4.05.2021
Ingenuity: mission extended
So successful is tiny Mars helicopter Ingenuity that NASA’s decided to extend its mission.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter worked so well on its initial test flights that NASA has decided to extend its mission another 30 sols (Mars days).
But instead of simply testing the helicopter, says Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division, it will be seeing how it can be used to help explore the Martian landscape in tandem with the Perseverance rover.
“It’s going to transition from a technology demonstration to an operations demonstration,” she says.
“It’s a new phase,” says the helicopter’s project manager, MiMi Aung of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in California.
Initially, Aung says, the goal was simply to demonstrate that it was possible to fly on Mars, and then to investigate how flying Ingenuity on Mars differed from flying it in the lab – important information for the development of the next generation of Mars helicopters. In the process, she expected that the helicopter would be pushed close enough to its limits that its last flight of the month was likely to be a crash.
But it turned out that there were precious few differences between flying on Mars and the engineers’ expectations.
In its first three flights, the helicopter demonstrated that it could rise, hover, fly, track its elevation to within a centimetre, and land safely at precisely the designated position. “All in all, it’s really a great-performing vehicle,” says Bob Balaram, the helicopter’s chief engineer.
What that means is that the Perseverance rover team is suddenly gifted with a functional helicopter that might actually be able to carry out aerial reconnaissance.
To test that, the helicopter’s fourth flight last Saturday (AEDT) saw it airborne for 117 seconds, flying 133 metres out and back, and taking about 60 black-and-white and 5 colour images along the way.
These, Aung says, will be used to make 3D maps of the surrounding terrain—maps that can be used to find another safe landing zone for the fifth flight.
“All in all, it’s really a great-performing vehicle,” says Bob Balaram, the helicopter’s chief engineer.
That flight will be a one-way trip to the new “airfield,” demonstrating that the helicopter can scout out its own landing zone on one flight, then go to it on the next, leaping across the Martian surface, rather than staying at a single base.
Meanwhile, says Jenifer Trosper, the rover’s deputy project manager, the Perseverance rover itself will go back to its main mission, to study Jezero Crater and collect samples for eventual return to Earth.
Previously, she says, scientists had thought that this was the point where Ingenuity would have to be abandoned, even if it hadn’t crashed.
That’s because the helicopter can only fly for 2 minutes per outing, before it has to land, lest its motor overheat, says Balaram. And because it’s solar powered, it has to recharge its batteries. It wasn’t expected to take long for the rover to outdistance it and lose contact.
But, says Trosper, it turns out that the rover won’t be driving very far in the next few weeks.
“We thought we would be driving away from the region we landed,” she says, “but the sample team is interested in getting the [first] samples from this region.”
That area, says Ken Farley, a project scientist at California Institute of Technology (Caltech), is a narrow strip about 1.6km long that appears to contain ancient mudstones.
These are formed from what was once silt at the bottom of the lake that once filled the crater, coming from a time when the lake would have been particularly habitable. They are also the type of sediment that is most likely to preserve signatures of ancient life, he says. “[So] we are planning to explore this area looking for interesting rocks.”
Will Ingenuity be able to help find the best sample sites? Time will tell.
Meanwhile, Farley says, “we appreciate the [helicopter’s] scouting ability and the ability to fly to territory the rover could not traverse. This is useful for future missions that could combine a rover with a helicopter.”
With flight number four logged, however, the helicopter team will have to slow down the pace of its operations.
For the past month, the rover’s main job has been to babysit the helicopter, taking pictures of it as it flies, and limiting its own activities to minimize the risk of electrical interference with the helicopter’s signals.
Now, the helicopter takes a backseat, and will only fly when it doesn’t distract from the rover’s main mission.
“We will fly every few weeks instead of every few sols,” Trosper says.
After 30 sols, the new phase of the helicopter’s mission will be re-evaluated, and possibly extended again.
“Right now it’s healthy,” Balaram says. “But it wasn’t designed for a long mission and its components haven’t been tested for how many cold Martian nights they can tolerate before something snaps.” But he says, “there are no consumables on this helicopter. The only consumable is our landing gear, which is good for up to 100 landings”.
