As a part of NASA’s 2020 exploration program of the red planet, the Perseverance rover was launched on 30 July 2020 and successfully landed on the Jezero Crater of Mars on 18 February 2021.
WHY WAS IT NAMED “PERSEVERANCE”?
Alexander Mather, a 7th grader earned the honor to name the rover after winning the entry to NASA’s "Name the Rover" essay contest. “Alex’s entry captured the spirit of exploration.", said Thomas Zurbuchen, the Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA.
PURPOSE OF THE MISSION:
The rover was designed - to study and look for signs of habitability, identify past environments capable of supporting microbial life, seeking biosignatures of possible past microbial life in those environments, testing oxygen production for future expeditions on the Martian atmosphere.
TECH SPECS:
Length - 10 feet (3 meters) Width - 9 feet (2.7 meters) Height - 7 feet (2.2 meters) Weight / Mass - 1,025 kilograms / 2,260 pounds
COST:
The funding for the design and construction of the spacecraft itself was about $2.2 billion.
PEOPLE BEHIND THE MISSION:
1. Katie Stack Morgan - Deputy project scientist of the mission, with interests in Martian sedimentology, stratigraphy, and geologic mapping of planetary surfaces.
2. Moo Stricker - leads the Planetary Protection of the mission. Her job is to make sure the rover is sterile before it lands on Mars because the germs from Earth would interfere in the detection of microbial life.
3. Allen Chen - Systems engineer who leads the landing team for Perseverance.
4. Heather Bottom - Systems engineer who helped in strategizing the rover's launch and journey to Mars.
5. Michelle Tomey Colizzi - Mechanical engineer who was responsible for assembling the spacecraft focusing on the aeroshell, the capsule that will prevent the rover from coming across any severe damages during its interplanetary trip to Mars.
6. Diana Trujillo - Aerospace engineer at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and currently leads the engineering team responsible for the robotic arm of the rover.
7. Eric Aguilar - Supervises a laboratory where engineers test models of the rover subsystems to make sure they function as expected before the rover touches down Mars.
8. Swati Mohan - Acting as the "eyes and ears", Mohan leads the guidance and controls operations for the Perseverance rover mission, and was the one who delivered the news about the successful touchdown on Mars.