Clouds may be seen passing via the Martian sky in new photos taken by NASA's Curiosity rover.
Curiosity is one among NASA's Mars exploration automobiles which has been on the planet's floor since August 2012. It's the predecessor to the newer Perseverance rover which touched down on Mars nearly precisely one 12 months in the past in February, 2021.
Whereas Perseverance could also be extra technically superior, Curiosity continues to be working to today, and is conducting invaluable analysis on the Purple Planet.
Final week, NASA launched new photos from Curiosity that have been taken in mid-December final 12 months at a time when the rover was greater than 3,300 Martian days into its ongoing mission.
The photographs, taken utilizing Curiosity's navigation digital camera, are snapshots of Mars' clouds. Taken a while aside, the pictures have been stitched collectively to kind two eight-frame movies.
Taken from two completely different views, one of many movies reveals the clouds passing straight overhead whereas the opposite reveals the clouds passing over the panorama.
They are often seen beneath.
The presence of clouds on Mars doesn't imply liquid water, nevertheless. By evaluating the 2 views, scientists have been capable of calculate that the clouds have been round 50 miles excessive and have been most likely made out of carbon dioxide ice because of the extraordinarily low temperatures at that altitude.
Scientists also needs to be capable to calculate how briskly the clouds are shifting, although NASA didn't disclose a determine.
Mars is a chilly, inhospitable planet with a median temperature of round -81 levels Fahrenheit, and an environment largely composed of carbon dioxide with some water vapor.
It is not the primary time that Curiosity has photographed clouds on Mars. In Could 2021, NASA launched photos of "shining clouds" taken by the rover in March of that 12 months.
The area company described the Martian clouds as "wispy puffs full of ice crystals that scattered gentle from the setting Solar, a few of them shimmering with colour."
By learning photos of Mars' clouds, scientists can perceive how they kind on Mars and why some are completely different to others.
NASA's Mars rovers have a behavior of exceeding their preliminary deliberate operation occasions. Curiosity's major mission was attributable to final simply 23 months, however the rover continues to work practically a decade later.
Whereas that is little doubt a powerful feat of endurance, Curiosity is but to surpass the marathon efforts of the Alternative rover, which was designed to final simply 90 Martian days and journey round 3,300 ft after touchdown on Mars in 2004.
However Alternative simply saved on going and its mission was lastly declared over in February 2019 after failing to speak with Earth following a extreme mud storm.
By this time the rover had surpassed all expectations, surviving for greater than 60 occasions its life expectancy and travelling greater than 28 miles.
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