China’s Mars rover completes main mission, continues exploration of Mars – IT Pro – News

The Chinese Mars rover Zhurong has completed its primary mission on the Red Planet. The Mars rover will explore the surface of Mars for 90 sols, or about 92 Earth days. The craft continues to explore the Red Planet even after its mission is complete.

China’s space agency CNSA writes that Zhurong has successfully completed all of its proposed missions, writes the organization. Since its landing in the Utopia Planetia region of Mars in mid-May, the Mars probe has, among other things, traveled 900 meters above the surface of Mars and analyzed various types of rocks and other surfaces. According to CNSA, the Zhurong is “in excellent condition” and fully charged.

Land of Zhurong on May 15 on the Red Planet and has since conducted research on Utopia Planitia, a region on Mars where there may have been an ocean in the past and where there may have been ice underground. Among other things, Zhurong conducted research on the surface of Mars and searched for signs of life on the planet. To do this, the Mars probe had six different instruments for scanning the soil, including a radar instrument that could see through the surface of the planet.

According to CNSA, Zhurong’s measuring instruments are working well and the Mars rover has sent 10 gigabytes of raw science data to Earth using the Tianwen 1 orbiter. This orbiter is said to have flown over Zhurong’s site once a day to transmit data back to Earth, he also writes . Space.com.

Hopefully, this data will eventually help scientists better understand Mars and its history. “We hope, by providing this data to our scientists, we can get a deeper understanding of the geology of Mars, and then see if we can find evidence of an ancient ocean in Utopia Planitia,” said Tianwen’s chief designer. to CCTV.

The rover on Mars will be temporarily offline between mid-September and the end of October. This is due to the expected interruption of its contacts with the Earth, due to solar electromagnetic radiation. After that, Zhurong would resume his mission.