After beginning its journey in the first week of March, NASA's Mars rover 'Curiosity' scaled the 6-feet-tall (20 metres) rock formation and captured a selfie along with a 3D panoramic view of the surroundings, NASA's Mars Mission website revealed on Tuesday.
A CNET report stated that the selfie was the first of its kind that has shown the Red Planet's stunning surroundings. Earlier images from rovers have focused on the rover itself, the story said.
Composed of 60 images, the selfies were captured by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on the rover’s robotic arm on March 26, which was the mission's 3070th Martian day — known as sol. The same images were merged with 11 images taken by the rover's Mastcam (camera atop its head) on March 16th to produce the final selfie.
Nicknamed after France's Mont Mercou, the Martian hill, NASA said is "at the transition between the clay-bearing unit Curiosity is departing and the sulfate-bearing unit" on Mount Sharp, which the rover has been scaling up since 2014.
NASA added that scientists have for long believed that the transition could help show how Mars became the desert planet that it is today.
(Published 01 April 2021, 10:35 IST)
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