All told, Glaze says, this is a “see how it goes” phase of the mission. “There is the potential to go beyond [30 days] but we’ll have to assess after 30 days.”
Not to mention that there is still the risk of a crash. “We are transferring to airfields that are not well characterised,” Aung says, “so there is higher possibility of errant landings.”
Quelle: COSMOS
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Update: 5.05.2021
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NASA Extends Mars Helicopter Mission, Will Scout for Perseverance Rover
Ingenuity will keep flying, but things are going to get more challenging
Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter has been doing an amazing job flying on Mars. Over the last several weeks it has far surpassed its original goal of proving that flight on Mars was simply possible, and is now showing how such flights are not only practical but also useful.
To that end, NASA has decided that the little helicopter deserves to not freeze to death quite so soon, and the agency has extended its mission for at least another month, giving it the opportunity to scout a new landing site to keep up with Perseverance as the rover starts its own science mission.
Some quick context: the Mars Helicopter mission was originally scheduled to last 30 days, and we’re currently a few weeks into that. The helicopter has flown successfully four times; the most recent flight was on April 30, and was a 266 meter round-trip at 5 meters altitude that took 117 seconds. Everything has worked nearly flawlessly, with (as far as we know) the only hiccup being a minor software bug that has a small chance of preventing the helicopter from entering flight mode. This bug has kicked in once, but JPL just tried doing the flight again, and then everything was fine.
In a press conference last week, NASA characterized Ingenuity’s technical performance as “exceeding all expectations,” and the helicopter met all of its technical goals (and then some) earlier than anyone expected. Originally, that wouldn’t have made a difference, and Perseverance would have driven off and left Ingenuity behind no matter how well it was performing. But some things have changed, allowing Ingenuity to transition from a tech demo into an extended operational demo, as Jennifer Trosper, Perseverance deputy project manager, explained:
“We had not originally planned to do this operational demo with the helicopter, but two things have happened that have enabled us to do it. The first thing is that originally, we thought that we’d be driving away from the location that we landed at, but the [Perseverance] science team is actually really interested in getting initial samples from this region that we’re in right now. Another thing that happened is that the helicopter is operating in a fantastic way. The communications link is overperforming, and even if we move farther away, we believe that the rover and the helicopter will still have strong communications, and we’ll be able to continue the operational demo.”
The communications link was one of the original reasons why Perseverance’s mission was going to be capped at 30 days. It’s a little bit counter-intuitive, but it turns out that the helicopter simply cannot keep up with the rover, which Ingenuity relies on for communication with Earth. Ingenuity is obviously faster in flight, but once you factor in recharge time, if the rover is driving a substantial distance, the helicopter would not be able to stay within communications range.
And there’s another issue with the communications link: as a tech demo, Ingenuity’s communication system wasn’t tested to make sure that it can’t be disrupted by electronic interference generated by other bits and pieces of the Perseverance rover. Consequently, Ingenuity’s 30-day mission was planned such that when the helicopter was in the air, Perseverance was perfectly stationary. This is why we don’t have video where Perseverance pans its cameras to follow the helicopter—using those actuators might have disrupted the communications link.
Going forward, Perseverance will be the priority, not Ingenuity. The helicopter will have to do its best to stay in contact with the rover as it starts focusing on its own science mission. Ingenuity will have to stay in range (within a kilometer or so) and communicate when it can, even if the rover is busy doing other stuff. This extended mission will initially last 30 more days, and if it turns out that Ingenuity can’t do what it needs to do without needing more from Perseverance, well, that’ll be the end of the Mars helicopter mission. Even best case, it sounds like we won’t be getting any more pictures of Ingenuity in flight, since planning that kind of stuff took up a lot of the rover’s time.
