Written by Lucy Lim, Planetary Scientist at NASA’s Goddard Area Flight Heart
Earth planning date: Friday, March 21, 2025
It is the beginning of spring right here within the Northern Hemisphere on Earth, however in Gale Crater on Mars our rover continues to be heading into the depths of Martian winter. We’re only a few weeks away from Mars’ aphelion — the time when it’s farthest from the Solar. The Mars-Solar distance varies extra considerably than the Earth-Solar distance due to the better eccentricity of Mars’ orbit, and its impact on the Martian climate is correspondingly extra essential.
As my colleague talked about in the earlier weblog put up, the layered sulfate bedrock on this area is damaged up into giant blocks that always make the driving robust going. The drive within the sol 4486 plan went very properly, nonetheless, transferring Curiosity almost 35 meters (about 115 ft) southward and upward. Our new workspace is in one of many “light-toned” stripes that may be seen within the orbital imagery and is correspondingly stuffed with light-toned laminated blocks typical of what we’ve seen earlier than on this geologic unit.
For the second plan in a row we had been additionally in a position to make use of the rover arm, as a result of rover having parked in a secure place — not at all times a given on this terrain! This enabled us to plan a pair of compositional measurements by the APXS on a bedrock goal (“Solstice Canyon”) to evaluate each the bedrock composition after mud removing and the impact of the ever-present mud on the instrument at different areas the place the rock can’t be brushed. Our different compositional measurement software, the LIBS, was additionally recruited for a co-targeted measurement on Solstice Canyon.
The second LIBS measurement and a MAHLI commentary went to the one distinctive, probably diagenetic, function seen amongst the entire light-toned workspace blocks, a small grayish patch that appears like a vein or a coating within the photos accessible at planning (“Black Oak”). The deliberate observations will give us each the composition and morphology of it in a lot better element.
An extended-distance RMI imaging mosaic was deliberate to research some ridges on an as-yet-unnamed butte off to the west. The ridges could also be proof of the identical kind of diagenetic exercise that produced the boxwork constructions which can be the following main science goal for Curiosity. A passive spectral raster was additionally deliberate for a possible boxwork area. As we cannot be capable to rove to each potential boxwork on Aeolis Mons, longer-distance views comparable to these can provide us a way of how widespread the boxwork-forming exercise could have been.
Mastcam imaging included some follow-up on a hummocky sedimentary function (“Pino Alto”) and documentation of textures within the close by native bedrock (“Piedra Blanca”) in addition to documentation imagery for the 2 LIBS targets.
Lastly, the fashionable Martian ambiance was investigated with measurements by APXS and the ChemCam passive imager to trace abundances of argon and oxygen, respectively, as they differ with the Martian seasons.
