NASA sends its Mars Curiosity rover on a 'summer road trip' to Mount Sharp

NASA has sent its Mars Curiosity rover on a trip to a new area of Mount Sharp,  peak located in  center of Gale Crater. While rover has journeyed an area of colossal Mount Sharp kwn as  clay-bearing unit, NASA declared in a blog post that vehicle is w ready for a “summer road trip” on its own.  

A massive structure that sits in middle of a huge crater, colossal Martian mountain’s new areas will be explored by rover which will put a mile on Curiosity’s odometer, as per NASA. At least three miles high, area which acts as a timeline for Mars is extremely important for researchers and exploration would reveal each layer in detail. Roughly covering a mile (1.6 kilometers) of terrain, rover will be able to ascend to next section of 3-mile-tall Martian (5-kilometer-tall) mountain it's been exploring since 2014 recording conditions that support ancient microbial life.  

Curiosity was designed to go beyond Opportunity's search for history of water, said Abigail Fraeman of JPL, who has served as deputy project scientist for both missions. We're uncovering an ancient world that offered life a foothold for longer than we realized.

In next stop, rover will explore mountain called "sulfate-bearing unit.”It will record  climate and prospects for life that changed nearly 3 billion years ago. explorer will te presence of sulfates, like gypsum and Epsom salts, usually form around water as it evaporates on surface. Rover handlers will commanding Curiosity from home rar than ir offices at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Sourn California, as per NASA’s blog post. With a top speed range between 82 and 328 feet (25 and100 meters) per hour, rover will also stop along way to drill a sample. Most of trip would be covered relying on  rover's automated driving abilities to find safest path on its own.  

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Curiosity can't drive entirely without humans in loop, said Matt Gildner, lead rover driver at JPL. But it does have ability to make simple decisions along way to avoid large rocks or risky terrain. It stops if it doesn't have eugh information to complete a drive on its own. 

Exploring  sandstone cap

Rover, additionally, will take a trip to a slope with a sandstone cap kwn as  "Greenheugh Pediment” which largely represents  major transition in climate of Gale Crater. In this region, rover will discover details about how  lakes that existed in 96-mile-wide (154-kilometer-wide) crater disappeared.  

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(Ims Credit: NASA)