With all that in mind, here’s what NASA says we should be expecting:
“With short drives expected for Perseverance in the near term, Ingenuity may execute flights that land near the rover’s current location or its next anticipated parking spot. The helicopter can use these opportunities to perform aerial observations of rover science targets, potential rover routes, and inaccessible features while also capturing stereo images for digital elevation maps. The lessons learned from these efforts will provide significant benefit to future mission planners. These scouting flights are a bonus and not a requirement for Perseverance to complete its science mission.
The cadence of flights during Ingenuity’s operations demonstration phase will slow from once every few days to about once every two or three weeks, and the forays will be scheduled to avoid interfering with Perseverance’s science operations. The team will assess flight operations after 30 sols and will complete flight operations no later than the end of August.”
Specifically, Ingenuity spent its recent Flight 4 scouting for a new airfield to land at, and Flight 5 will be the first flight of this new operations phase, where it’ll attempt to land at this new airfield, a place it’s never touched down before about 60m south of its current position on Mars. NASA expects that there might be one or two flights after this, but nobody’s quite sure how it’s going to go, and NASA wasn’t willing to speculate about what’ll happen longer term.
It’s important to remember that all of this is happening in the context of Ingenuity being a 30 day tech demo. The hardware on the helicopter was designed with that length of time in mind, and not a multi-month mission. NASA said during their press conference that the landing gear is probably good for at least 100 landings, and the solar panel and sun angle will be able to meet energy requirements for at least a few months. The expectation is that with enough day/night thermal cycles, a solder joint will snap, rendering Ingenuity inoperable in some way. Nobody knows when that’ll happen, but again, this is a piece of hardware designed to function for 30 days, and despite JPL’s legacy of ridiculously long-loved robotic explorers, we should adjust our expectations accordingly. MiMi Aung, Mars Helicopter Project Manager, has it exactly right when she says that “we will be celebrating each day that Ingenuity survives and operates beyond that original window.” We’re just glad that there will be more to celebrate going forward.
Quelle: IEEE
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Update: 9.05.2021
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NASA Mars helicopter heard humming through planet's thin air
NASA is sharing sounds of its little helicopter humming through the thin Martian air
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- First came the amazing pictures, then the video. Now NASA is sharing sounds of its little helicopter humming through the thin Martian air.
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California released this first-ever audio Friday, just before Ingenuity made its fifth test flight, a short one-way trip to a new airfield.
During the fourth flight a week earlier, the low hum from the helicopter blades spinning at more than 2,500 revolutions per minute is barely audible. It almost sounds like a low-pitched, faraway mosquito or other flying insect.
That’s because the 4-pound (1.8-kilogram) helicopter was more than 260 feet (80 meters) from the microphone on the Perseverance rover. The rumbling wind gusts also obscured the chopper's sound.
Scientists isolated the sound of the whirring blades and magnified it, making it easier to hear.
Ingenuity — the first powered aircraft to fly at another planet — arrived at Mars on Feb. 18, clinging to Perseverance's belly. Its first flight was April 19; NASA named the takeoff and landing area Wright Brothers Field in honor of Wilbur and Orrville, who made the world's first airplane flights in 1903. A stamp-size piece of wing fabric from the original Wright Flyer is aboard Ingenuity.
The $85 million tech demo was supposed to end a few days ago, but NASA extended the mission by at least a month to get more flying time.
For Friday afternoon's 108-second test flight, the helicopter traveled southward in the same direction the rover is heading. Once over its new airfield, the chopper soared to twice its previous altitude — 33 feet (10 meters) — took pictures, then landed. The two airfields are 423 feet (129 meters) apart.
With the helicopter's first phase complete, the rover can now start hunting for rocks that might contain signs of past microscopic life. Core samples will be collected for eventual return to Earth.
Quelle: abcNews
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Sounds of the Mars Helicopter’s whirring rotors add another new dimension to the historic project.
For the first time, a spacecraft on another planet has recorded the sounds of a separate spacecraft. NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used one of its two microphones to listen as the Ingenuity helicopter flew for the fourth time on April 30, 2021. A new video combines footage of the solar-powered helicopter taken by Perseverance’s Mastcam-Z imager with audio from a microphone belonging to the rover’s SuperCam laser instrument.
