The American Curiosity rover has discovered a meteorite on the Red Planet. The alien object is about 30 cm wide and is composed primarily of iron and nickel, the team said. Curiosity. And he also got the name – “Cocoa” (Cacao).
Meteorite “Cocoa”. Image Source: NASA
Curiosity landed in Mars’ 154km-wide Gale crater in August 2012 to answer the question of whether life could exist in this area. The data collected over the past ten years was enough to persuade scientists to an affirmative answer: there could be potentially inhabited lakes and streams here. It is even likely that the watershed persisted for several million years, and this could be enough for the development of Martian microorganisms.
Meteorite “Lebanon”
Curiosity does not try to look for signs of the microbes themselves – this work is entrusted to the Perseverance rover, which in February 2021 landed in another Martian crater Lake. Since September 2014, Curiosity has been climbing the slopes of Mount Sharp, a huge massif that towers 5.5 km above Gale Crater. Recently, the probe reached sulfate-rich deposits that formed in relatively dry conditions – perhaps these rocks will help scientists understand how Gale Crater and Mars in general were able to turn from a relatively warm and humid place to the current cold desert.
Meteorite “Egg Stone”
To date, Curiosity has covered 29.47 km on the surface of Mars, and it has previously stumbled upon meteorites. In 2014, the rover found its first alien object, later called “Lebanon” (Lebanon) – its size is about 2.1 m, and in 2016 a meteorite was found, which was given the name “Egg Rock” (Egg Rock).
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