Photos from Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover

I previously wrote about NASA’s launch of its Mars Perseverance Rover. Yesterday it successfully landed on the surface of Mars, and you can watch recorded coverage of the landing here:

Did you know that NASA will be posting raw images that are taken from the Perseverance Rover? You can find them here.

 

I was disappointed to find only 3 low-resolution (2 of the 3 images are 320x240 pixels, and the other is 1280x960 pixels) .png files at the moment. Perhaps they will post high-resolution raw files (i.e., straight out of the camera and unprocessed) at a later time. Maybe Perseverance only had the bandwidth to send thumbnails and the original raw files will take more time to be transmitted back to earth. Nevertheless, how cool is that?

Also notice that on the Raw Images website, each photo is accompanied by an acquisition date along with its corresponding day on Mars which is referred to as a sol or a Martian day. A sol is 24 hours, 39 minutes, and 35.244 seconds long which is only slightly longer than an earth day. However, a Martian year is approximately 668 sols, equivalent to approximately 687 Earth days. All 3 of the currant images were taken on February 18, 2021 which is designated as sol 0.

I plan to check back occasionally to see if more interesting images from Perseverance are posted to the Raw Images site. While looking for photos, I also happened to find the archives of raw images from the Mars Curiosity Rover (launched in 2011) which you can view here. Happy exploring, earthlings!

Send Your Name to Mars

NASA plans to launch its Perseverance rover to Mars, with a launch period between July 30 and August 15. The first launch attempt will be tomorrow, July 30, and the trip will take about 7 months. Did you know that you can be a part of the mission? You can send your name to Mars!

A placard commemorating NASA's “Send Your Name to Mars” campaign was installed on the Perseverance Mars rover. It contains 3 microchips with more than 10 million names of people who signed up before the deadline. The names were stenciled onto the chips using electron beam engraving. If you had previously signed up, you can retrieve your boarding pass. If you missed the time window to have your name etched into one of the chips, you can send you name to Mars in a future mission.

The “Send Your Name to Mars” campaign is intended to generate interest in NASA Mars missions. To find out more, visit https://mars.nasa.gov. From there, you can learn about prior and future missions to Mars. And if you join at the right time, you’ll be able to watch the launch broadcast.