It may look like a lightsaber sitting on the surface of Mars, but this titanium tube is actually a sample canister dropped off by the Perseverance rover. This could eventually be the first pristine sample of Martian soil and rock returned to Earth in a future mission.
Since it landed on the Red Planet in February 2021, Perseverance has been collecting samples of dust, rock and even air. While the rover analyzes many of these itself, some samples are stashed away in titanium tubes for a future mission called the Mars Sample Return campaign.
This mission, currently still in the planning stages, is expected to involve a series of robots that would run a relay race to get the samples back to Earth. First, Perseverance would hand off the samples it’s collected to another robotic lander that would set down nearby. From there, the lander would use a robotic arm to place the samples into a capsule on a small rocket. This would then blast off into orbit around Mars, where yet another spacecraft would grab them and finally bring the samples back to Earth for scientists to study, including looking for signs of microbial life.
But there’s also a backup plan in case something goes wrong with Perseverance before the Sample Return robots get there. The rover will drop 10 titanium tubes of samples at a location called Three Forks, which will serve as a depot that can be collected by two Sample Recovery Helicopters if need be.
On December 21, Perseverance dropped off the first of these canisters. It contains a sample of igneous rock that was collected on January 31 from a region called South Séítah. The rover retrieved the tube from inside its belly, checked it with its CacheCam, then dropped it about 3 ft (89 cm) to the ground. Next, the WATSON camera on the end of the rover’s 7-ft (2-m) robotic arm was swung around to peer underneath to make sure the tube hadn’t landed on its end or rolled into the path of the wheels.
The remaining nine tubes will be dropped at Three Forks over the next two months.
The Mars Sample Return campaign is described in the video below.
Source: NASA JPL
