The Rover Named Perseverance

3/13/2021

 Greetings everyone!

    I am back with a post about the Perseverance rover and its landing on Mars! This will be my largest post yet, as I'll be going into detail about Perseverance, the parts of Perseverance, what do they do, and how they will be impacting the mission. I will also talk about the first flying machine on Mars, Ingenuity.

About Perseverance and its purpose

    The rover named Perseverance made by NASA launched to Mars on July 30th, 2020. It landed a week ago on February 18th, 2021 in the Jezro Crater. The main goal of Perseverance is to observe and seek out possible signs of ancient life and collect samples of them from the regolith. 

    

    Secondly, is to analyze the climate on Mars to then discover evidence of ancient habitable environments where life would've thrived. This would solidify the fact that we are not the first lifeforms, and life other than Earth used to exist. We can also understand what happened to Mars, what caused such a drastic change that knocked most of the magnetic field, skinned the planet of oxygen, and killed life eons ago.

    Next, is to understand the geology of Mars. This is incredibly useful, as it helps us understand the geological processes that went on in ancient Mars, and would help us understand what truly happened through the record of the environment deep below the surface. Not only that, we can go through rocks in search of preserved organics, or known better as the building blocks of life. 

    Finally, is to prepare for future human exploration. With Perseverance on the ground, we can use the technologies onboard the rover to analyze natural resources on Mars for important life support systems and fuel. With knowledge of the Perseverance rover, we can find places where humans will get the best chance of surviving.

Ingenuity, The First Martian Helicopter

    Ingenuity, the first helicopter to be flown on Mars in around 60 - 90 sols, which is around April 14th - May 10th. I'm still on the lookout for more information and if there is an exact date, I will let you know: (It's here! Today! Here's the link to the stream at 2:00 PM EST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JM_2hmdRnfQ)

    The Ingenuity helicopter will be deployed at the underside of the rover. It isn't specifically known if the helicopter will fly, as lower air density means the rotors need to spin faster and it's hard to determine if it's going actually fly. But if that's the case (I'm hoping!) it'll fly, so it'd mean that there will be aeronautic missions on Mars! This will increase the mobility of exploration vehicles on Mars, which allows further explorations by going into the sky instead of rovers on land. This will eliminate the problem of dangerous terrain, as you can just use a small helicopter to scout ahead. But as I said before, gravity and air density play a big role. Speaking of gravity and air density...

Characteristics of Mars and why it's difficult to colonize

    You remember seeing the movie, The Martian? If you didn't go watch it, it's very good. A large portion of the movie has been tuned to realism, so just bear with me.

Gravity:

According to Wikipedia, the gravity of Mars is weaker than Earth, due to the smaller mass. It's said that the gravitational acceleration on Mars is 38% of Earth. So it's around 1/3 of that of Earth. And if you know, on the ISS (International Space Station), astronauts have to workout day and day out to avoid bone and muscle loss because of the reduced work in order to move around. So on Mars, they have to do just the same. Maybe in the future, we'll have a solution for the gravity problem but for now, the explorers of Mars need to exercise frequently.

Radiation:

Radiation is a big problem on Mars. Mars itself doesn't have a strong magnetosphere, such as the one on Earth. It protects us from solar radiation and powerful solar winds that could otherwise damage Earth. On Mars, explorers will have to avoid radiation and stay indoors to reduce exposure. So that'd mean rovers and other autonomous vehicles would have to take control, which is why the Ingenuity helicopter will make this much easier.

Atmosphere:

The atmosphere on Mars is very, VERY thin. It has approximately less than 1% of Earth's value. On top of that, it's made of 95% carbon dioxide, 2.8% nitrogen, 2% argon, 0.174% oxygen, and 0.0747% carbon monoxide. So for the habitats for these explorers, they need to be airtight and extremely strong. For the varying pressure differences, the habitats, and the airlocks, need to be extremely strong so it avoids just exploding and killing everyone. Well, maybe not an explosion but just a burst.

Soil/Regolith:

Martian regolith is extremely dangerous. It's extremely toxic, according to Wikipedia, perchlorate. Perchlorate is extremely harmful to human health, and it says that the ions of perchlorate are somewhat toxic to the thyroid gland. On top of that, it lacks the vital nutrients, enzymes, and microorganisms for plants to grow. Going back to The Martian, Mark Watney would have to fully decontaminate the soil, add those vital enzymes and nutrients, have enough water AND sunlight in the first place. Sunlight is reduced due to the distance from Earth, and sandstorms often cover up the sunlight produced by it. And explorers returning back into the habitats would have to fully clean the suits to avoid perchlorate poisoning.

