Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The rover just lately drilled a pattern from a brand new area with options that would reveal whether or not Mars’ subsurface as soon as supplied an atmosphere appropriate for all times.
New pictures from NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover present the primary close-up views of a area scientists had beforehand noticed solely from orbit. The pictures and knowledge being collected are already elevating new questions on how the Martian floor was altering billions of years in the past. The Purple Planet as soon as had rivers, lakes, and probably an ocean. Though scientists aren’t certain why, its water ultimately dried up and the planet reworked into the chilly desert it’s immediately.
By the point Curiosity’s present location shaped, the long-lived lakes had been gone in Gale Crater, the rover’s touchdown space, however water was nonetheless percolating below the floor. The rover discovered dramatic proof of that groundwater when it encountered crisscrossing low ridges, some just some inches tall, organized in what geologists name a boxwork sample. The bedrock under these ridges seemingly shaped when groundwater trickling by the rock left behind minerals that accrued in these cracks and fissures, hardening and turning into cementlike. Eons of sandblasting by Martian wind wore away the rock however not the minerals, revealing networks of resistant ridges inside.
The ridges Curiosity has seen thus far look a bit like a crumbling curb. The boxwork patterns stretch throughout miles of a layer on Mount Sharp, a 3-mile-tall (5-kilometer-tall) mountain whose foothills the rover has been climbing since 2014. Intriguingly, boxwork patterns haven’t been noticed wherever else on the mountain, both by Curiosity or orbiters passing overhead.
“A giant thriller is why the ridges had been hardened into these huge patterns and why solely right here,” mentioned Curiosity’s venture scientist, Ashwin Vasavada of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “As we drive on, we’ll be learning the ridges and mineral cements to ensure our concept of how they shaped is on track.”
Essential to the boxwork patterns’ historical past is the a part of the mountain the place they’re discovered. Mount Sharp consists of a number of layers, every of which shaped throughout totally different eras of historic Martian local weather. Curiosity basically “time travels” because it ascends from the oldest to youngest layers, trying to find indicators of water and environments that would have supported historic microbial life.
The rover is at the moment exploring a layer with an abundance of salty minerals known as magnesium sulfates, which kind as water dries up. Their presence right here suggests this layer emerged because the local weather turned drier. Remarkably, the boxwork patterns present that even within the midst of this drying, water was nonetheless current underground, creating adjustments seen immediately.
Scientists hope to achieve extra perception into why the boxwork patterns shaped right here, and Mars just lately supplied some surprising clues. The bedrock between the boxwork ridges has a unique composition than different layers of Mount Sharp. It additionally has a lot of tiny fractures crammed with white veins of calcium sulfate, one other salty mineral left behind as groundwater trickles by rock cracks. Related veins had been plentiful on decrease layers of the mountain, together with one enriched with clays, however had not been noticed within the sulfate layer till now.
“That’s actually stunning,” mentioned Curiosity’s deputy venture scientist, Abigail Fraeman of JPL. “These calcium sulfate veins was once all over the place, however they roughly disappeared as we climbed greater up Mount Sharp. The staff is happy to determine why they’ve returned now.”
On June 8, Curiosity got down to study concerning the distinctive composition of the bedrock on this space, utilizing the drill on the tip of its robotic arm to snag a pattern of a rock nicknamed “Altadena.” The rover then dropped the pulverized pattern into devices inside its physique for extra detailed evaluation.
Drilling further samples from extra distant boxwork patterns, the place the mineral ridges are a lot bigger, will assist the mission make sense of what they discover. The staff can even seek for organic molecules and different proof of an historic liveable atmosphere preserved within the cemented ridges.
As Curiosity continues to discover, it will likely be leaving a brand new assortment of nicknames behind, as properly. To maintain monitor of options on the planet, the mission applies nicknames to every spot the rover research, from hills it views with its cameras to particular calcium sulfate veins it zaps with its laser. (Official names, reminiscent of Aeolis Mons — in any other case often known as Mount Sharp — are accredited by the Worldwide Astronomical Union.)
The earlier names had been chosen from native websites in Southern California, the place JPL relies. The Altadena pattern, as an illustration, bears the title of a neighborhood close to JPL that was severely burned throughout January’s Eaton Canyon fire. Now on a brand new a part of their Martian map, the staff is deciding on names from round Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni, Earth’s largest salt flat. This exceptionally dry terrain crosses into Chile’s Atacama Desert, and astrobiologists research each the salt flat and the encompassing desert due to their similarity to Mars’ excessive dryness.
Curiosity was constructed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California. JPL leads the mission on behalf of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington as a part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio.
For extra about Curiosity, go to:
science.nasa.gov/mission/msl-curiosity
Andrew Good
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-2433
andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov
Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov
2025-080