A rock on Mars spilled a shocking yellow treasure after Curiosity by chance cracked by way of its unremarkable exterior.
When the rover rolled its 899-kilogram (1,982-pound) physique over the delicate lump of mineral in Could 2024, the deposit broke open, revealing yellow crystals of elemental sulfur, generally known as brimstone.
Though sulfates are pretty frequent on Mars, this represented the primary sulfur in its pure elemental kind discovered on the crimson planet.
What’s much more thrilling is that the Gediz Vallis Channel, the place Curiosity discovered the rock, is plagued by objects that look suspiciously much like the sulfur rock earlier than it received fortuitously crushed – suggesting that, by some means, elemental sulfur could also be plentiful there in some locations.
Watch the video beneath for a abstract:
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“Discovering a subject of stones manufactured from pure sulfur is like discovering an oasis within the desert,” stated Curiosity challenge scientist Ashwin Vasavada of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in July 2024.
“It should not be there, so now we’ve to clarify it. Discovering unusual and sudden issues is what makes planetary exploration so thrilling.”
Sulfates are salts that kind when sulfur, normally in compound kind, mixes with different minerals in water.
When the water evaporates, the minerals combine and dry out, leaving the sulfates behind.
These sulfate minerals can inform us loads about Mars, reminiscent of its water historical past, and the way it has weathered over time.
Pure sulfur, however, solely types beneath a really slender set of circumstances, which aren’t recognized to have occurred within the area of Mars the place Curiosity made its discovery.
There are plenty of issues we do not know concerning the geological historical past of Mars, however the discovery of scads of pure sulfur simply hanging about on the Martian floor suggests that there is one thing fairly large that we’re not conscious of.
Sulfur, it is necessary to know, is an important factor for all life. It is normally taken up within the type of sulfates, and used to make two of the important amino acids dwelling organisms have to make proteins.
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Since we have recognized about sulfates on Mars for a while, the invention does not inform us something new in that space. We’re but to seek out particular indicators of life on Mars, anyway.
However we do hold stumbling throughout the stays of bits and items that dwelling organisms would discover helpful, together with chemistry, water, and previous liveable circumstances.
Caught right here on Earth, we’re pretty restricted in how we are able to entry Mars.
Curiosity’s devices had been capable of analyze and determine the sulfurous rocks within the Gediz Vallis Channel, but when it hadn’t taken a route that rolled over and cracked one open, it might have been a while till we discovered the sulfur.
A rock similar to the one damaged by Curiosity, photographed 9 days after the sulfur discovery. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)
The following step will likely be to determine precisely how, primarily based on what we learn about Mars, that sulfur might have come to be there.
That is going to take a bit extra work, presumably involving some detailed modeling of Mars’s geological evolution.
In the meantime, Curiosity will proceed to gather information on the identical.
The Gediz Vallis channel is an space wealthy in Martian historical past, an historic waterway whose rocks now bear the imprint of the river that after flowed over them, billions of years in the past.
Curiosity continues to be trundling its method alongside the channel, to see what different surprises is perhaps ready simply across the subsequent rock.
You may comply with Curiosity’s adventures within the rover’s science replace weblog.
Curiosity has collected 42 powderized rock samples with the drill on the top of its robotic arm. All 42 holes made by the drill are proven right here. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)
And greater than 5 years into its personal mission, NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover continues to be ambling throughout the floor of the crimson planet, doing what any five-year-old likes to do – stopping to have a look at each rock on its path.
One among its newest discoveries occurs to look surprisingly misplaced, prompting scientists to marvel if it might not have come from Mars in any respect.
Associated: ‘Main Discovery’: After Years of Analysis, Scientists Discovered a New Chemical Response
On June 19 2025, the six-wheeled explorer set a brand new report, formally finishing the longest highway journey of any robotic automobile on one other planet.
In a single drive, the rover rolled over 411 meters of Mars’ rocky floor. That will not sound like a lot, however in comparison with Curiosity and Alternative, which inch alongside at a relative snail’s tempo, Percy is a velocity demon.
The Mars robots actually are a marvel. They symbolize the intrepidity of the human spirit, resilience, and dedication. And, after all, our boundless curiosity concerning the Universe through which we stay.
An earlier model of this text was printed in July 2024.