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It has been almost a month since the Perseverance Mars rover successfully landed on the Red Planet to the cheers of scientists and spectators millions of miles away.
The rover has been busy since landing in northeastern Jezero Crater and has completed several tests in preparation for its upcoming missions, deploying its mechanical arm and observing its new home.
NASA TO PERFORM SECOND ROCKET TEST FOR ARTEMIS MOON MISSIONS
Perseverance, or “Percy,” is responsible for searching for traces of ancient microbial life in addition to collecting and caching samples for later return to Earth.
This trip is scheduled for 2031 at the earliest after Percy collects around 30 tubes of Martian rock and sediment.
On March 13, the rover dropped his “belly pan,” or the protective coating that protects its sampling system.
Additionally, the rover hosted a stowaway for its second mission: the very first helicopter on Mars aptly named Ingenuity – which will be tested in June.
While one of the next steps for engineers at Percy and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory is to new site “Octavia E. Butler Landing” in one place to test ingenuity, the rover was able to accomplish a lot.
Thanks to its SuperCam’s advanced high-definition imaging and audio recording capability, whole new sights and sounds have been sent back to Earth to the amazement of scientists and civilians alike.
The SuperCam is a rock vaporizing instrument that is mounted on the “head” of the rover’s mast and will play an active role in selecting rocks that are worth examining.
During a joint press conference with the National Center for Space Studies (CNES) to update the public on their progress, NASA released audio of the rover’s wind and laser hitting Máaz, one of its first rocky targets, in addition to some of his early SuperCams. Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) readings.
The historical recordings were released on March 10 and now have more than 900,000 plays each on NASA’s SoundCloud page.
Days earlier, NASA announced that Percy had completed his first training on the surface of the Martian planet spanning 21.3 feet.
Monitoring the terrain, the scientists determined that several of the rocks they spotted are chemically similar to volcanic rocks and that wind and water have eroded them.
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Geologists told the science journal Nature that the wind models appeared to have blown up rocks mostly from the northwest, and darker colored rocks that might have been weathered by water might have fallen into the old delta. of the river that once flowed through the crater and its lake.
While much of Mars’ astrobiological history remains unknown, Percy was able to take a closer look at researchers – providing crucial data for future missions.
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