The laser zaps rocks from a distance, studying their vapor with a spectrometer to reveal their chemical composition. The instrument’s microphone records the sounds of those laser strikes, which provide information on the physical properties of the targets, such as their relative hardness. The microphone can also record ambient noise, like the Martian wind.
With Perseverance parked 262 feet (80 meters) from the helicopter’s takeoff and landing spot, the rover mission wasn’t sure if the microphone would pick up any sound of the flight. Even during flight, when the helicopter’s blades spin at 2,537 rpm, the sound is greatly muffled by the thin Martian atmosphere. It is further obscured by Martian wind gusts during the initial moments of the flight. Listen closely, though, and the helicopter’s hum can be heard faintly above the sound of those winds.
For the first time, a spacecraft on another planet has recorded the sounds of a separate spacecraft. NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used its SuperCam microphone to listen to the Ingenuity helicopter on April 30, 2021, as it flew on Mars for the fourth time. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/CNRS/ISAE-Supaéro
“This is a very good surprise,” said David Mimoun, a professor of planetary science at Institut Supérieur de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace (ISAE-SUPAERO) in Toulouse, France, and science lead for the SuperCam Mars microphone. “We had carried out tests and simulations that told us the microphone would barely pick up the sounds of the helicopter, as the Mars atmosphere damps the sound propagation strongly. We have been lucky to register the helicopter at such a distance. This recording will be a gold mine for our understanding of the Martian atmosphere.”
Scientists made the audio, which is recorded in mono, easier to hear by isolating the 84 hertz helicopter blade sound, reducing the frequencies below 80 hertz and above 90 hertz, and increasing the volume of the remaining signal. Some frequencies were clipped to bring out the helicopter’s hum, which is loudest when the helicopter passes through the field of view of the camera.
“This is an example of how the different payload instrument suites complement each other, resulting in information synergy,” said Soren Madsen, Perseverance payload development manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. JPL built Perseverance as well as Ingenuity and operates both of them. “In this particular case, the microphone and video let us observe the helicopter as if we are there, and additional information, such as the Doppler shift, confirms details of the flight path.”
SuperCam is led by the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where the instrument’s body unit was developed. That part of the instrument includes several spectrometers, control electronics, and software. The mast unit, including the microphone, was developed and built by several laboratories of the CNRS (French research center), ISAE-Supaéro, and French universities under the contracting authority of the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (the French space agency). Calibration targets on the rover deck are provided by Spain’s University of Valladolid.
Arizona State University leads operations of the Mastcam-Z instrument, working in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego. The Mastcam-Z team includes dozens of scientists, engineers, operations specialists, managers, and students from a variety of institutions.
Quelle: NASA
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NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Completes First One-Way Trip
The Red Planet rotorcraft headed south in support of furthering research into the potential use of aerial scouts on Mars in the future.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter completed its fifth flight on the Red Planet today with its first one-way journey from Wright Brothers Field to an airfield 423 feet (129 meters) to the south. After arrival above its new airfield, Ingenuity climbed to an altitude record of 33 feet (10 meters) and captured high-resolution color images of its new neighborhood before touching down.
The flight represents the rotorcraft’s transition to its new operations demonstration phase. This phase will focus on investigating what kind of capabilities a rotorcraft operating from Mars can provide. Examples include scouting, aerial observations of areas not accessible by a rover, and detailed stereo imaging from atmospheric altitudes. These operations and the lessons learned from them could significantly benefit future aerial exploration of Mars and other worlds.
“The fifth flight of the Mars Helicopter is another great achievement for the agency,” said Bob Pearce, associate administrator for NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate. “The continuing success of Ingenuity proves the value of bringing together the strengths of diverse skill sets from across the agency to create the future, like flying an aircraft on another planet!”
The flight began at 3:26 p.m. EDT (12:26 p.m. PDT, 12:33 p.m. local Mars time) and lasted 108 seconds. The Ingenuity team chose the new landing site based on information gathered during the previous flight – the first “aerial scout” operation on another world – which enabled them to generate digital elevation maps indicating almost completely flat terrain with almost no obstructions.
