JAKARTA - The Perseverance rover will finally enter an important moment in the search for evidence of ancient life on Mars. This six-legged robot, will begin to climb the delta region of the Jazero Crater.
Later Perseverance will look for locations to sample objects on Mars that may contain ancient microbes and organics. The hike will be for reconnaissance, as Perseverance goes for a walk in search of a rock that holds a secret about whether alien life ever existed on Mars.
He had spent the last few days maneuvering alone on the delta road called the Hawksbill Ridge. This gentle incline will take the car-sized robot to a height of several tens of feet around the bottom of the crater.
Using a drill at the end of its robotic arm and a complex sample collection system, Perseverance will then collect rock cores to return to Earth, the first part of the Mars Sample Return campaign.
The rover is expected to collect about eight samples over about half an Earth year during the Delta Front Campaign.
Then Perseverance is expected to lay the first batch of rock from the delta when it returns to the bottom of the crater at the end of the year. After completing the descent, the robot will ascend again into the delta, possibly via another route yet to be traveled to begin the Delta Peak Campaign, which will also last about half an Earth year.
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NASA wants these rocks to be brought back to Earth in the 2030s so they can undergo detailed analysis. Scientists hope that, in addition to providing answers about the potential for ancient life on the Red Planet, they will also reveal more about Mars' climate and how it evolved.
"The delta at Jezero Crater promises a veritable geological feast and one of the best locations on Mars to look for signs of past microscopic life. The answers are out there, and the Perseverance team is ready to find them," said NASA Science Mission Directorate associate administrator Thomas Zurbuchen.
A delta is a structure built from silt and sand that is dumped by a river as it enters a wider body of water. The sudden deceleration that occurs in the flow of the river allows anything that was carried in suspension to fall.
In the case of Jezero Crater, the wider body of water is most likely a crater-sized lake that existed billions of years ago.
The delta itself rises more than 130 feet (40 meters) above the crater floor and is filled with jagged cliffs, sloping surfaces, large protruding boulders, and pockets of sand, the delta promises many geological discoveries, perhaps even evidence that life Microscopy existed on Mars billions of years ago.
For information, Perseverance landed on Mars on February 18, 2021, after a nearly seven-month journey through space, and made its first test drive more than two weeks later. Thus quoted from the Daily Mail, Wednesday, May 18.
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