'Now we know we sent the rover to the right location.”
, drilling 2 inches into the planet's surface to extract a rock core, one of a number that will eventually be sent back to Earth.
The rover has now collected a total of 12 rock samples, and the latest is the most important yet, as NASA has identified organic molecules within the material it has extracted from the Martian surface. Perseverance collected the sample on July 20 while investigating the sedimentary rocks of the twenty-eight-mile wide ancient river delta. The rover used its Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals, or SHERLOC, instrument to scan a sample collected from "Wildcat Ridge"
. The ridge is a rock approximately 3 feet wide that is thought to have formed billions of years ago due to mud and fine sand settling in an evaporating saltwater lake.NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSSSHERLOC's analysis shows the samples feature a class of organic molecules linked to sulfates. Crucially, sulfate minerals are capable of storing a significant amount of information about the watery environment in which they were formed.
“The fact the organic matter was found in such a sedimentary rock — known for preserving fossils of ancient life here on Earth — is important," said Perseverance project scientist Ken Farley of Caltech in Pasadena, California.
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