(CNN) – This might be the closest we’ve come to finding a flower Mars.
While investigating Martian rocks in Gale Crater, the Curiosity rover stumbled upon a small surprise. The rock artifact, which looks like a piece of coral or a flower, is smaller than a single coin.
The ‘flower’ of Mars and its adjacent spheroids were likely ‘made in the ancient past, when water-borne minerals cemented rocks’, According to NASA.
The Curiosity rover discovered this rock, smaller than a dime, which looks like a flower or a piece of coral inside Gale Crater on Mars on February 24. The tiny fragments in this image were created billions of years ago when water-borne minerals solidified rocks.
Curiosity snapped a photo of a small rock group on February 24 using the Mars Hand Lens Imager, a camera at the end of its robotic arm.
The finding is similar to other small features that Curiosity has discovered in the past, all of which formed “when mineral fluids travel through channels in the rock,” according to the agency. Previously, the Opportunity rover also discovered Martian “blueberries”tiny mineral globules indicate formerly aqueous soil on the Red Planet.
Every image that Curiosity collects and shares in these features helps researchers piece together the timeline for the presence of water in the crater.
A decade of exploration
Later this year, Curiosity will celebrate an important event: the tenth anniversary of Mars. Curiosity landed on the red planet on August 5, 2012. It has been exploring the crater and Mount Sharp in its center for a decade.
The mission is designed to determine if Mars is habitable for microbial life. Early on, the rover discovered chemical and mineral evidence that confirmed the planet’s habitability at some point in its distant past. Since then, Curiosity has been researching the geological record to understand when Mars was best suited to support life.
Curiosity continues to weave through steep rocks and hills, collecting rock and soil samples for analysis.
The car-sized rover has paved the way for the Perseverance rover and Creativity helicopter, which are currently exploring the Jezero crater, located 3,700 kilometers away, which will eventually bring the first Martian samples back to Earth through future missions. The combined efforts of these vehicles could help answer the ultimate question about whether life exists on Mars.
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