NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover Starts Unpacking Boxwork Formations

The rover recently pierced a sample of a new region with features that could reveal whether the March in the past has once provided an environment adapted to life.

New images of the curiosity of NASA Mars Rover show the first close views of a region that scientists had previously observed only from orbit. The images and data collected are already raising new questions about how the Martian surface changed billions of years ago. The red planet once had rivers, lakes and perhaps an ocean. Although scientists do not know why, its water finally dried and the planet turned into a cold desert, it is today.

As the current location of curiosity was formed, the long lifespan lakes had gone in a scabry crater, the rover landing area, but the water was still percolating under the surface. The rover found spectacular evidence of these groundwater when it encountered increasing low crests, some a few centimeters high, arranged in what geologists call a box model. The rocky substratum below these ridges has probably formed when the groundwater runs through the rock have left minerals that accumulate in these cracks and cracks, hardening and becoming in cement. Sandcraft by the Martian wind have exhausted the rock but not minerals, revealing networks of ridges resistant inside.

The curiosity of the ridges has so far saw a little like a ruined sidewalk. Boxwork’s patterns are extending for kilometers from a layer on Mount Sharp, a mountain of 3 miles (5 kilometers high) whose foothills have climbed since 2014. Curiously, the cartridge models have not been identified elsewhere on the mountain, whether by curiosity or the orbits passing over the head.

“A great mystery is the reason why the ridges were hardened in these major models and why only here,” the scientist of the Curiosity project, Ashwin Vasavada of the NASA jet laboratory in southern California said. “As we head, we are studying peaks and mineral cements to make sure that our idea of ​​how they have formed are on the target.”

The important thing for the history of boxwork models is the part of the mountain where they are. Mount Sharp consists of several layers, each formed at different times in the old Martian climate. The curiosity “moves” mainly when it rises from the oldest to the youngest to the youngest, in search of signs of water and environments which could have supported ancient microbial life.

The rover currently explores a layer with an abundance of salted minerals called magnesium sulfates, which are formed as dry water. Their presence here suggests that this layer appeared as the climate has become drier. Remarkably, boxwork models show that even in the middle of this drying, water was still present underground, creating changes seen today.

Scientists hope to better understand why boxwork models have formed here, and Mars recently provided unexpected clues. The rocky substratum between the boxwork crests has a different composition from that of the other layers of Mont Sharp. It also has many tiny fractures filled with white veins of calcium sulfate, another salty mineral left behind the behind the scenes of the groundwater through rock cracks. Similar veins were numerous on the lower layers of the mountain, including an enriched with clays, but had not been spotted in the sulfate layer so far.

“It’s really surprising,” said the deputy scientist of the Curiosity project, Abigail Fraeman of JPL. “These veins of calcium sulfate were everywhere, but they have more or less disappeared when we climbed above Mount Sharp. The team is delighted to understand why they have returned now.”

On June 8, Curiosity decided to discover the unique composition of the rocky substratum in this area, using the exercise at the end of his robotic arm to take a sample of a rock nicknamed “Altadena”. The rover then deposited the sprayed sample in instruments of his body for a more detailed analysis.

Make additional samples from more distant boxwork models, where mineral ridges are much larger, will help the mission to understand what they find. The team will also look for organic molecules and other evidence of an ancient habitable environment preserved in cemented ridges.

While curiosity continues to explore, it will also leave a new assortment of nicknames. To keep a trace of the planet’s features, the mission applies nicknames to each spot in rover studies, Hills which he sees with his cameras with specific calcium sulfate veins, he zaps with his laser. (Official names, like Aeolis Mons – otherwise known as Mount Sharp – are approved by the International Astronomical Union.)

The previous names were selected from local sites in southern California, where JPL is based. The sample of Altadena, for example, bears the name of a community near JPL which was seriously burned during the late Eaton Canyon in January. Now, on a new part of their Martian card, the team selects names of the Uyuni Bolivia Salar, the largest Salon on Earth. This exceptionally dry terrain crosses the Chile desert, and astrobiologists study both flat salt and the surrounding desert because of their similarity with the extreme drought in March.

Curiosity was built by the NASA laboratory propulsion jet, which is managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California. JPL directs the mission on behalf of the NASA scientific mission management in Washington as part of the NASA Mars exploration program portfolio.

To find out more about curiosity, visit:

science.nasa.gov/mission/msl-curiosity

Andrew good
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.
818-393-2433
Andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov

Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
NASA seat, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov

2025-080