The Perseverance rover scrapes a rock to “see something no one has seen before”

(CNN) – The Perseverance rover took a well-deserved rest in October during the solar conjunction, but he’s back to investigate the intriguing rocks in the Jezero crater on Mars.
Solar conjunction, a period in which the sun is between Earth and Mars, began on October 2, disrupting NASA’s communications with the rover. This blackout ended on October 19, and Perseverance returned to search for signs of ancient life on the red planet.

One of the main objectives of the rover is to collect rock and soil samples from Mars that will be returned to Earth for future missions. Already collected two samples and he had the help of the Ingenuity helicopter, which acts as an aerial scout, to find his next targets worthy of sampling.

Since October 25, the Perseverance rover has been investigating some rock formations in the southern Séítah region of the planet, which are of interest to the rover’s science team on Earth. The rover has a tool on its robotic arm that can scrape through layers of rock to peek inside.

“These types of rocks normally form in water and may contain clues about the environment they were in. Let’s see if this is another good place for #SamplingMars (sampling Mars),” read a post from the Facebook account of the rover, managed by NASA, on November 4.

After abrading the rocks, the rover sent back images to show what was underneath the rusty-looking top layer – what appears to be a group of granulated minerals and sediments.

“Looking inside to see something no one has seen before. I chipped away a small portion of this rock to remove the surface layer and see what’s underneath. Focusing on my next #SamplingMars target,” Perseverance’s Facebook account posted on 9 of November.

This is what the Martian rock looks like after the rover used its wear tool, revealing possible minerals in the rock.

The mineral content of the rocks in Jezero Crater, which once housed a lake 3.7 billion years ago, acts like an ancient, undisturbed time capsule. Minerals can tell scientists how rocks were formed and what the climate was like at the time. This could provide an overview of what the lake and its river delta looked like when the planet was hotter, wetter, and potentially habitable.

It appears that Perseverance is preparing to collect a sample of the weathered rock to see what Martian secrets Southern Séítah may reveal.

NASA’s Perseverance rover approaches on the rocks of Mars.

“Perseverance and his team have come a long way during the last 8 months of operation on the surface of Mars,” wrote David Pedersen, co-investigator of the rover’s PIXL instrument at the Technical University of Denmark, in a recent Perseverance blog post.

“Now, it is part of normal mission routine for the rover to collect rock samples and conduct proximity science using the instruments mounted on the turret at the end of the robotic / manipulator arm.”