NASA has released an audio recording of its Perseverance rover firing lasers at the Martian surface. The strikes, which sound like a series of small prints, are designed to help scientists analyze the rocks around the rover. In this case, the target was a rock called ‘Máaz’, which scientists could discover was basaltic, BBC News reports, which means it contains a lot of magnesium and iron.
According to NASA’s website, the laser is fired by Perseverance’s ‘SuperCam’, which makes it possible to “zap and study” the rover at a distance of 7 meters on a rock as small as the period at the end of this sentence. . away. Once the laser has shot at a rock, it uses its camera and spectrometer to analyze the hot gas in which the rock evaporates. The sound created by the laser provides extra data about the rock being studied.
You’re listening to the first audio recordings of laser attacks on Mars. These rhythmic tapping sounds heard through the microphone on my SuperCam instrument have different intensities that can help my team figure out the structure of the rocks around me. https://t.co/nfWyOyfhNy
– NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover (@NASAPersevere) 10 March 2021
Since the successful landing last month, Perseverance has returned a variety of images and sound recordings from the surface of Mars. Although images of the planet are nothing new, this is the first time a Mars rover has used a microphone from the surface of Mars. NASA’s website notes that of two previous spacecraft that carried microphones to Mars, one failed, and the other one never turned on its microphone.
All of these data points are essential to help the SUV-sized rover as it performs its mission of searching for signs of life and analyzing the geology of the red planet. One Mars year, or two Earth years, is currently being spent exploring the area around its landing site, which was probably a lake billions of years ago.