The Martian rock that looks like a “skull” and whose origin be confusion to NASA’s scientists

In 2016, the Rover Perseverance of the NASA He found a peculiar and strange iron and nickel meteor that fell from the sky of the red planet. This copy, called «Egg Rock»He was the first examined with a laser on Mars, being one of the most important records since Rover landed in August 2012 on Martian soil.

“The dark, smooth and brilliant aspect of this goal, and its form similar to a sphere, attracted the attention of some MSL scientists when we received the Mastcam images in the new location,” he said at that time Pierre-Yves Meslinmember of the Chemcam team, of the Research Institute in Astrophysics and Planetology (Irap).

Now, almost ten years of this first finding, the Rover of the American space agency would have found a similar dark rock although its origin would be totally uncertain.

In the confines of Cráter Jezero Marciano, the Rover found this dark and eroded rock. Nickname “Skull Hill»—O« Hill of the skull » – by its shape, this peculiar stone has baffled the scientists of the agency, who have not managed to clarify their origin.

The first thing that attracted attention to NASA experts was LocalizaCión. Although the Martian land has been characterized by being is clear and dusty, Skull Hill stands out for its dark color. The images captured by the Rover also show small cavities or spaces that could be the result of long erosion processes.

As revealed by the different analyzes carried out by the SuperCam of the Perseverance – the tool that analyzes the chemical composition of the rocks – indicated that it does not have the high levels of iron or nickel that are usually found in meteorites from space, as in the example of 2016. discarded its possible Spatial originthe most likely theory is that it is an igneous rock, which could have been expelled from an impact crater.

«Fortunately for us, the Rover has instruments that can measure the chemical composition of the rocks on Mars. Understanding the composition of these darker masses will help the team interpret the origin of this unique rock, ”said the agency in a statement.

This is not the first curious finding of rover in recent months. In another region of the crater, the team detected small and bright spheres that also surprised the researchers.

In this case, the team of scientists baptized the rock as «San Pablo Bay». Composed of hundreds of small spheres of dark gray, this training was really intriguing for scientists. Specifically, some of these structures have eliptical lengthened forms, while others have more angular edges, suggesting that they could be fragments of fractured spherulites.

In the case of Skull Hill, it remains motionless under the red sky. The US agency has already confirmed that it will continue to analyze the properties of this rock, with the aim of obtaining information about the volcanic processes that could have starred in the past of the planet.