Jet Propulsion Laboratory<\/a> built the rover, which is leading its Mars mission. <\/p>\nAfter travelling for eight months and 352 million miles, the rover landed on Mars in 2012. NASA noted that it was the largest and most capable rover ever sent to Mars at the time. <\/p>\n
The rover has explored as much as 22 miles of the planet and previously found chemical and mineral evidence of previous habitable environments. <\/p>\n
According to NASA, the rover is continuing to gather samples and data from a time when Mars may have hosted microbial life. <\/p>\n
The one-inch rock was found in the Gale Crater, an impact basin. In June, Curiosity took images of a geological structure called \u201cspiderwebs\u201d because of its pattern of ridges, also indicating that Mars previously had water that has since hardened. <\/p>\n
![\"This](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1754895075_924_1-PIA26632-Curiositys_Views_its_Power_Source_While_Talking_to_an_Orbiter.png\")
<\/p>\n
open image in gallery<\/p>\n
This view of tracks trailing NASA\u2019s Curiosity was captured July 26, 2025, as the rover simultaneously relayed data to a Mars orbiter (NASA\/JPL-Caltech)<\/p>\n
\u201cThe images and data being collected are already raising new questions about how the Martian surface was changing billions of years ago,\u201d NASA said in a June statement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Red Planet once had rivers, lakes, and possibly an ocean. Although scientists aren\u2019t sure why, its water eventually dried up and the planet transformed into the chilly desert it is today,\u201d the agency added. \u201cRemarkably, the boxwork patterns show that even in the midst of this drying, water was still present underground, creating changes seen today.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEons of sandblasting by Martian wind wore away the rock but not the minerals, revealing networks of resistant ridges within,\u201d said the agency. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":136305,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[159,783,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-136304","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-space","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115008810755473917","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136304\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"On](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/1754895071_814_NASA.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/static.independent.co.uk\/2025\/08\/11\/0\/37\/mars-coral-ht-jt-250808_1754668477652_hpMain_4x3.avif\")
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