If there’s anywhere a rover should look for such biosignatures, it’s probably Jezero Crater. “That’s how we actually build a case for biosignatures,” said JPL’s Kathryn Stack Morgan, the deputy project scientist for the $2.4-billion Mars 2020 mission. That means looking for certain structures and textures, not just the right raw materials. It requires looking for the kinds of patterns left by living things on Earth. Using its drill and lab instruments, Curiosity revealed that its home base of Gale Crater was once a watery place with the right organic ingredients to host life.īut finding signs of ancient life is far more difficult. Though Mars is dusty and dry today, scientists think it was warmer, wetter and altogether more Earthlike more than 3.5 billion years ago. It has already survived a hurdle no previous rover has had to face: a global pandemic. Perseverance, NASA’s newest Mars rover, is living up to its name. Science & Medicine Meet Perseverance, JPL’s newest Mars rover ![]() With Perseverance, mission scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge and elsewhere are searching for hints of past life - a goal as ambitious as it is challenging. Even that didn’t prove living things ever existed there. But water alone does not life make.Ĭuriosity landed on Mars in 2012 to search for chemical cocktails that, together with water, could provide hospitable environments for past life. Next came the solar-powered twins Spirit and Opportunity, tasked with finding signs of past water on the planet’s surface. NASA returned to the Martian surface in 1997 with the tiny Sojourner rover. Subsequent missions took the scientific journey one step at a time. “We still don’t really know entirely what Viking found.” “We didn’t understand enough about Mars to interpret that data,” Horgan said. ![]() They found intriguing chemical activity in the planet’s soil, but nothing conclusive. The twin landers were sent with the express purpose of looking for evidence of life. ![]() Scientifically, however, it’s coming full circle from Viking 1 and 2, which reached Mars in 1976. Perseverance’s trip is a one-way ride that’s scheduled to end Thursday around 12:55 p.m.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |