There is a rover NASA on Mars which aims to take pictures and look for objects or other strange situations that occur on the planet. In general, the whole scenario on Mars is very uniform: its rocks have the same color, the same shape and are hardly detached.
However, on January 9, 2023, the last image captured by NASA’s Curiosity rover Mast Camera indicates that there is a gray rock that looks nothing like the ones that were already there. Learn more about scientists’ hunch about the gray rock found on Mars.
Gray Rock on Mars
On November 26, 2011, NASA launched a space car called the Mars Curiosity Rover from Cape Canaveral. He had the goal of exploring the Gale crater on Mars. A few months later, on August 6, 2012, he accomplished his mission: he landed on Aeolis Palus, the name given to the inner part of Gale crater. And since then, he’s been on Mars making important records of the red planet.
It was there that he made a record that intrigued scientists: a gray rock, apparently rich in iron, was deposited in Martian soil. What was the scientists guess? Find out below.
Meteorites on Mars
Scientists believe it to be a meteorite. In 2016, Curiosity Rover found an iron meteorite called Egg Rock, after studies by NASA. Due to the similarities, they believe that the recently found stone could be part of the core of this asteroid.
For planetary geologist Catherine O’Connell-Cooper, the gray rock could also be material left over from the top of Mount Sharp, although she doesn’t rule out the option of being a meteorite. However, she claims that the case is rare:
“We’ve analyzed a few meteorites over the last 10 years, but they’re not as plentiful, so we’ve stopped getting excited about thinking about one again.”
