NASA retrospects Perseverance rover's first year on Mars; recalls records created

NASA's Perseverance rover can be counted among the most fascinating missions of 2021 which helped in expanding the exploration of alien worlds by humans. Launched on July 30 last year, the Perseverance rover landed on Mars in February 2021 and has been treading in the barren neighbouring world looking for signs of life. Now since the year is about to end, here's a look back at what the rover has achieved in its first year of scientific exploration on the red planet. 

Perseverance and its adventures

As of December 29, Perseverance has spent 302 sols (martian days) on the red planet and has made significant progress in the first year of its service. The rover touched down on Mars' Jezero crater and has made some groundbreaking discoveries like confirming the presence of a lake on the red planet billions of years ago and finding evidence of a dormant volcano. According to NASA, the rover has driven over 2.9 kilometers on Mars, which is the greatest length traveled by a rover on the red planet to date.

In addition to this, Perseverance has also created the record for the longest drive in a Martian day and has collected over 50 gigabytes of science data. In the list of the rover's achievements also is a collection of rock samples on six instances. NASA says that these samples will soon be brought to Earth for analysis in the coming years. However, what is most fascinating for anyone interested in the rover and its exploration is the images it has beamed back. Scientists now have over 1,00,000 images sent by Perseverance which also includes two of its selfies. 

Earlier in October, scientists using the data collected by the Perseverance rover had confirmed that the Jezero crater once house a massive lake that dried out 3.7 billion years ago. Besides, the images beamed back also revealed that the Jezero crater endured flash floods in the past, which had swept massive boulders that can still be found near the crater. However, the most recent discovery is that of a dormant volcano in the Jezero crater. Interestingly, NASA scientists have also confirmed that the rocks in the crater interacted with water multiple times and some even contain organic molecules.