NASA's Perseverance rover discovers 'odd' rock, scientists now investigate

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Perseverance rover recently spotted a peculiar holey rock that bears a resemblance to meteorites, said the US space agency on April 1. The Perseverance team tweeted on Thursday that the scientists have not yet determined exactly what the rock is as of now but called it an “odd one”. The rock is nearly 6 inches long and told its followers, probably interested in knowing more about Mars to locate a “row of laser” where the robotic explorer zapped it.

NASA’s Perseverance rover is equipped with a rock-zapping laser designed to help the robot collect the data on Mars geology. The United States space agency also released the laser in action as heard by a microphone. While sharing the audio earlier this month, NASA wrote, “Variations in the intensity of the zapping sounds will provide information on the physical structure of the targets, such as its relative hardness or the presence of weathering coatings.” 

Among some of the speculations about the rock recently discovered, scientists believe it might be a weathered piece of bedrock, a little chunk of Mars among other possibilities. The historic Perseverance rover that landed on Mars on February 18, 2021, is currently studying a region of Mars called Jezero Crater and the robotic explorer is set to provide answers to several questions about the Red Planet while also searching for signs of past microbial life.

Since the previous rovers on Mars have collected evidence of water along with the chemical building blocks of life, Perseverance will provide more in-depth knowledge as scientists “think it might be possible that life existed on Mars a long time ago”.

Ancient Crater Lake Discovered On Mars

An ancient crater lake in the southern highlands of Mars appears to have been created due to glacier runoff, claimed researchers on March 30 indicating that the Martian Planet could have a cold and icy past. The Researchers at Brown University said in a statement that they have discovered a never-known-before type of ancient crater lake on the Red planet that could give scientists insight into the mysterious past of the planet and its early climate. The latest study on Mars’ ancient crater has been published in Planetary Science Journal and is led by Brown University’s Ph.D. student Ben Boatwright.

Image credits: @NASA/NASAPersevere-Twitter