The first high resolution panorama that the Perseverance Mars Roverlanding site provides a strikingly detailed overview of Jezero Crater, including the cracked edge of the crater in the distance and low cliffs indicating the edge of an old river delta.
The panorama consists of 142 images taken by the Mastcam-Z camera instrument over the weekend, three days after the dramatic landing of the Rover.
Click on the image below to zoom in and explore that landscape.
The zoomable dual camera system is mounted on a remote sensing mast and can rotate 360 degrees to provide panoramic color and 3D images. It is capable of detecting something as small as a housefly over the length of a soccer field.
“I’m taking everything in,” the rover’s Twitter account reported Wednesday. “This is the first 360-degree view of my home that uses Mastcam-Z.”
Persistence landed last Thursday in a crater that once held a body of water the size of Lake Tahoe. Billions of years ago, water penetrated the crater through a channel that cut through the rim of the crater, depositing sediments in a broad delta formation as it filled the crater to a depth of hundreds of feet.
The water disappeared about three billion years ago, but the sediments may contain remnants of ancient microbial life. Perseverance is designed to collect promising rock and soil samples that will be deposited on the surface later this decade for recovery by another rover. The samples will then be launched into orbit for recording by a European spacecraft that wants to do so. bring them back to earth for detailed analysis.
NASA / JPL-Caltech / ASU / MSSS
The Mastcam-Z panorama looks out over the floor of the crater, showing Jezero’s rough edge in the distance and eroding cliffs indicating the edge of the delta formation. Sand marks in the area where rocket exhaust plumes hit the surface such as Perseverance is reduced to touch by his “sky crane” jet suit.
“We are located in a lovely place, where you can see different features that are in many ways similar to features found by (the earlier robbers) Spirit, Opportunity and Curiosity on their landing sites,” said Jim Bell, lead researcher of the Arizona State University, said. . ASU operates Mastcam-Z in partnership with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego.
NASA / JPL-Caltech / ASU / MSSS
One goal of the initial imaging campaign is to identify relatively flat, rock-free areas where a small helicopter, still attached to the robber’s abdomen, can be unloaded for testing to determine if flight in the thin Mars atmosphere is feasible. .
Initial test flights are expected in about two months.