Sandstorms:

The sandstorms on Mars are dangerous in the fact that it reduces visibility and is extremely large. According to NASA, "moderately big storms that pop up on Mars and they cover continent-sized areas and last for weeks at a time." Going further, "every three Mars years (about 5 1/2 Earth Years), normal storms grow into planet-encircling dust storms." They call them Global Dust Storms. But, winds aren't that big of an issue, as since there is barely any atmosphere, winds would be relatively low compared to Earth. 

Temperature:

The temperature on Mars is freezing cold. Around -60 Celsius, or -80 degrees Farhenheit. But it gets worse. If you don't know, Mars has seasons, extremely similar to ones on Earth, with winter, spring, summer, and fall. So during winter and at the poles, it can get so low as -125 Celsius (-195 Fahrenheit). And on a summer day on Mars at the equator, it'll be at a nice 20 degrees Celsius.

All of these show how difficult living on Mars really is. But, with the discoveries that the Ingenuity and Perseverance will make, we can know to the fullest of what is truly there on Mars.

Parts of Perseverance

There are many working parts of the rover, but I'll cover the ones that will be the utmost of importance.

RIMFAX:

RIMFAX is a tool that can detect ice, water, or brines more than 10 meters (30 feet) underneath the Martian surface! It uses probes and ground-penetrating radar, just like the ones we use on Earth. This is immensely important in finding possible underground frozen pools of water. With the development of more advanced technologies, we can use rovers/helicopters for scouting missions in the poles to find viable sources of water that can be used for oxygen, fuel cells, and watering plants!

MOXIE:

This is the part that everyone has an eye on. MOXIE is used to turn CO2 into oxygen. Kind of like a mechanical tree. This will be extremely helpful, as in the future, carrying oxygen to breathe takes up a lot of room, let alone for fueling spaceships. If MOXIE works, explorers could have a sustainable source of oxygen, and this can allow scientists to add more things to the first rocket. And if we scale up MOXIE, we could help produce oxygen for the first major colonies on Mars! It's currently testing its capabilities right now, and it'll constantly keep on doing it throughout the entire mission!

MEDA:

MEDA is an instrument that's used to understand the climate and the geological environment. It has many sensors built on it to do a variety of things. It can find wind speed + direction, humidity, atmospheric pressure, soil/air temperatures, and solar radiation. This can be extremely helpful in determining whether or not Ingenuity will fly, or when it'll fly. Sharp winds could blow it off course and cause damage if it falls to the ground.

SuperCam:

SuperCam is quite interesting. Using a laser, it zaps a chosen rock to analyze what it's comprised of. Using that information, we can determine what said the rock had been through. Rocks are like windows to the past, because if you know what it's made out of, you can tell what major events happened while it was there.

Mastcam-Z:

It's a pair of high-definition cameras that take what NASA describes as "three-dimensional stereo images", with a "powerful zoom lens." It provides similar 3D images like we humans do, but better!

PIXL:

PIXL is a tool to help see the textures on rocks in great detail. It can see as small as a grain of salt! It has a Micro-Context Camera to provide images to then correlate with its elemental composition maps, with the characteristics of the target area. Interestingly enough, it can scan any changes in texture and chemicals in the rocks/soil that may have been left behind by any ancient microbial life. 

SHERLOC [and WATSON]:

Putting it out there, great job on the team who made this name! SHERLOC detects fine organic molecules, minerals, and potential biosignatures. Like the actual Sherlock Holmes, it has a magnifying glass to see in fine detail. It uses ultraviolet laser light to spot any organic chemicals, akin to how modern-day detectives do in order to find any forensic clues. On top of that, it carries a small piece of spacesuit material to see how it holds up in the Martian environment. This can tell us back on Earth what we need to add or remove from the spacesuits in order to make them better. WATSON captures detailed images and maps of the minerals and other interesting things that SHERLOC collects. We can then analyze the minerals even closer and have visual help with it!

Microphones:

Attached to the rover are other things such as microphones! It can capture the noise on Mars and the results are quite interesting! There is a website where you can listen to a side-by-side comparison of noise on Earth, and what it'd sound like on Mars! Here's a link to it.

Each part of the rover has an important role in analyzing the characteristics of Mars. Each one is vital in understanding Mars as a whole. Because with more information about Mars, future explorers will be able to know more about what to expect, and how to adapt to it. With each Mars mission, we will be able to get close, if not closer than the last to the dream of the first people on Mars. And most likely, when you and I are still alive, we'll be able to cheer on the people who will accomplish such a monumental task.

🌳