Typically, NASA’s ‘Perseverance’ rover sends back evocative images of bleak dusty landscapes, red-hued sandstorms and samples of Martian rocks. So its operators were surprised to receive a photo on Monday of a shiny silver object that looked like a fragile, neglected package stuck between two rocks.
The NASA team concluded that the object was a piece of debris thrown by the robotic spacecraft during its descent in February 2021.
“My team discovered 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 put me on landing day in 2021.” Perseverance Twitter account mentioned.
“This shiny piece of tin is part of a thermal blanket – a substance used to control temperature. It’s a surprise to find this out here: my descent phase dropped about 2km away. Did this piece fall here then, or was it blown away by the wind? the wind?”
The image has reignited fears that space exploration threatens to pollute the pristine environments of Mars and the Moon. O The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 Create an obligation under international law to prevent harmful pollution of outer space, the moon and other celestial bodies, but some argue that the law is not detailed enough to guarantee protection.
However, in the brood of perseverance, Professor Andrew Coates, UCLA Mullard astronomer space The science lab said: “The good news is that everything is sterilized before going to Mars, and the space radiation environment helps during the nine-month trip to Mars, as does the hostile surface environment.”
“As it is very difficult to land Marte Because of the thin atmosphere, landing craft are almost always associated with landing system hardware that also land on the surface – parachutes, aft missiles, landing systems – such as the Perseverance and Curiosity celestial elevator, airbags and missile systems. legacies for previous missions. ” “They fly until sunset.” from the landing site and eventually fall off, but the risk of contamination is very low.”
Avoiding pollution is essential for tasks like perseverance, which look for signs of ancient life in them. Jezero Crater on Mars. Scientists believe that more than 3.5 billion years ago, the area flooded and was home to ancient river deltas. It’s conceivable that microbial life may have survived on Jezero during this wetter period, so the car-sized spacecraft collects soil samples to return to Earth so scientists can assess signs of ancient life.
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