“We’re going to be able to watch ourselves for the first time land on another planet.” “We’re going to be able to watch ourselves for the first time land on another planet,” Matt Wallace, who serves as deputy project manager for Mars 2020, said at the news conference. Perseverance is equipped with a series of groundbreaking gadgets, as well as video cameras and microphones that will document the sights and sounds of Mars itself. The same minerals have been identified in parts of the Jezero Crater, which scientists have singled out as locations to look for potential well-preserved evidence of past Martian microbial life. Turkey’s Lake Salda, Horgan continued, features carbonate minerals that are particularly good at preserving long-dead organisms. Researchers believe that the ancient lake was “ chemically similar” to one on Earth today. In fact, researchers even did field work at Lake Salda to prepare for #CountdownToMars and /xB2GGgYfbr Though located a world away, Lake Salda, #Turkey, has geological similarities to Jezero Crater on #Mars. Orbital data suggests that “signs of organic materials and life” could be preserved in specific regions of the crater, she added. The ancient river could have transported “organic or biological material” that may have “concentrated” in the mud at the bottom of the lake, said Briony Horgan, a Purdue University researcher and associate professor of planetary science who is part of the Mars 2020 science team, during last month’s news conference. Perseverance will explore different landscapes within the crater, including an area into which a river once flowed, creating a delta where it met the lake. Perseverance is set to land in Jezero Crater, which researchers believe was home to a lake about the size of Lake Tahoe about 3.5 billion years ago, back when Mars supported a warm, wet climate, rather than the dry and cold one it has today. Animation by Megan McGrew/PBS NewsHour, based on NASA images Why Jezero Crater? This animation shows the events that occur in the final minutes of the nearly seven-month journey that NASA’s Perseverance rover takes to Mars. “Samples from Mars have the potential to profoundly change our understanding of the origin, evolution and distribution of life on Earth, and elsewhere in the solar system,” Lori Glaze, who directs NASA’s Planetary Science Division, said during a news conference last month. Successfully transporting rocks and dust from Mars would be a scientific achievement much like when samples collected from the moon during NASA’s Apollo missions were brought back decades ago. The information the rover collects will help determine how future astronauts could survive during potential stays on the planet, using technologies developed from our evolving understanding of its alien landscape.Ī key facet of Perseverance’s mission involves collecting and storing geologic samples that researchers hope can eventually be returned to Earth for study. Perseverance carries a host of equipment designed to search for clues of ancient life, but also to evaluate the conditions of present-day Mars with an eye toward potential human exploration. Watchers can also “attend” NASA’s “ #CountdownToMars Landing” event on Facebook where, among other opportunities, participants will be able to ask NASA experts questions and “connect with like-minded space enthusiasts” before and during the landing. One of those events includes “ Juntos perseveramos,” the agency’s “first-ever Spanish-language show for a planetary landing” that will cover the rover’s mission, as well as “the role Hispanic NASA professionals have had in its success.” However, spacewalks resumed a couple of months ago.NASA’s coverage of the Perseverance landing will begin Thursday at 2:15 p.m. Last year NASA halted spacewalks on the ISS due to investigations into issues with the spacesuits aboard the station. It is unclear exactly when this latest spacewalk will complete its work, but NASA will continue to livestream the spacewalk on NASA Live, via its YouTube channel and other services until the event is over. This is the second NASA spacewalk aboard the ISS for both Mann and Wakata, and those watching live coverage of the spacewalk can see Wakata wearing an unmarked suit, while Mann will utilize a suit with red stripes. During this NASA spacewalk, astronauts Nicole Mann and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Koichi Wakata are working side by side to complete the work.Īs noted above, this work is part of an ongoing series of upgrades to the station, more of which will continue later in the year when other pieces arrive on the station. The stream constantly moves between footage of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, cameras on the station itself, and video recorded directly from the astronaut’s helmets.
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