies on the sizes of craters and the ages of rocks from the moon, and it’s not extraordinarily exact.
This picture, taken August 2, exhibits mysterious holes and lightweight and darkish patches which can be potential crystals. The Perseverance rover abraded the rock to organize for drilling into it. JPL-Caltech/NASA
Igneous rocks on Mars are usually previous and protect a report of their ages effectively. “If you wish to determine when issues occurred on Mars, you need an igneous rock,” Stack Morgan says.
On the bottom, although, issues are slightly extra sophisticated. This rock was the primary that Perseverance cleared mud from in preparation for taking a pattern. The picture exhibits mysterious holes, which may have been fashioned by erosion or by air bubbles trapped in lava because it cooled. And the floor is split into mild and darkish patches that may very well be particular person crystals, or cemented grains.
In the event that they’re crystals, that implies volcanic exercise, Stack Morgan says — however these crystals are greater than anticipated for lava that might have cooled on the planet’s floor. Comparable crystals kind deep within the subsurface of Earth, the place magma solidifies slowly. When lava cools at Earth’s floor, the crystals “don’t have time to develop large,” Stack Morgan says. The following step, she says, is “considering via how rocks like this might have fashioned right here, if they’re certainly igneous or volcanic rocks. How would we get a rock that appears like this?” Perhaps this rock fashioned underground and was transported to the floor, but it surely’s not clear how.
First pattern try
That very same rock carried extra surprises when the rover crew tried to drill into it August 6. The drill labored completely, to the crew’s elation. “One of the advanced robotic techniques ever designed and executed labored completely with no faults the primary time,” Stack Morgan says. “We have been like ‘Oh my god, that is superb.’”
However once they appeared contained in the tube that was meant to seize the rock pattern, it was empty.
“It’s been a little bit of an emotional curler coaster,” Stack Morgan says.
Perseverance’s shadow (left) looms over the borehole that the rover made on its first try to drill into the Pink Planet. The rover’s WATSON imager took a close-up of that gap (composite picture at proper). These photographs have been taken August 6.JPL-Caltech/NASA, MSSS
The crew thinks that the rock was extra crumbly than anticipated, and primarily turned to mud. “The rock was not in a position to hold its act collectively,” Stack Morgan says. The drill is designed to brush the small grains produced within the drilling course of, referred to as cuttings, up and out of the pattern tube. Stack Morgan thinks your complete pattern was handled as cuttings and ended up in a pile of mud on the bottom.
There’s a silver lining: Now the rover has a sealed pattern of Martian environment. And the rover will try to take one other pattern of a hardier rock someday quickly, Stack Morgan says.
Within the wind
Mars could have had lakes and rivers in its previous, however immediately the dry, dusty panorama is formed largely by wind (SN: 7/14/20). Perseverance has seen plenty of mud devils and windstorms sweep via Jezero crater as a lovely reminder of how environments are all the time altering, even on a dried-up planet like Mars.
A mud satan swirls throughout the Martian panorama. This picture was captured with the Perseverance rover’s left Mastcam-Z digicam June 15.JPL-Caltech/NASA, ASU
“We frequently consider Mars as this barren wasteland the place not a lot occurs immediately,” Stack Morgan says. “However while you see these mud devils transfer throughout the photographs, you’re sort of reminded that Mars, although not Earthlike, is its personal very energetic planet nonetheless.”
