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that of NASA Perseverance rover on Mars began his collection of rocks out of this world.
The rover, which is designed to look for signs of old life on March and to pack equipment for a future sample return mission, carried out its first two successful sampling maneuvers on Monday and Wednesday (September 6 and 8). NASA scientists describing the collection said they were delighted with what they know so far about the two rock cores.
“This is a truly historic achievement, the very first rock cores collected from another Earth planet – it’s amazing,” Meenakshi Wadhwa, senior scientist for the return of samples from Mars, at NASA Jet propulsion laboratory (JPL) in California and Arizona State University, said at a press conference on Friday, Sept. 10.
Related: Where to find the latest Mars photos from NASA’s Perseverance rover
“In our scientific community, we’ve been talking about returning samples from Mars for decades, and now it’s starting to feel real,” Wadhwa added. “These first core samples will actually be among dozens of other samples to be collected by the Perseverance rover.”
This week’s successes came after a first attempt at sampling a month before did not go as planned. On August 6, the Perseverance rover drilled into carefully selected rock, but failed to hide a rock core. Scientists who solved the problem determined that the rock was unexpectedly friable, foiling the rover’s sampling mechanism.
At this point, the top priority of the mission team was to confirm that the sampling mechanism was working properly. After analyzing the initial failure, Perseverance staff directed the rover to a new target that appeared to be less weathered and more robust, Jessica Samuels, head of the Perseverance surface mission at JPL, told the press conference. .
And the rover team’s second rock selection, nicknamed “Rochette”, proved more favorable to the Perseverance gear. In the meantime, the engineers’ excitement had spread to the geologists on the team. “As we were evaluating this goal, the science team also found that this goal was of tremendous value,” Samuels said.
As a result, the mission team decided to attempt to collect not one but two samples of Rochette, which the team now calls “Montdenier” and “Montagnac”. Perseverance is equipped with 43 sample tubes, and because the rover will set up one or more tube magazines during its mission, scientists have budgeted to take several rock cores they want to be positive so they can come back. on Earth, deputy scientist of Perseverance Katie Stack Morgan of JPL said at the press conference.
Due to the previous sampling misfire, the human directors of Perseverance asked the robot to take additional photos before attempting to store the first sample, Montdenier, adding to the uncertainty.
Related: Jezero Crater Photo Tour: Here’s Where Perseverance Will Land on Mars
“We have been rewarded for our patience,” Matt Robinson, leader of Perseverance’s strategic sampling operations team at JPL, during the press conference, sharing an image. “Looking at the drill in the tube, you see a nice carrot there. At that point our team was absolutely delighted. I have no words to say how we felt.”
Scientists are also delighted, of course. The two new samples come from the same rock inside Crater lake, where the rover explores land that long ago housed a lake. This rock is probably relatively young, and so far scientists have determined that it is basaltic, which means it may represent cooled lava that has flowed along the surface of the Red Planet. In addition, Perseverance detected salt in both nuclei.
These compounds could have formed from groundwater flowing through rock or evaporating surface water, according to one. NASA statement. Additionally, the salt may have trapped tiny water bubbles during the crystal’s formation, the statement said, which scientists could eventually study as a kind of time capsule in the rock.
Since landing on the Red Planet in February, the Perseverance rover has spent nearly 200 Martian days (just over 200 Earth days) on the surface and has traveled approximately 1.4 miles (2.2 kilometers), Samuels said. . However, because of Solar conjunction of Mars, when the sun interposes itself between Earth and Mars and makes communication with the red planet difficult, Perseverance and the rest of NASA’s Martian fleet will suspend their work for several weeks from the beginning of October, according to NASA.
But even as the humans behind Perseverance celebrate the two new samples and prepare for a scientific break, they’re also planning the rover’s next moves.
Perseverance is heading towards a region that scientists call South Séítah, which the rover’s flight companion, the Ingenuity helicopter, carried out spotting during reconnaissance flights. Scientists on the mission are intrigued by the region’s rugged landscape of ridges, sand dunes and rock shards, and the rock here is likely older than Rochette, according to NASA.
The mission hopes to spend its time on Mars laying the groundwork for a future multispatial mission that NASA and the European Space Agency have begun to develop to bring scientists their first pristine pieces of the red planet, maybe by 2031. The sample collection is an important milestone not only for Perseverance, but for the agency’s Mars program at large, said Lori Glaze, head of the Planetary Sciences Division at the NASA, during the press conference.
And Perseverance is also looking back, building on NASA’s decades of experience in exploring Mars, she said. “Everything we do builds on what we’ve learned before,” Glaze said. “We stand on the shoulders of giants to be where we are today.”
Email Meghan Bartels at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter @meghanbartels. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
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