Was ancient Mars habitable? NASA's Perseverance rover is grinding into a 'weird, uncooperative' rock to find out
NASA's Perseverance rover is digging deeper into Mars' geologic past as it begins grinding into Red Planet rock surfaces to expose material that could hold clues to the planet's ancient environment and habitability.
Earlier this month, the Perseverance rover used its abrasion tool to scrape away the top layer of a rocky Martian outcrop nicknamed "Kenmore," revealing a fresh surface for close-up analysis of the rock's composition and history. The procedure, which involves a combination of mechanical grinding and gas-blast cleaning, allows scientists to study rock interiors that haven't been altered by wind, radiation or dust over billions of years.
"Kenmore was a weird, uncooperative rock," Ken Farley, Perseverance's deputy project scientist, said in a statement. "Visually, it looked fine — the sort of rock we could get a good abrasion on and perhaps, if the science was right, perform a sample collection. But during abrasion, it vibrated all over the place and small chunks broke off. Fortunately, we managed to get just far enough below the surface to move forward with an analysis."
The recent abrasion marks a shift in the rover's focus from primarily scouting and sampling to more detailed in-situ science. Compared to its predecessors, Perseverance uses an advanced abrading bit and gaseous Dust Removal Tool, or gDRT, which applies five puffs of nitrogen to clear samples in a way that poses less risk of contamination. For comparison, earlier rovers used a brush instead to sweep debris, or tailings, out of the way.
After an abrasion is complete, Perseverance's science instruments are deployed to investigate the exposed rock. The rover's WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and Engineering) imager snaps close-up photos, while its SuperCam uses laser pulses to analyze the composition of vaporized material with one spectrometer and study visible and infrared light reflected from the freshly exposed surface with another.
"The tailings showed us that this rock contains clay minerals, which contain water as hydroxide molecules bound with iron and magnesium — relatively typical of ancient Mars clay minerals." Cathy Quantin-Nataf, SuperCam team member, said in the statement. "The abrasion spectra gave us the chemical composition of the rock, showing enhancements in iron and magnesium."
Perseverance also relies on its SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) and PIXL (Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry) instruments to help determine mineral content, chemical composition and potential signs of past water activity or even microbial life. In fact, not only did these tools find further evidence of clay, they also detected feldspar — a mineral common in Earth's crust as well as on the moon and other rocky planets. The team also found, for the first time, manganese hydroxide in the observed specimens.
"The data we obtain now from rocks like Kenmore will help future missions so they don't have to think about weird, uncooperative rocks," Farley said. "Instead, they'll have a much better idea whether you can easily drive over it, sample it, separate the hydrogen and oxygen contained inside for fuel, or if it would be suitable to use as construction material for a habitat."
The work is being carried out in Mars' Jezero Crater, a 28-mile-wide (45-kilometer-wide) basin that once hosted a river delta and lake. Scientists believe the region contains some of the best-preserved records of Mars' wet past, making it a prime location to search for biosignatures, or indicators of ancient life. Kenmore represents the 30th Martian rock that Perseverance has studied in such fine detail.
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Perseverance is also continuing to collect rock core samples, which are being sealed in tubes and stored for a possible future return to Earth through the planned Mars Sample Return (MSR) campaign — though the Trump administration's recently released FY 2026 NASA budget proposal suggests cutting the MSR program altogether.
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