Perseverance Rover

Like the Junocam they tried to kill ingenuity but like the Junocam it proved to be quite useful and valuable.
 
Opposition to Ingenuity

The idea to include a helicopter in the Mars 2020 mission was opposed by several people. Up until the end of the 2010s, several NASA leaders, scientists and JPL employees argued against integrating a helicopter into the mission. For three years, the future Ingenuity was developed outside the Mars 2020 project and its budget.[60][61] And although NASA management accepted assurances in the spring of 2018 that the addition of a helicopter would not harm the goals of the expedition, Mars 2020 chief scientist, Kenneth Farley, stated "I have personally been opposed to it because we are working very hard for efficiencies and spending 30 days working on a technology demonstration does not further those goals directly from the science point of view".[62] Farley was convinced that the helicopter was a distraction from the priority scientific tasks, unacceptable even for a short time.[62]

The skepticism on the part of NASA leadership was not unfounded. Scientists, engineers and managers proceeded from a pragmatic comparison of the benefits of additional aerial reconnaissance with the costs that inevitably fall on the schedule for the rover to complete all the tasks assigned to it. During a live-stream from NASA, MiMi Aung, the Ingenuity Project Manager, and Jennifer Trosper discussed the value of Ingenuity. Trosper argued that the rover would outpace the helicopter due to its auto-navigation capability, thus negating one of central arguments for the value to the mission of the helicopter. During the operations on Mars, Tosper was shown to be correct when, in the spring of 2022, at the beginning of Sol 400 the helicopter fell behind the rover.
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There were a number senior management personnel who opposed the Ingenuity helicopter for several reasons, fortunately they were circumvented and Ingenuity's performance on Mars well beyond its' designers expectations proved these opponents wrong.
 
NMaude said:
Opposition to Ingenuity

There were a number senior management personnel who opposed the Ingenuity helicopter for several reasons, fortunately they were circumvented and Ingenuity's performance on Mars well beyond its' designers expectations proved these opponents wrong.
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No, Ingenuity's performance had nothing to do with it. Whether it worked or not had no bearing on the matter. The issue was accommodating the helicopter and the risk it posed to the rover.
 
Ingenuity was kinda cherry on the cake, but the real deal with that mission was a) the rover and b) Mars Sample Return: caching samples.
These two could not be allowed to fail... and even less because of a smallish helicopter drone.

My understanding is that the emplacement of the helicopter below the rover (to be dropped before deployment and flight) could have wrecked the rover if the drop had not happened because of some glitch. End result: the loss a $billion nuclear rover (and a slice of future MSR) to a tiny drone helicopter. That was found to be pretty unacceptable risk.

The helicopter supporters took note of that, and then successfully fought back. In the end everybody was happy: rover worked, did his slice of MSR, while the helicopter flew 72 times rather than 5 planned.

But space exploration history is littered with "no happy ending" failures...
 
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See Ingenuity’s Flight Map: 72 Helicopter Flights on Mars

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7DFnNimSfw


Apr 18, 2024
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter became the first vehicle to achieve powered, controlled flight on another planet when it took to the Martian skies on April 19, 2021. This video maps the location of the 72 flights that the helicopter took over the course of nearly three years. Ingenuity far surpassed expectations — soaring higher and faster than previously imagined.

Designed to be a technology demonstration that would make no more than five test flights in 30 days, Ingenuity eventually flew more than 14 times farther than the distance expected, and logged more than two hours of total flight time. It flew for the final time on Jan. 18, 2024.

For more information on Ingenuity, visit: go.nasa.gov/ingenuity.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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Will Perseverance eventually find microscopic life on Mars now that the SHERLOC instrument has been re activated? I would like to think so.
 
The six-wheeled geologist found a fascinating rock that has some indications it may have hosted microbial life billions of years ago, but further research is needed.
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Analysis by instruments aboard the rover indicates the rock possesses qualities that fit the definition of a possible indicator of ancient life. The rock exhibits chemical signatures and structures that could possibly have been formed by life billions of years ago when the area being explored by the rover contained running water. Other explanations for the observed features are being considered by the science team, and future research steps will be required to determine whether ancient life is a valid explanation.
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Multiple scans of Cheyava Falls by the rover’s SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) instrument indicate it contains organic compounds. While such carbon-based molecules are considered the building blocks of life, they also can be formed by non-biological processes.
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While both the organic matter and the leopard spots are of great interest, they aren’t the only aspects of the Cheyava Falls rock confounding the science team. They were surprised to find that these veins are filled with millimeter-size crystals of olivine, a mineral that forms from magma. The olivine might be related to rocks that were formed farther up the rim of the river valley and that may have been produced by crystallization of magma.

If so, the team has another question to answer: Could the olivine and sulfate have been introduced to the rock at uninhabitably high temperatures, creating an abiotic chemical reaction that resulted in the leopard spots?
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www.jpl.nasa.gov

NASA’s Perseverance Rover Scientists Find Intriguing Mars Rock

The six-wheeled geologist found a fascinating rock that has some indications it may have hosted microbial life billions of years ago, but further research is needed.
www.jpl.nasa.gov www.jpl.nasa.gov
 
The discovery provides some wind in the sails for NASA's flagging efforts to devise and fly a Mars Sample Return mission. The agency's most recent plan, costing $11 billion, was determined to be too expensive. Now, the space agency is asking the industry for help. In June it commissioned 10 studies on alternative means of returning rocks from Mars sooner, and presumably for a lower cost.

