NASA's Perseverance sends sunset pics from Mars: 'Take a moment to marvel'

The Perseverance rover, which is currently exploring Mars for signs of microbial life, keeps sharing images of the red planet that never ceases to amaze. From craters to uneven terrains, the NASA rover has offered us glimpses of our neighbouring planet from the best angles. Recently, Perseverance has beamed back another image taken from its Mastcam-Z camera system for the first time. The image features a sunset on Mars, which can be seen in this hazy image shared by the Perseverance team on Twitter. "Take a moment to marvel at this: I captured my first view of a Martian sunset with my Mastcam-Z. It’s easy to be go-go-go all the time, but it’s also important to look up", read the rover's tweet.

More about the sunset image from Mars

Revealing more information about this dreamy picture from the red planet, NASA's Mars Exploration Program said in its report that this image was captured by Perseverance's Mastcam-Z camera system on Nov. 9, 2021, the 257th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Scientists have known that skies on Mars turn blue during sunset as fine dust in the atmosphere permits blue light to penetrate the atmosphere more efficiently than colours with longer wavelengths. But as you can see, this image is a bit different as less dust in the atmosphere resulted in a picture with more muted colour than average. The colour has been calibrated and white-balanced to remove camera artefacts, as per the report. 

The Perseverance is parked in the Séítah region of Jezero crater these days where it is conducting an excavation over an unusual region having layered rocks. Earlier on Wednesday, the rover successfully carved out a rock sample loaded with greenish mineral olivine. The region Perseverance is currently exploring is has been found with layered rocks, the kind which is formed in water. Scientists believe that this region might have clues of water in ancient Mars as it is already known that the 45 kilometres wide Jezero crater was filled with water billions of years ago. Besides, scientists are also counting on the rover as it will characterize the planet's geology and past climate and pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet. 

(Image: Twitter/@NASAPersevere)