To keep away from patches of knife-edged rocks, the mission has taken another path up Mount Sharp.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover spent most of March climbing the “Greenheugh Pediment” – a delicate slope capped by rubbly sandstone. The rover briefly summited this function’s north face two years in the past; now on the pediment’s southern facet, Curiosity has navigated again onto the pediment to discover it extra totally.
However on March 18, the mission crew noticed an sudden terrain change forward and realized they must flip round: The trail earlier than Curiosity was carpeted with extra wind-sharpened rocks, or ventifacts, than they've ever seen within the rover’s practically 10 years on the Purple Planet.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover used its Mast Digital camera, or Mastcam, to take this 360-degree panorama on March 23, 2022, the three,423th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The crew has informally described the wind-sharpened rocks seen right here as “gator-back” rocks due to their scaly look. Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Ventifacts chewed up Curiosity’s wheels earlier within the mission. Since then, rover engineers have discovered methods to sluggish wheel put on, together with a traction management algorithm, to cut back how regularly they should assess the wheels. They usually additionally plan rover routes that keep away from driving over such rocks, together with these newest ventifacts, that are manufactured from sandstone – the toughest sort of rock Curiosity has encountered on Mars.
The crew nicknamed their scalelike look “gator-back” terrain. Though the mission had scouted the world utilizing orbital imagery, it took seeing these rocks close-up to disclose the ventifacts.
“It was apparent from Curiosity’s photographs that this might not be good for our wheels,” stated Curiosity Undertaking Supervisor Megan Lin of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, which leads the mission. “It will be sluggish going, and we wouldn’t have been in a position to implement rover-driving greatest practices.”
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover used its Mast Digital camera, or Mastcam, to survey these wind-sharpened rocks, known as ventifacts, on March 15, 2022, the three,415th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The crew has informally described these patches of ventifacts as “gator-back” rocks due to their scaly look. Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The gator-back rocks aren’t impassable – they simply wouldn’t have been price crossing, contemplating how troublesome the trail can be and the way a lot they might age the rover’s wheels.
So the mission is mapping out a brand new course for the rover because it continues to discover Mount Sharp, a 3.4-mile-tall (5.5-kilometer-tall) mountain that Curiosity has been ascending since 2014. Because it climbs, Curiosity is ready to research totally different sedimentary layers that have been formed by water billions of years in the past. These layers assist scientists perceive whether or not microscopic life might have survived within the historical Martian atmosphere.
Why Greenheugh?
The Greenheugh Pediment is a broad, sloping plain close to the bottom of Mount Sharp that extends about 1.2 miles (2 kilometers) throughout. Curiosity’s scientists first seen it in orbital imagery earlier than the rover’s touchdown in 2012. The pediment stands out as a standalone function on this a part of Mount Sharp, and scientists needed to know the way it shaped.
Low-angle self-portrait of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover. Credit score: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
It additionally sits close by the Gediz Vallis Ridge, which can have been created as particles flowed down the mountain. Curiosity will all the time stay within the decrease foothills of Mount Sharp, the place there’s proof of historical water and environments that might have been liveable prior to now. Driving throughout a few mile (1.5 kilometers) of the pediment to assemble photographs of Gediz Vallis Ridge would have been a solution to research materials from the mountain’s uppermost reaches.
“From a distance, we will see car-sized boulders that have been transported down from increased ranges of Mount Sharp – possibly by water comparatively late in Mars’ moist period,” stated Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity’s mission scientist at JPL. “We don’t actually know what they're, so we needed to see them up shut.”
The Highway Much less Traveled
Over the following couple weeks, Curiosity will climb down from the pediment to a spot it had beforehand been exploring: a transition zone between a clay-rich space and one with bigger quantities of salt minerals known as sulfates. The clay minerals shaped when the mountain was wetter, dappled with streams and ponds; the salts might have shaped as Mars’ local weather dried out over time.
“It was actually cool to see rocks that preserved a time when lakes have been drying up and being changed by streams and dry sand dunes,” stated Abigail Fraeman, Curiosity’s deputy mission scientist at JPL. “I’m actually curious to see what we discover as we proceed to climb on this alternate route.”
Curiosity’s wheels shall be on safer floor because it leaves the gator-back terrain behind, however engineers are targeted on different indicators of wear and tear on the rover’s robotic arm, which carries its rock drill. Braking mechanisms on two of the arm’s joints have stopped working prior to now 12 months. Nonetheless, every joint has redundant components to make sure the arm can preserve drilling rock samples. The crew is finding out one of the best methods to make use of the arm to make sure these redundant components preserve working so long as doable.
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