NASA’s Perseverance rover collects two samples of Martian regolith

NASA’s Perseverance rover snagged two new samples from the Martian floor on Dec. 2 and 6. However not like the 15 rock cores collected so far, these latest samples got here from a pile of wind-blown sand and dust just like however smaller than a dune. Now contained in particular metallic assortment tubes, considered one of these two samples will likely be thought of for deposit on the Martian floor someday this month as a part of the Mars Pattern Return marketing campaign.

Scientists need to examine Martian samples with highly effective lab tools on Earth to seek for indicators of historical microbial life and to raised perceive the processes which have formed the floor of Mars. A lot of the samples will likely be rock; nonetheless, researchers additionally need to look at regolith—damaged rock and dust—not solely due to what it could actually educate us about geological processes and the surroundings on Mars, but in addition to mitigate a number of the challenges astronauts will face on the Crimson Planet. Regolith can have an effect on all the things from spacesuits to solar panels, so it is simply as fascinating to engineers as it’s to scientists.

As with rock cores, these newest samples had been collected utilizing a drill on the tip of the rover’s robotic arm. However for the regolith samples, Perseverance used a drill bit that appears like a spike with small holes on one finish to collect free materials.

Engineers designed the particular drill bit after intensive testing with simulated regolith developed by JPL. Referred to as Mojave Mars Simulant, it is manufactured from volcanic rock crushed into a wide range of particle sizes, from effective dust to coarse pebbles, primarily based on photos of regolith and information collected by earlier Mars missions.

“All the things we study in regards to the measurement, form, and chemistry of regolith grains helps us design and take a look at higher instruments for future missions,” mentioned Iona Tirona of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, which leads the Perseverance mission. Tirona was the exercise lead for operations to gather the current regolith pattern. “The extra information we’ve got, the extra practical our simulants will be.”

The problem of dust

Learning regolith up shut may assist engineers design future Mars missions—in addition to the tools utilized by future Martian astronauts. Mud and regolith can injury spacecraft and science devices alike. Regolith can jam delicate components and decelerate rovers on the floor. The grains may additionally pose distinctive challenges to astronauts: Lunar regolith was found to be sharp sufficient to tear microscopic holes in spacesuits in the course of the Apollo missions to the moon.

Regolith might be useful if packed towards a habitat to protect astronauts from radiation, however it additionally incorporates dangers: The Martian floor incorporates perchlorate, a poisonous chemical that might threaten the well being of astronauts if giant quantities had been by accident inhaled or ingested.

“If we’ve got a extra everlasting presence on Mars, we have to know the way the dust and regolith will work together with our spacecraft and habitats,” mentioned Perseverance group member Erin Gibbons, a McGill College doctoral candidate who makes use of Mars regolith simulants as a part of her work with the rover‘s rock-vaporizing laser, referred to as SuperCam.

“A few of these dust grains might be as effective as cigarette smoke, and will get into an astronaut’s respiration equipment,” added Gibbons, who was beforehand a part of a NASA program learning human-robot exploration of Mars. “We would like a fuller image of which supplies could be dangerous to our explorers, whether or not they’re human or robotic.”

Apart from answering questions on well being and safety hazards, a tube of Martian regolith may encourage scientific surprise. Taking a look at it underneath a microscope would reveal a kaleidoscope of grains in numerous shapes and colours. Every one could be like a jigsaw puzzle piece, all of them joined collectively by wind and water over billions of years.

“There are such a lot of totally different supplies combined into Martian regolith,” mentioned Libby Hausrath of College of Nevada, Las Vegas, considered one of Perseverance’s pattern return scientists. “Every pattern represents an built-in historical past of the planet’s floor.”

As an knowledgeable on Earth’s soils, Hausrath is most all in favour of discovering indicators of interplay between water and rock. On Earth, life is discovered virtually in every single place there’s water. The identical may have been true for Mars billions of years in the past, when the planet’s local weather was rather more like Earth’s.