NASA's Perseverance rover on Mars has collected its 24th sample of Jezero Crater. The 'Comet Geyser' sample is "great for biosignature studies," according to the space agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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TechTranscript
00:00Sample 24 is called Comet Geyser, and we collected it from the Bunsen Peak rock on the margin unit.
00:08The Comet Geyser sample is really exciting for several reasons.
00:12This rock is dominated by silica and carbonate.
00:15These phases are known on Earth to be good at preserving biosignatures.
00:20Carbonate is a phase that forms in association with fluids such as water,
00:25which is really important in our search for evidence for past life on Mars.
00:30It's still a bit of a mystery what this rock is.
00:33There are interesting textures that could be consistent with either an igneous rock or a sedimentary rock.
00:41And that's what makes it so exciting to us as scientists,
00:43is because we get to put our thinking caps on and really try and solve this puzzle.