NASA explorer ship just landed on Mars and these are the first images sent back

Tram Ho

Yesterday, a robot about the size of an SUV in a protective compartment crashed through the Martian atmosphere at supersonic speeds. A parachute helped slow its fall, then a jet parachute directed it to a safe landing point.

Mission operators at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, USA receive a signal that the screams have hit the ground and are still “alive” at 3:55 pm, ET. The whole room immediately exploded in cheers and applause, then fell silent just a few minutes later when the first photo was transmitted.

Tàu thám hiểm NASA vừa hạ cánh xuống sao Hỏa và đây là những hình ảnh đầu tiên được gửi về - Ảnh 1.

The first photo of the Perseverance expedition ship from Mars.

A second photo quickly appeared, taken by the camera located on the back of the self-propelled device.

Tàu thám hiểm NASA vừa hạ cánh xuống sao Hỏa và đây là những hình ảnh đầu tiên được gửi về - Ảnh 2.

Second photo Perseverance took on Mars, using the rear camera, 18 February 2021.

“We shoot these right after landing. There is still dust in the air from the device’s landing,” said Rob Manning, chief engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Here’s what NASA does. Here’s what we can do as a nation.”

The images show the dusty basin of the Jezero crater: an ancient lake bed that could have harbored microbial life 3.5 billion years ago, when it was filled with water. Perseverance is now ready to spend the next “Martian year” (roughly 2 years on Earth) to explore the deltas of the river that once fed craters and look for signs of alien life. ancient crystal.

Tàu thám hiểm NASA vừa hạ cánh xuống sao Hỏa và đây là những hình ảnh đầu tiên được gửi về - Ảnh 3.

Illustration of Perseverance and accompanying helicopter.

According to scientists, this is probably the best place to search for remnants of life on Mars, as the river that once supplied Lake Jezero would have mud and clay, a natural trap for the commits. co-bacteria, then retain their mark in the mud.

Perseverance carried 43 sample tubes so it could hold rock fragments, including alien fossils, if any. NASA plans to send another mission to take those samples and bring them back to Earth in the 2030s.

The Jezero Crater is the most dangerous landing site any mission on Mars has ever targeted. Rock fields surround the landing zone, sand dunes bordering the southwest and cliffs 60 meters long cut straight through the center. But Perseverance’s sophisticated landing-assisted computer software surveyed all of those dangers as it plunged towards Mars and directed the device toward a flat land.

Tàu thám hiểm NASA vừa hạ cánh xuống sao Hỏa và đây là những hình ảnh đầu tiên được gửi về - Ảnh 5.

Illustration of Perseverance’s location at the Jezero Crater on Mars.

As early as this weekend, NASA can get short pictures and videos of Perseverance’s field trip to Mars. This self-propelled robot is equipped with a camera and a microphone to record the entire trip. These will be the first ever recorded footage of the Mars landing.

For now, it will continue to upload, transmit that data to Earth via a spaceship that has been orbiting Mars for years. Then, during the first weeks on the red planet’s surface, Perseverance will perform a system check to make sure everything is working properly. It will then open its belly shield to drop its first interplanetary helicopter, set to conduct a series of test flights, opening up a potentially new way of space exploration.

Both Perseverance and a helicopter, known as Ingenuity, are expected to record those flights in full. Drones and autonomous vehicles will observe each other from the ground and the air.

Once Ingenuity has flown, Perseverance will embark on a long journey through the Jezero crater. Certainly more images will be sent back to Earth.

Refer to BI

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Source : Genk