MSFC DIRECTOR PATRICK SCHEUERMANN WITH HIS COMMEMORATIVE SOFTBALL PRESENTED TO HIM BEFORE HE THREW THE FIRST PITCH AT THE NASA VERSUS ARMY SOFTBALL TOURNAMENT AS ONE OF THE 2013 MSFC PICNIC ACTIVITIES

NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter is viewed here through the Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) camera, part of the SuperCam instrument aboard NASA's Perseverance rover. This image was taken on May 14, 2021, the 82nd Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The RMI is able to spot a softball from nearly a mile away, allowing scientists to take images of details from a long distance. It also provides fine details of nearby targets zapped by SuperCam's laser. A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust). Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis. The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA24665

This composite image of the "Delta Scarp" in Mars' Jezero Crater was generated using data from two imagers aboard NASA's Perseverance rover. Taken by the rover's Mastcam-Z, the bottom image shows both the base and plateau of the escarpment. The inset above, created from a mosaic of five Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) pictures, zooms in on a 377-foot-wide (115-meter-wide) portion of the scarp, allowing closer inspection of some of its intriguing geologic features. Part of the rover's SuperCam instrument, the RMI is able to spot an object the size of a softball from nearly a mile away, allowing scientists to take images of details from a long distance. It also provides fine details of nearby targets zapped by SuperCam's laser. SuperCam is led by Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where the instrument's Body Unit was developed. That part of the instrument includes several spectrometers, control electronics and software. The Mast Unit was developed and built by several laboratories of the CNRS (French National Centre for Scientific Research) and French universities under the contracting authority of CNES. Arizona State University in Tempe leads the operations of the Mastcam-Z instrument, working in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego. A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust). Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis. The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA24684

Composed of five images, this mosaic of the Jezero Crater's "Delta Scarp" was taken on March 17, 2021, by the Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) camera aboard NASA's Perseverance rover from 1.4 miles (2.25 kilometers) away. Scientists believe the 377-foot-wide (115-meter-wide) escarpment is a portion of the remnants of a fan-shaped deposit of sediments that resulted from the confluence between an ancient river and an ancient lake. An annotated version of the same image (Figure 1) reveals location of a conglomerate (rock composed of coarse-grained pebbles mixed with sand) and examples of crossbedding (tilted layers of sedimentary rock that can result from water passing over a loose bed of sediment). Part of the SuperCam instrument, the RMI is able to spot an object the size of a softball from nearly a mile away, allowing scientists to take images of details from a long distance. It also provides fine details of nearby targets zapped by SuperCam's laser. SuperCam is led by Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where the instrument's Body Unit was developed. That part of the instrument includes several spectrometers as well as control electronics and software. The Mast Unit was developed and built by several laboratories of the CNRS (the French research center) and French universities under the contracting authority of CNES (the French space agency). A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust). Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis. The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA24683

The Remote Microscopic Imager (RMI) camera aboard NASA's Perseverance Mars rover took these zoomed-in images of the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter and one of its rotor blades on Feb. 24, 2024, the 1,072nd Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The mosaic shows the helicopter at right, standing at an angle near the apex of a sand ripple. About 49 feet (15 meters) to the west of the helicopter's location (just left of center in the image), a large portion of one of the helicopter's rotor blades lies on the surface. The Ingenuity team is considering a theory that the blade detached after the rotorcraft impacted the Martian surface at the conclusion of the helicopter's 72nd and final flight on Jan. 18, 2024. This mosaic is made up of seven images taken by the RMI, which is part of the rover's SuperCam instrument. At the time these images were taken, the distance between the rover and helicopter was about 1,365 feet (415 meters). Each circular image has a field of view of 26 feet (7.8 meters) at this distance. Able to spot a softball from nearly a mile away, the RMI allows scientists to take images of details from a long distance. It also provides fine details of nearby targets zapped by SuperCam's laser. SuperCam is led by Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where the instrument's body unit was developed. The mast unit, including the RMI used for these images, was developed and built by several laboratories of the CNRS (the French research center) and French universities under the contracting authority of Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES), the French space agency. A key objective for Perseverance's mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet's geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust). Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis. The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA's Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA26238