Mars ‘Delta Scarp’ from over a mile away: Resilience scientist Vivian Sun was thrilled to see certain geological features in the Jezero Crater “Delta Scarp” images, as they provide evidence of a watery past. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/CNRS/ASU/MSSS
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A favorite shot of the rover scientist Perseverance from the young Mars mission offers a new perspective on old and interesting surface features.
Ask any space explorer and they’ll have a favorite picture or two from their mission. For Bill Anders from Apollo 8 it was The picture looks back at the earth from near the moon. Astronaut Randy Bresnik received the award Photo aurora he boarded the International Space Station. And for Vivian Sun, a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, it’s an image taken by NASA’s Mars rover, Perseverance, of one of the steep slopes of Jezero Crater (a long, steep slope at the edge of the plateau) — so far away yet so. close seductive.
Sun knows that this close-up shot of what the exploratory science team calls the “Delta Scarp” and its conglomerates (coarse-grained gravel mixed with sand that has turned into rock) and cross-beds (sloping layers of sedimentary rock) at At first glance, this may seem like something only geologists can love. But the leader of Perseverance’s first science campaign wants to assure you that this Martian mosaic replaces any cinematic prowess that has no geological significance.
“I have studied Jezero Crater for many years and must have seen the orbital images of the Scarp Delta more than a thousand times,” said Sun. “But there is only so much to learn from orbit, and when this image of the steep slopes came to Earth from the rover after landing, it literally took my breath away. This is a favorite because it’s the first time I’ve seen real evidence of the conglomerates and crosses we suspect.”
Two views of the Delta Scarp: The composite image of the “Delta Scarp” Jezero crater was created with data from the Remote Microscopic Imager and the Mastcam-Z camera from the Perseverance rover. Credit: RMI: NASA / JPL-Caltech / LANL / CNES / CNRS / ASU / MSSS
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The conglomerates are cemented together in an aqueous environment, and transverse layers can be evidence of water movement recorded by waves or waves of loose sediment that the water has passed through long ago. Both features were exactly what Sun and the science team had hoped to find at Jezero. About 3.8 billion years ago, the crater probably housed a body of water the size of Lake Tahoe, along with fan-shaped rivers and deltas that formed from sediment deposits from that river.
“We’ve known for some time that the Scarp delta in Jezero was home to a rushing river billions of years ago,” Sun said. “Now we know that we can look at evidence of this river system up close to get a better picture of the size and strength of the water flowing through it. And since the river has deposited sediment and other material on the cliffs not only from the inside, but from the outside as well, it should be an amazing place to look for traces of ancient life.”
The mission expects to explore the Scarp Delta region sometime next year during Perseverance’s second scientific campaign. Currently in the first days of its first scientific campaign, the rover is exploring a 4 square kilometer crater floor that could contain the deepest (and oldest) layer of Jezero exposed bedrock with other interesting geological features. During this first campaign, they will collect the first samples from other planets to bring back to Earth on future missions.
Perseverance to Delta Scarp: This annotated image of Mars’ Jezero crater shows the position of NASA’s Perseverance rover (yellow dot) and the field of view of the Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) camera as it took a series of “Recorded” Delta Scarp images on March 17, 2021. Credit: NASA/JPL- Caltech / University of Arizona
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Sun’s favorite image shows a section of slope 377 feet (115 meters) wide. It consists of five images taken by the rover’s Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) camera on March 17, 2021 (March 26, 2021).
As part of the SuperCam instrument, RMI can detect objects the size of a softball from nearly a mile away, allowing scientists to capture detail from great distances. It can also observe dust grains as small as four thousand inches (100 microns) in size. The SuperCam’s 5.6 kilogram sensor head sits atop the rover’s mast and can perform five types of analyzes to study the geology of Mars and help scientists select rocks the rover would look for as samples of ancient microbial life.
More about mission
The main goal of the Perseverance mission on Mars is astrobiology, including looking for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet’s past geology and climate, paving the way for human exploration of the red planet and being the first mission to collect and temporarily store Martian rock and regolith (debris and dust).
NASA’s next mission, in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), will send a spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and bring them back to Earth for in-depth analysis.
The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA’s lunar-to-Mars exploration approach, which includes the Artemis mission to the moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the red planet.
JPL, managed for NASA by Caltech of Pasadena, California, builds and maintains the Perseverance rover.
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