NASA will return to the red planet. This time it will do so with technologies it had never used and, for the first time, it will be broadcast in Spanish. The voice that will guide the Spanish-speaking public will be that of the aeronautical engineer caleña Diana Trujillo.
“The universe is a pretty big place. If we’re alone in it, it would be a big waste of space.” This is one of the most famous phrases of Carl Sagan, the American astronomer and science communicator who inspired thousands of people around the world with his television show Cosmos.
Sagan not only motivated astronomers, astrophysicists or aerospace engineers, but he was also the driving force behind the creativity of many filmmakers who brought to the big screen stories about space travel and life on other planets.
Although they may seem like distant worlds, the world of science and the world of fantasy that allows us, institutions like NASA are working on projects that bring these two worlds together.
Such is the case of Rover Perseverance, which left planet Earth on July 30 last year bound for Mars, with the intention of fulfilling the dream of scientists and artists: to find life on the red planet.
The mission that will put the scout vehicle on the neighboring planet is called Mars 2020, and this Thursday, February 18 will pass a crucial stage of its development, Perseverance will land on the surface and begin its exploration with a high-tech team that NASA had not used on previous trips.
Seven sampling and exploration tools, including a helicopter detached from the vehicle, will be some of the innovations the Rover will have for its research.
In addition, Mars 2020 Perseverance carries more cameras than any interplanetary mission in history. The remote-controlled vehicle will land in an area called Jezero Crater. The reason they chose this space is because about 3.5 billion years ago it was the delta of a river with cliffs, sand dunes and rock fields that could have preserved organic molecules and other potential signs of microbial life. .
If this speculation is true, this mission would be the first to prove that life exists on other planets. The Rover will also try to get important data about the geology and climate of Mars that could help scientists understand why if at some point the red planet and Earth had some similarities, they ended up being so different.
Although many doubts are expected to be resolved with this trip, the amarterization that will take place this Thursday and the exploration that will take place are therefore only the first stage of a trip that is expected, for the first time in history, have a return.
Perseverance will collect pieces of rock cores and place them in sample tubes for storage at a download site, where a new trip prepared by the U.S. space agency will pick them up so they can be studied on Earth.
While NASA is optimistic about the results of the landing, it is important to note that only 50% of attempts to descend on the surface of the neighboring planet, made by all space agencies in the world, have successful and the possibility that Perseverance will not achieve its goal is alive.