Curiosity Touches Rock Then Moves On
September 25, 2012
Curiosity, NASA’s newest Mars rover, has resumed its trek across the surface of the red planet after using its huge robotic arm to touch a Martian rock for the first time. On September 22, Curiosity moved its Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) up against a football-sized rock to analyze the rock’s chemical elements. The rock was named “Jake Matijevic,” for an engineer on the Curiosity project who died shortly after the rover landed in Gale Crater on August 6.
Over the next several days, Curiosity also examined the rock with its Mars Hand Lens Imager, a high-resolution, close-up camera. Finally, Curiosity zapped the rock with its Chemistry and Camera instrument (ChemCam). Laser blasts from ChemCam turned the rock to glowing plasma, a gaseous form of matter composed of electrically charged particles. A telescope on the instrument then recorded the light given off for analysis by three spectrometers. The spectrometers spread out light and other types of electromagnetic waves into a spectrum and display it for study.
After completing its study of “Jake Matijevic,” Curiosity took its longest trip yet, driving 138 feet (42 meters) toward Glenelg, a rocky spot in Gale Crater. The rover will also study this area using its close-up camera and APXS instrument. The rover’s ultimate target is Mount Sharp (also known as Aeolis Mons), a mysterious 3-mile- (5-kilometer-) high mountain in Gale Crater. Mount Sharp consists of layers of rock that may have been laid down over billions of years. Although the mountain looks similar to layered mountains on Earth, scientists do not know exactly how it formed. As the rover scales the mountain, it will analyze the layers in an attempt to discover how Mars, which was once warmer and wetter, became so cold and dry.
Additional World Book articles:
- Mars Pathfinder
- Phoenix (spacecraft)
- Space exploration (Probes to Mars)
- The Search for Water on Mars (a Special Report)