Another map is nearing its end

This graph shows the relative elevation of various sampling sites visited by NASA's Perseverance Mars rover. Colored dots along the line represent targets where data was collected by the rover's SuperCam laser instrument; the colors correspond to different regions within Jezero Crater, which are labeled. The black diamonds represent locations where the rover's abrasion tool was used to collect data on rock composition. The x-axis indicates the sol, or day, of the rover's mission, and the y-axis shows elevation in meters. Jezero Crater sits about 8,530 feet (2,600 meters) below reference level (the equivalent for "sea level" on Mars, which does not have any oceans), which is why the numbers appear to be decreasing as Perseverance is gaining elevation.

The dotted horizontal lines represent estimated levels of ancient, now-dry lakes. Jezero Crater was filled by water for much of its history; this lake environment could have preserved signs of microbial life, if any formed here billions of years ago.

At the far right of the graph, the line suddenly jumps, indicating a sharp elevation gain, showing how quickly the rover has ascended toward the crater rim.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/IRAP/DLR/PIA26476

This press conference was recorded at AGU's 2024 Annual Meeting on 12 December 2024.

The week of AGU 2024, NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover will likely reach the highest point in its mission. Summiting the rim of Jezero Crater (it took three months of careful navigation – and a lot of slipping and sliding in Martian regolith) has been a goal of the Perseverance science team since the mission was conceived. Why? According to the mission’s project scientist Ken Farley: “The view will be great, but the science results promise to be even greater.”

The impact of that created Jezero Crater billions of years ago excavated Martian bedrock – placing 10 trillion tons of the Red Planet’s insides on and near the newly excavated crater’s rim. These rocks offer up a geologic bonanza from the basement of time as they’re not only the oldest rocks of the mission, but among the oldest in the solar system. During its exploration of the crater rim, the Perseverance science team expects to encounter a wide diversity of samples coming from different locations and depths of the Jezero region.

The Perseverance AGU 2024 briefing will include early science results from the crater’s rim, plans for exploration of the crater’s rim, and the latest science from the floor of Jezero Crater.

The briefing will also highlight a novel AI application – how Perseverance’s “Simple Planner” tool enables the rover to autonomously reschedule activities in response to changes in environmental conditions (such as Mars being warmer than expected, or rover energy/State of charge being higher than expected) as well as execution variations (e.g. activities taking longer or shorter than expected or failing). The energy savings created by Simple Planner translates into more time for science collection and significantly longer drives.

Panelists:

Lindsay Hays, NASA HQ 
Ken Farley, Caltech 
Candice Bedford, Purdue 
Justin Maki, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Includes the notional path for the next several years where it will explore outside the crater

We are actually there. Nili Planum. The outer edge of Syrtis Major, that dark "peninsula" one sees even through backyard telescopes, a big part of all those studies that people like Percival Lowell or Schiaparelli did, when the dreamer types were still looking for vegetation and canals. We've never known anything like this on Mars, even after decades of rovers exploring the planet.

It might be nice if we could actually see it!

We are now weeks into the springtime, but this muddy winter gloom just goes on and on and on. And there is so much to see here!

Credits - NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS/J. Roger (landru79)

4-tile NavCam from the top of the crater rim wall. To the left is the unexplored region outside the crater. To the right of this image is the slope down to the floor of Jezero crater. I'll add the view to the unexplored area in the comments of this post.

At this time we don't have the official drive distance etc, but I will add that in the comments when it becomes available

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/James Sorenson

Perseverance rover paused after its long drive and captured this splendid scene. The camera (MastCam-Z) was set at maximum zoom, and was acquired at the local mean solar time of 16:05. Image credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS

End-of-drive rear HazCam, looking down the rim wall slope it has been climbing since it left Neretva Vallis.

Credits NASA/JPL-Caltech

Marvel over NASA’s Mars rock collection. Each of these rock samples was selected by the agency’s Perseverance Mars rover team with the intention of returning them to scientific labs on Earth for in-depth study with instruments too large to send to the Red Planet. Mars Sample Return (MSR) is that crucial next step.

Considered one of the planetary science community’s highest priorities, MSR would be the first effort to bring back pieces of another planet and provides the best opportunity to answer fundamental questions about Mars' early evolution, its potential for ancient life, and its climate, while also unlocking mysteries that we have yet to even conceive. NASA is teaming with ESA (European Space Agency) on this important endeavor.

This video montage shows high-resolution imagery from Perseverance’s CacheCam of rock cores inside the rover's sample tubes. These snapshots preserve a record of each core before its tube is sealed. The video shows cores drilled by the rover between its February 2021 landing and December 2024, when it was climbing to the rim of Jezero Crater.

Read about all the carefully selected samples: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/mars...

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

No new names yet, and with the vast drives, I don't need to make a zoomed in version for now

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/Kevin M. Gill

Taken on 6 December 2024, 08:53:32

Source Mars2020 - Sol 1349 - MastCam-Z

Author Kevin M. Gill

Creative Commons attribution - This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

4-tile end of drive NavCam looking back at the rover's wheel tracks and beyond to the distant crater floor.

If the rover keeps up this pace of long drives we could reach the summit in another 2 or 3 drives, but there's some rocky outcrops on the path ahead, that may be of interest to the science team, so we may see a short break in the drives

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Climb: 31.42 meters (103.08 ft)

Drive: 164.84 meters (540.81 ft)

End-of-drive 4-tile processed NavCam

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Map and drive data will be added in the comments

A long drive and climb by Perseverance rover during Sol 1347 (December 3, 2024)

The drive distance was 173.45 meters / 569 feet, and an increase in elevation of 26.9 meters / 88.3 feet.

The post-drive tiled image attached is from one the rover's navigation camera at site 63-1150.

The image was acquired at 2:30pm local mars solar time. The updated map and drive data will be in the comments section of this post.

Image credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Don't try to tell me that there isn't at least one skier, boarder or sledder among the rover drivers.

Bonus points for the white powder they made with the abrasion tool (left of center, where the tracks meet the rocks). Pico Turquino may not be good enough for certain geologists, but some people know how to have fun on powder that no one has carved in 3 billion years.

This Rover also drove out of this one:

Processed post-drive 4-tile NavCam.

NASA/JPL-Caltech

Looking back with one of Perseverance's zoomable mast cameras (max zoom). This mosaic uses two overlapping images and shows the rover's wheel tracks made when it visited the science waypoint at Pico Turquino. The images were acquired on Sol 1341 from site 62.1840 just before 1 pm local mars solar time, from a distance of ~190 meters / 208 yards). For scale the wheel tracks measure ~3 meters / ~9.5 feet across. Image credits NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS

minor annotations added