The tiny Mars moon Phobos looms large on the sun's face in dramatic eclipse footage captured by NASA's Perseverance rover.
The life-seeking Perseverance took a break from its quest to reach an ancient Red Planet river delta to observe the moon passing across the sun.
The observations can help scientists better understand the moon's orbit and how its gravity pulls on the Martian surface, ultimately shaping the Red Planet.
Other Mars rovers have seen solar eclipses. The Mast cam-Z camera from Perseverance provides the most powerful view yet of the event, with a high frame rate not used before on the Martian surface.
I knew it was going to be good, but I didn't expect it to be this amazing, said Rachel Howson, one of the Mastcam-Z team members.
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One of Mars' two natural satellites is Phobos, which is 157 times smaller than Earth's moon. Deimos is smaller than Phobos. Scientists think the two bodies are former asteroids that were captured by Mars.
Researchers say that Phobos will crash into the Red Planet in a few tens of millions of years.
Roughly 20 years of eclipse observations like this, taken from rovers on Mars, have refined the understanding of that moon.
We are learning more about the structure of Mars from these observations. JPL officials said in the statement that these forces also change Phobos's position.
geophysicists can use those changes to better understand how pliable the interior of Mars is, revealing more about the materials within the crust and mantle.
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Phobos and/or Deimos have been caught in action by previous rover missions. JPL officials pointed to the time-lapse video that mission team members created from observations of Phobos.
The rover was able to capture solar eclipse videos thanks to its upgraded capabilities. As of this year, Opportunity and Spirit had observed 40 eclipses by Phobos and eight solar transits by Deimos.
Perseverance's Mastcam-Z has a sunglasses-like filter that reduces the intensity of the sun's light, allowing scientists to see bumps and ridges in the outline of Phobos. As a result of sunspots like those, the sun has been active all month.
Perseverance is on a years-long quest to hunt for signs of ancient life on Mars and to collect and cache dozens of samples that may hold evidence of Red Planet organisms. The European Space Agency and NASA plan to return samples to Earth over the next decade.
Ingenuity is a helicopter that accompanies Perseverance on its journeys. The little chopper has achieved 25 airborne sorties to date.
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