December 12, 2023, NASA Perseverance Spacecraft reaches milestone — 1,000 Martian days, or sol. To celebrate, NASA has released a 360-degree mosaic of the spacecraft’s current location and a video walkthrough of the site narrated by Perseverance project scientist Ken Farley.
This composite image is made up of 993 individual images taken with Perseverance’s Mastcam-Z instrument on November 3, November 4, and November 6 of last year, totaling a whopping 2.3 billion images. It has 80 million pixels.
You may notice a significant difference in color between the team images and videos included in this article. Image shows natural color. Mars The video image is adjusted for Earth-like lighting. According to NASA“This adjustment allows mission scientists to draw on everyday experiences to interpret the landscape.”
The landscape is Jezero Crater, where a river flowed into an ancient lake an estimated 3.5 billion years ago. In addition to studying the crater’s geology, scientists are looking for past signs of microbial life.
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Perseverance currently sits atop what the researchers call Airy Hill, where traces of water can be seen in the landscape. The flat, light-colored rocks were probably deposited on the banks of slow-moving rivers, and the larger rocks were probably thrown into place by strong floods.
An unusual rock outcrop has piqued the researchers’ interest, and they suspect it may be the remains of an old lava flow. “Laboratory equipment in operation” earth “We can measure exactly when the volcanic rock was formed, so if we can bring samples of this lava back to Earth in the future, we may be able to tell when and for how long water flowed into Jezero,” Farley said in the video. It is stated inside.
Previously, Perseverance explored the floor of a crater before moving through the delta’s sediments. Then continue “upstream” to the point where the river has carved a canyon into the crater’s rim. Perseverance then climbs a natural ramp to reach the rim itself.
“One attractive target is a light-colored rock halfway up the edge,” Farley says. “They may have interacted with hot water in a hydrothermal environment. This is another exciting place to look for evidence of past life.”
