NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover uses SHERLOC - one of several instruments on the end of its robotic arm - to study rocks in an area nicknamed ’Skinner Ridge.’
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover uses SHERLOC - one of several instruments on the end of its robotic arm - to study rocks in an area nicknamed 'Skinner Ridge.' A cutting-edge instrument called SHERLOC, which hunts for molecules potentially related to ancient life, played a key role in a recent study. In its first 400 days on Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover may have found a diverse collection of organics - carbon-based molecules considered the building blocks of life - thanks to SHERLOC , an innovative instrument on the rover's robotic arm. Scientists with the mission, which is searching for evidence that the planet supported microbial life billions of years ago, aren't sure whether biological or geological sources formed the molecules, but they're intrigued. Short for Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals, SHERLOC helps scientists decide whether a sample is worth collecting. This makes the instrument essential to the Mars Sample Return campaign. The Perseverance rover is the first step of the campaign, a joint effort by NASA and ESA (European Space Agency) that seeks to bring scientifically selected samples back from Mars to be studied on Earth with lab equipment far more complex than could be sent to the Red Planet.
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