Madrid. Striking rock formations documented by the rover curiosity NASA provide evidence of a dry climate in the Red Planet’s ancient past.
During the past year, the rover Curiosity Mars NASA has been traveling through a transition zone from a clay-rich region to one filled with a salty mineral called sulfate. While the science team focused on the clay-rich and sulfate-laden regions for evidence each might offer about Mars’s watery past, the transition zone is also proving to be scientifically fascinating. In fact, this transition may provide the record of a major change in Mars’ climate billions of years ago that scientists are only beginning to understand.
The clay minerals formed when lakes and streams once traversed Gale Crater, depositing sediment at what is now the base of Mount Sharp, the three-mile-high mountain whose foothills Curiosity has been climbing since 2014. the transition zone, the observations of curiosity they show that the streams dried up and sand dunes formed on top of the lake sediments.
“We no longer see the lacustrine deposits that we saw for years further down Mount Sharp,” Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement. “Instead, we see a lot of evidence of drier climates, like dry dunes that occasionally had streams around them. That’s a big change from lakes that persisted for perhaps millions of years before.”
From earlier, distant views, my team nicknamed this area “the bacon strip.” (My overhead map shows why.) Now that I’m up on top, we’re calling it “Hogwallow Flats” – and the nearby rocks are a sight to behold. My team is happy as pigs in mud(stone)!
map: https://t.co/SEbqOKoQq1 pic.twitter.com/fsz5hFjmLF
— NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover (@NASAPersevere) June 16, 2022
As the rover climbs higher through the transition zone, it detects less clay and more sulfate. curiosity it will soon drill the last rock sample it will take in this area, providing a more detailed view of the changing mineral composition of these rocks.
Unique geological features also stand out in this area. The hills in the area likely began in a dry environment of large windswept sand dunes, which hardened into rock over time. Interspersed in the remains of these dunes are other waterborne sediments, perhaps deposited in ponds or small streams that once weaved between the dunes. These sediments now appear as stacks of scaly layers resistant to erosion, like one nicknamed “The Bow.”
What makes the story richer and even more complicated is the knowledge that there were multiple periods when groundwater flowed and flowed over time, leaving a jumble of puzzle pieces for scientists to investigate. curiosity assemble them on a precise timeline.
curiosity will celebrate its tenth year on Mars on August 5. While the rover is showing its age after a full decade of exploration, nothing has stopped it from continuing its ascent.
Episode in ‘safe mode’
June seventh, curiosity it went into safe mode after detecting a temperature reading on an instrument control box inside the rover’s body that was hotter than expected. Safe mode occurs when a spacecraft detects a problem and automatically shuts down all but the most essential functions so engineers can assess the situation.
Though curiosity came out of safe mode and returned to normal operations two days later, JPL engineers are still analyzing the exact cause of the problem. They suspect safe mode kicked in after a temperature sensor provided an inaccurate measurement, and there’s no sign it will significantly affect rover operations, as backup temperature sensors can ensure electronics inside the rover’s body rover do not get too hot.
My team has spotted something unexpected: It’s a piece of a thermal blanket that they think may have come from my descent stage, the rocket-powered jet pack that set me down on landing day back in 2021. pic.twitter.com/O4rIaEABLu
— NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover (@NASAPersevere) June 15, 2022
wheel wear
The rover’s aluminum wheels also show signs of wear. On June 4, the engineering team ordered Curiosity to take new pictures of its wheels, something it had been doing every thousand meters to check its general condition.
The team discovered that the left center wheel had sustained damage to one of its claws, the zigzag treads along the wheels of curiosity. This particular wheel already had four broken claws, so now five of its 19 claws are broken.
The previously damaged claws attracted attention online recently because some of the metal “skin” between them appears to have fallen off the wheel in recent months, leaving a gap.
The team has decided to increase the image of the wheels to every 500 meters, a return to the original cadence. A traction control algorithm had reduced tire wear enough to justify increasing the distance between images.
We have shown through ground testing that we can safely drive on the wheel rims if necessary,” said Megan Lin, project manager for curiosity at JPL. “If we ever get to the point where a single wheel has broken off most of its claws, we might do a controlled break to shed whatever pieces remain. Given recent trends, it seems unlikely we’ll need to take such action. The wheels hold up.” well and provide the traction we need to continue our ascent.
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