Since its descent onto the Red Planet, the Mars Curiosity rover has made some informative discoveries – and it’s not even at the target location yet.

Purdue alumnus and NASA employee Douglas Adams was involved in the delivery of the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft, as the parachute cognizant engineer. Adams was responsible for the benign testing, building and delivery of the parachute used during the descent to Mars’ surface.

Although his work with the mission is complete, Adams still actively follows the mission and the spacecraft’s discoveries. The “prime mission,” meaning the span of time the rover was designed to last, is one Martian year, so a little over two Earth years. Today is the 74th Earth day of Curiosity’s “prime mission,” and it has driven just more than three-tenths of a mile.

Adams explained the landing location was set away from the target location – the 5-kilometer Mount Sharp – so it could analyze its surroundings on the way. One of the discoveries thus far indicates water as a past presence on the planet.

“They found rocks that were round, which of course indicates that there was water movement,” Adams said. “It’s the same way you get river rocks on Earth. The rocks were layered, basically compacted into the same kind of thing that you would find here.”

Enthusiast of the Curiosity rover’s mission Jay Melosh, a professor in the College of Science, said these Earth-like characteristics tie Mars much more closely to Earth.

“It appears that Mars was much more similar to conditions on Earth than it is now,” Melosh said. “This is part of the whole investigation of life in the Universe. ... We want to understand how common life is in the Universe.”

The 7-foot tall, 9-foot wide and 10-foot long rover is crawling at a speed of about three-tenths of a mile per hour, making its way to Mount Sharp, where there is evidence of water erosion.

Melosh said the discoveries so far have been exciting and the design objectives have not even been achieved yet.

Adams agreed the most anticipated science is still to come. For instance, the Radiation Assessment Detector, which measures the radiation environment with regards to human habitability, has not yet been used. He said the mission could also be a foreshadowing of a manned mission to the Red Planet.

“In the bigger picture, there is an interest of possibly sending humans to Mars, so this falls under the category of what we call a robotic precursor to a manned flight,” Adams said. “It’s telling us what science a human may want to do when on the surface ... It’s an important step in sending people to Mars.”

Quelle: purdueexponent