Even though the Red Planet is now cold and dry, the landing site, Jezero Crater, was filled with a 1, 600-foot (500-metre) deep lake that opened to a network of rivers some 3.5 to 3.9 billion years ago. The 45-kilometre wide basin “could have collected and preserved ancient organic molecules and other potential signs of microbial life from the water and sediments that flowed into the crater billions of years ago,” NASA said in a statement.
At least five different kinds of rocks, including “clays and carbonates that have high potential to preserve signatures of past life,” are believed to lie in the crater, just north of the Martian equator, the US space agency said. Scientists have debated where to land the rover for the past four years, and whittled down their decision from a total of 64 possible sites.
The USD 2.5 billion rover a joint project of the European Space Agency and NASA is set to launch in July 2020, and land in February 2021. Mars 2020 is designed to land inside the crater and collect samples that will eventually be returned to Earth for further analysis, perhaps by the later 2020s.
Bhupendra Singh Chundawat is a seasoned technology journalist with over 22 years of experience in the media industry. He specializes in covering the global technology landscape, with a deep focus on manufacturing trends and the geopolitical impact on tech companies. Currently serving as the Editor at Udaipur Kiran, his insights are shaped by decades of hands-on reporting and editorial leadership in the fast-evolving world of technology.