Hints of life?

(NLDO) - NASA's Perseverance rover has just found important new evidence of a world that once had alien life.

According to Universal Today, the new discovery by the life-hunting robot Perseverance occurred in an area called Bright Angel, inside a vast impact plain called Jezero Crater on Mars.

The unusual rocks — dubbed “popcorn rocks” by scientists — are evidence of something NASA has always hoped to find: The presence — or past presence — of water.

This image of the area that NASA's life-hunting robot is exploring shows a type of light-colored rock with a rough surface like popcorn, very common - Photo: NASA

Perseverance's mission focuses on ancient life on Mars.

Along with searching for fossil evidence of ancient life, or more fortunately something alive, it also searches for and tries to understand environments that could support life.

New evidence supports the theory NASA relied on when it launched this expensive robot to Mars: Jezero Crater may have been a wet plain billions of years ago, home to an Earth-like river and lake system teeming with life.

The Bright Angel area that NASA's robot is exploring is a scientifically interesting area. It is part of a tributary that leads into Jezero Crater.

Image taken from above by NASA's orbiter, marking the river branch and route that Perseverance passed through - Photo: NASA

The strange rocks in this area are strikingly bright in color, have a rough surface like popcorn, and have many ridges that look like mineral veins.

Mineral veins, which occur when water transports minerals through rocks and deposits them, are common in Earth rocks, so scientists believe that "popcorn rocks" are evidence of a world similar to Earth's lakes and rivers.

The next step is to identify the minerals present in these popcorn rocks.

Perseverance will use abrasive tools and other instruments to get a closer look. It will vaporize some of the rocks and use the SuperCam instrument suite to examine the rocks' chemistry.

If the results are positive, it can collect samples in tubes, one to take with it and one to drop back on site so that NASA spacecraft can access and bring them back to Earth.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/nasa-tim-ra-da-bap-rang-ngoai-hanh-tinh-goi-y-ve-su-song-196240620174544711.htm