Now, scientists can point to rocks like Chevaya Falls and say this is precisely why they must be studied in ultra-capable labs back on Earth.
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arstechnica.com

No, NASA hasn’t found life on Mars yet, but the latest discovery is intriguing

"These spots are a big surprise."
arstechnica.com arstechnica.com
 

A Striped Surprise​

Last week, team scientists and the internet alike were amazed when Perseverance spotted a black-and-white striped rock unlike any seen on Mars before. Is this a sign of exciting discoveries to come?
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science.nasa.gov

A Striped Surprise - NASA Science

Last week, team scientists and the internet alike were amazed when Perseverance spotted a black-and-white striped rock unlike any seen on Mars before. Is this a sign of exciting discoveries to come?
science.nasa.gov science.nasa.gov
 
Interesting discovery Flyaway, I wonder what is behind the stripes on the rock are? Weathering or something else? But let's see what else Perseverance see's on Mars.
 
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Mars cleans Perseverance and erases its work

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuXynIUdH-I


Jul 6, 2025
Episode 222
Perseverance is a robotic field geologist observing the aftermath of events that occurred millions to billions of years ago. But it's also a witness to events happening today that have shaped the surface of Mars across geologic time.
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NASA Mars@NASAMars
·
On Wednesday, Sept. 10 at 11am EDT,
@NASA will host a media teleconference with Acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy and experts from the Mars Perseverance mission to discuss the analysis of a rock sampled by the rover.
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https://twitter.com/x/status/1965198005818314961
View: https://x.com/NASAMars/status/1965198005818314961



Details of New Perseverance Mars Rover Finding

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-StZggK4hhA


Scheduled for Sep 10, 2025
Experts discuss the analysis of a rock sampled by NASA's Perseverance Mars rover last year. The sample, called “Sapphire Canyon,” was collected in July 2024 from a set of rocky outcrops on the edges of Neretva Vallis, a river valley carved by water rushing into Jezero Crater long ago.

Participants in the teleconference include:
- Acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy
- Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington
- Lindsay Hays, Senior Scientist for Mars Exploration, Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters
- Katie Stack Morgan, Perseverance Project Scientist, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California
- Joel Hurowitz, planetary scientist, Stony Brook University, New York
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"This just in!" to use a news phrase,

Mars Guy Oct 12, 2025
Episode 236Every mission to the surface of Mars has in some way helped prepare for the eventual arrival of humans. But no mission has gone as far as Perseverance with its effort to test the materials that will keep astronauts alive on the surface.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/semeion/
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Perseverance being on Mars for just about five years? Hasn't time flown by. It will be good to see where Perseverance goes next and what discoveries it uncovers.
 

Perseverance Rover’s View of Crater Rim Drive

an 30, 2026
This animation shows Perseverance’s point of view during drive of 807 feet (246 meters) along the rim of Jezero Crater on Dec. 10, 2025, the 1,709th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Captured over two hours and 35 minutes, 53 Navigation Camera (Navcam) image pairs were combined with rover data on orientation, wheel speed, and steering angle, as well as data from Perseverance's Inertial Measurement Unit, and placed into a 3D virtual environment. The result is this reconstruction with virtual frames inserted about every 4 inches (0.1 meters) of drive progress.

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed for the agency by Caltech, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.

For more about Perseverance: science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-2020-perseverance/

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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View: https://youtube.com/watch?v=LO2GluKu4C8
 
https://twitter.com/x/status/2017315217479504080
View: https://twitter.com/NASAJPL/status/2017315217479504080


NASA JPL

@NASAJPL
Perseverance just did something it’s never done before.

On Dec. 8 and 10, 2025, the Mars rover completed drives planned by generative AI. The first-of-its-kind demonstration hints at a future of more efficient exploration and even more science. https://jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasas-perseverance-rover-completes-first-ai-planned-drive-on-mars/
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View: https://youtube.com/watch?v=0QtS85SRnOE
 
NASA’s Perseverance Now Autonomously Pinpoints Its Location on Mars [Feb. 18]

A new technology developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California enables Perseverance to figure out its whereabouts without calling humans for help. Dubbed Mars Global Localization, the technology features an algorithm that rapidly compares panoramic images from the rover’s navigation cameras with onboard orbital terrain maps. Running on a powerful processor that Perseverance originally used to communicate with the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, the algorithm takes about two minutes to pinpoint the rover’s location within some 10 inches (25 centimeters). Mars Global Localization was first used successfully in regular mission operations on Feb. 2, then again Feb. 16.
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The upgrade is especially valuable given how well Perseverance’s auto-navigation self-driving system has been working.
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The small team began working in 2023, testing the accuracy of the algorithm they’d developed using data from 264 previous rover stops. The algorithm compared rover panoramic photos to MRO imagery and correctly pinpointed the rover’s location for every single stop.
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Use of Ingenuity to refine it:
Tapping into the HBS computer has had its challenges. To address reliability, the team developed a “sanity check”: The algorithm runs on the HBS multiple times before one of the rover’s main computers checks to ensure the results match. During testing, the team repeatedly found the rover’s position was off by 1 millimeter.
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