Perseverance: Nasa Mars rover collects ‘amazing’ rock samples

The US space agency’s Perseverance rover is close to completing its first set of objectives on Mars.

The Nasa robot has collected a diverse set of rock samples that it will soon deposit on the surface, awaiting carriage to Earth by later missions.

It’s 17 months since the vehicle arrived in an area called Jezero Crater, slung below a rocket crane.

Everything “Percy” has seen since confirms to scientists the rover is in the perfect place to hunt for life.

It’s not looking for any organisms that are alive today; the harsh environment on Mars makes their presence highly improbable. Rather, the robot is searching for the traces of biology that could have existed billions of years ago when Jezero was filled with a lake.

This ancient history, scientists hope, is now recorded in the “amazing” rock samples that will be laid down in “a depot” in the next couple of months.

“If [Jezero’s ancient] conditions existed pretty much anywhere on Earth at any point in time over the last 3.5 billion years, I think it’s safe to say, or at least assume, that biology would have done its thing and left its mark in these rocks for us to observe,” said David Shuster, a Perseverance mission scientist from the University of California, Berkeley.