Mars Looks Strangely Familiar in Stunning New Panorama
A 360-degree panorama, taken by the Perseverance Rover on Mars, could just as easily have been snapped in a rocky desert somewhere here on Earth.
The difference lies in a subtle tweak to the color contrast.
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"The relatively dust-free skies provide a clear view of the surrounding terrain," says planetary scientist Jim Bell, the principal investigator of the rover's 'eyes' – the two cameras of the Mastcam-Z instrument.
"In this particular mosaic, we have enhanced the color contrast, which accentuates the differences in the terrain and sky."
The only time the red planet's skies should look this blue is during a sunset – the opposite of the color scheme we see here on Earth.
Yet with just a hint of color enhancement, the resulting landscape is strangely familiar.
Looking through Percy's eyes across the jagged rocks, ripples of sand, and rolling hills, you can almost imagine you are standing in the Atacama desert.
That stark similarity is precisely why NASA scientists are testing future rovers in the Chilean desert.
Already, they have successfully detected molecular evidence of life there "in one of the most biologically sparse environments on Earth," according to a 2023 paper published in Astrobiology.
The hope is that one day, these new-and-improved rovers will join Perseverance, Opportunity, and Curiosity on Mars to accomplish similar feats.
But seeing the red planet through an Earthly lens is like wearing rose-tinted glasses. It sure looks promising, but as you can see from the natural-color version of the image, there's a lot that sets Mars apart from the Atacama.
As the fourth planet from the Sun, Mars receives less than half of the sunlight that Earth does, and the volume of its atmosphere is less than 1 percent of that of Earth's atmosphere.
Whether remnants of ancient life can exist under such hostile and destructive conditions remains to be seen… possibly with Percy's own two eyes.
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Forbes
a day ago
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