Robot Perseverance. (NASA)
Hitekno.com – Exploratory robot Mars latest belongs NASA, Perseverance which landed on the Red Planet last month was carrying a small helicopter called Ingenuity.
The rover mission team and Ingenuity have selected an airfield on Mars for the 1.8 kg helicopter.
According to NASA officials, the Ingenuity test flight is expected to begin as early as the first week of April.
Furthermore, NASA will provide updates on Ingenuity’s flight plans during a press conference held on March 23 at 1:30 p.m. EDT. This broadcast can be viewed live on the NASA website.
Ingenuity is currently still stored in the stomach of the Perseverance explorer since his landing at Jezero Crater, Mars. Once Perseverance reaches the location of the selected airfield, the six-wheeled robot will release Ingenuity to the surface and drive about 100 m.
Perseverance will try to document the small helicopter’s flight using a Mastcam-Z camera suite and two microphones.
Reporting from Space.com on Friday (19/3/2021), Ingenuity is also equipped with a high-resolution camera but does not have scientific instruments because this mission is just a demonstration of technology designed to help pave the way for future exploration of Mars air.
As an experimental mission, if Ingenuity’s flight is successful then future Red Planet missions could include helicopters that will either serve as reconnaissance cruisers or collect data on their own.
After helping take off from the surface, Perseverance will begin to focus on its core mission. Explorers will hunt for signs of ancient Martian life and collect dozens of samples that will be brought back to Earth in early 2031.
Ingenuity isn’t the only technology demonstration Perseverance has brought to Mars. One scientific instrument on the rover called MOXIE (Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment) was designed to produce pure oxygen from the Red Planet’s thin, carbon dioxide-dominated atmosphere.
According to NASA, such instrument equipment if upgraded could help humanity prepare for and gain a foothold on Mars one day. (Suara.com/Lintang Siltya Utami)
– .