“We bid adieu to our first Martian home, Wright Brothers Field, with grateful thanks for the support it provided to the historic first flights of a planetary rotorcraft,” said Bob Balaram, chief engineer for Ingenuity Mars Helicopter at JPL. “No matter where we go from here, we will always carry with us a reminder of how much those two bicycle builders from Dayton meant to us during our pursuit of the first flight on another world.”
The Wright brothers went on from proving powered, controlled flight was possible to attempting to better understand how the new technology could be employed. In a similar fashion, NASA seeks to learn more with Ingenuity how operations with next-generation helicopters could benefit future exploration of the Red Planet. This new phase will bring added risk to Ingenuity, with more one-way flights and more precision maneuvering.
Having successfully landed at its new airfield, Ingenuity will await future instructions, relayed via Perseverance, from mission controllers. The agency’s fifth rover to the fourth planet is also heading south, toward a region where it will commence science operations and sample collection. The rover team’s near-term strategy doesn’t require long drives that would leave the helicopter far behind, allowing Ingenuity to continue with this operations demonstration.
“The plan forward is to fly Ingenuity in a manner that does not reduce the pace of Perseverance science operations,” said Balaram. “We may get a couple more flights in over the next few weeks, and then the agency will evaluate how we’re doing. We have already been able to gather all the flight performance data that we originally came here to collect. Now, this new operations demo gives us an opportunity to further expand our knowledge of flying machines on other planets.”
Last week on Mars
Helicopter Ingenuity’s fifth flight marked the start of its next phase as a scouting vehicle.
The fifth flight of tiny Mars helicopter Ingenuity – the one that flew it above mission expectations – took place on Friday 7 May. The robot craft took off at ‘Wright Brothers Field’ – the same spot where the it had risen and landed on all its other flights – but landed at an airfield 423 feet (129 metres) to the south. Landing in a new place is another first for the rotorcraft.
NASA said that the flight represents the rotorcraft’s transition to its new “operations demonstration phase”. They say the new phase will focus on investigating what kind of capabilities a rotorcraft operating from Mars can provide. These things might include scouting, aerial observations of areas not accessible by a rover, and detailed stereo imaging from atmospheric altitudes. NASA believes the lessons learnt will assist with future explorations of Mars, and of other alien planets.
“The fifth flight of the Mars Helicopter is another great achievement for the agency,” said Bob Pearce, associate administrator for NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate. “The continuing success of Ingenuity proves the value of bringing together the strengths of diverse skill sets from across the agency to create the future, like flying an aircraft on another planet!”
The flight lasted 108 seconds. The Ingenuity team chose the new landing site based on information gathered during the fourth flight – the first “aerial scout” operation on another world – which enabled them to generate digital elevation maps indicating almost completely flat terrain with almost no obstructions.
“We bid adieu to our first Martian home, Wright Brothers Field, with grateful thanks for the support it provided to the historic first flights of a planetary rotorcraft,” said Bob Balaram, chief engineer for Ingenuity Mars Helicopter at JPL. “No matter where we go from here, we will always carry with us a reminder of how much those two bicycle builders from Dayton meant to us during our pursuit of the first flight on another world.”
Mars rover Perseverance continues taking regular weather measurements at Jezero Crater, in the Isidis Planitia region of Mars’ northern hemisphere. On Mars sol (day) 75 of the mission (6 May 2021) the high temperature was -21°C, and low -80°C.
It has also recently been reported that China’s Mars rover – named Zhurong, for an ancient fire god – will attempt its long-anticipated landing mid this month. The Tianwen-1 spacecraft carrying Zhurong has been on station in Mars orbit since 10 February, collecting information about possible rover landing sites. The 240kg rover is designed to operate for about 90 Martian days.
