Categories: CuriosityMarsMars Science Laboratory

MSL Update: Curiosity Finds Calcium-Rich Deposits

Veins in Rocks on Mars and Earth. Ccredit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL/CNES/IRAP/LPGNantes/CNRS/LGLyon/Planet-Terre

Justin Maki, the Engineering Camera Team Lead for the Mars Science Laboratory provides the latest Curiosity Rover Report from JPL and talks about how the rover has found calcium deposits on Mars similar to those seen on Earth when water circulates in cracks and rock fractures.

The set of images below shows the similarity of sulfate-rich veins seen on Curiosity rover to sulfate-rich veins seen on Earth. The view on the left is a mosaic of two shots from the remote micro-imager on Curiosity’s Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument on Dec. 14, 2012, or the 126th sol, or Martian day, of operations. They show a view of “Sheepbed” rock in the “Yellowknife Bay” area of Mars. The sulfate-rich veins are the light-colored veins about 1 to 5 millimeters (0.04 to 0.2 inches) wide.

The image on the right is from the Egyptian desert on Earth. A pocket knife is shown for scale. (image courtesy of Pierre Thomas).

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Nancy Atkinson

Nancy has been with Universe Today since 2004, and has published over 6,000 articles on space exploration, astronomy, science and technology. She is the author of two books: "Eight Years to the Moon: the History of the Apollo Missions," (2019) which shares the stories of 60 engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make landing on the Moon possible; and "Incredible Stories from Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos" (2016) tells the stories of those who work on NASA's robotic missions to explore the Solar System and beyond. Follow Nancy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Nancy_A and and Instagram at and https://www.instagram.com/nancyatkinson_ut/