Space and Physics
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NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover has just collected its 26th sample, named "Silver Mountain", and NASA has confirmed not only does it have curious textures "unlike anything we've seen before" but it's the oldest one yet.
Perseverance has been exploring a site called Blue Hill that has been described by the science team as of “immense scientific interest.” This is part of the Shallow Bay site and it is rich in a very peculiar type of pyroxene, an important mineral found in many igneous rocks. Pyroxene minerals are among the most common components of the Earth’s upper mantle. The rover has also been studying rocks with serpentine, a group of green minerals that might have formed from magma meeting water.
The region has low-calcium pyroxene and might be linked to a much larger rock unit detectable from space. Unfortunately, Blue Hill is the only outcrop on Perseverance’s path which makes this exploration invaluable, so it grabbed a sample.
"My 26th sample, known as 'Silver Mountain,' has textures unlike anything we've seen before," the official Perseverance account shared in a post on X.
The rock, which measures 2.9 centimeters (1.1 inches) across, is unique beyond the pyroxene. It is the oldest sample yet collected by Perseverance. It is from the Nochian epoch, an age in Mars’s geological history that ranges from 3.7 to 4.1 billion years ago.
“Between our Noachian-aged pyroxene sample and the newfound focus on serpentine-bearing rocks, our journey through Jezero Crater has never been more exciting. Each step — each scan, each drive, each core sample — brings us closer to understanding Mars’ complex past,” Nicolas Randazzo, a Postdoctoral Scientist at the University of Alberta, wrote on the NASA blog.
The sample is among the many that are expected to be delivered to Earth with the Mars Sample Return. The mission has suffered several setbacks and it has now been delayed by NASA. Its future depends on the next NASA administrator. With the Trump administration's sustained attacks on Science in the US, it is unclear what that future might be.