Quelle: COSMOS
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Update: 13.05.2021
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Perseverance’s Robotic Arm Starts Conducting Science
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover used its dual-camera Mastcam-Z imager to capture this image of "Santa Cruz," a hill about 1.5 miles (2.5 kilometers) away from the rover, on April 29, 2021, the 68th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The entire scene is inside of Mars' Jezero Crater; the crater's rim can be seen on the horizon line beyond the hill.
This scene is not white balanced; instead, it is displayed in a preliminary calibrated version of a natural-color composite, approximately simulating the colors of the scene as it would appear to a person on Mars. An enhanced color version is also included (Figure 1).
Arizona State University in Tempe leads the operations of the Mastcam-Z instrument, working in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego.
A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust).
Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis.
The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.
JPL, which is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover viewed these rocks using its Mastcam-Z imager on April 27, 2021, the 66th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Stitched together from 21 images, this mosaic is not white balanced; instead, it is displayed in a preliminary calibrated version of a natural-color composite, approximately simulating the colors of the scene as it would appear on Mars.
For scale, the largest piece of rock casting a shadow in the upper right part of the mosaic is about 11 inches (27 centimeters) across, and the entire scene is about 10 feet (3 meters) across. The smallest pebbles and other features that can reliably be resolved at this zoom scale are around 0.04 to 0.08 inches (1-2 millimeters) across.
The scene was also captured in enhanced color (Figure 1) as well as a color anaglyph made for viewing through red-blue 3D glasses (Figure 2).
Arizona State University in Tempe leads the operations of the Mastcam-Z instrument, working in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego.
A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust).
Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis.
The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.
JPL, which is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.
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NASA’s newest Mars rover is beginning to study the floor of an ancient crater that once held a lake.
NASA’s Perseverance rover has been busy serving as a communications base station for the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter and documenting the rotorcraft’s historic flights. But the rover has also been busy focusing its science instruments on rocks that lay on the floor of Jezero Crater.
What insights they turn up will help scientists create a timeline of when an ancient lake formed there, when it dried, and when sediment began piling up in the delta that formed in the crater long ago. Understanding this timeline should help date rock samples – to be collected later in the mission – that might preserve a record of ancient microbes.
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used the WATSON camera on the end of its robotic arm to conduct a focus test on May 10, 2021, the 79th Martian day, or sol, of the mission.
A camera called WATSON on the end of the rover’s robotic arm has taken detailed shots of the rocks. A pair of zoomable cameras that make up the Mastcam-Z imager on the rover’s “head” has also surveyed the terrain. And a laser instrument called SuperCam has zapped some of the rocks to detect their chemistry. These instruments and others allow scientists to learn more about Jezero Crater and to home in on areas they might like to study in greater depth.
One important question scientists want to answer: whether these rocks are sedimentary (like sandstone) or igneous (formed by volcanic activity). Each type of rock tells a different kind of story. Some sedimentary rocks – formed in the presence of water from rock and mineral fragments like sand, silt, and clay – are better suited to preserving biosignatures, or signs of past life. Igneous rocks, on the other hand, are more precise geological clocks that allow scientists to create an accurate timeline of how an area formed.
One complicating factor is that the rocks around Perseverance have been eroded by wind over time and covered with younger sand and dust. On Earth, a geologist might trudge into the field and break a rock sample open to get a better idea of its origins. “When you look inside a rock, that’s where you see the story,” said Ken Farley of Caltech, Perseverance’s project scientist.
Click (or touch) and drag to interact with this 3D model of the Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
While Perseverance doesn’t have a rock hammer, it does have other ways to peer past millennia’s worth of dust. When scientists find a particularly enticing spot, they can reach out with the rover’s arm and use an abrader to grind and flatten a rock’s surface, revealing its internal structure and composition. Once they’ve done that, the team gathers more detailed chemical and mineralogical information using arm instruments called PIXL (Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry) and SHERLOC (Scanning for Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals).
“The more rocks you look at, the more you know,” Farley said.
And the more the team knows, the better samples they can ultimately collect with the drill on the rover’s arm. The best ones will be stored in special tubes and deposited in collections on the planet’s surface for eventual return to Earth.
Quelle: JPL NASA