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Gardens on Mars? No, Just Rocks!

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Gardens on Mars? No, Just Rocks!

A color photo from the Martian surface shows rough terrain, with numerous tan colored rocks in many shapes and sizes scattered and embedded in soil that’s a warm shade of brown. One rock is much larger, and flat, taking up most of the center-left of the image. On its surface is a shallow, circular impression — its ratio of width to depth like that of a coin — and the impression is surrounded on its right side by mounded dust, clearly dug out from the hole. Both the dust and the impression are a yellowish tan, very distinct from the surface of the flat rock. To the left of that, almost at the center-;eft edge of the image, is another hole, clearly deeper and surrounded on all sides by a higher mound of dust, the same yellow-tan color.
NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image of the area in front of it, showing the Serpentine Lake abrasion patch on the right-hand-side of the rock, with the Green Gardens sampling location on the left. The rover used its onboard Front Right Hazard Avoidance Camera A, and captured the image on Feb. 16, 2025 (sol 1420, or Martian day 1,420 of the Mars 2020 mission) at the local mean solar time of 16:45:19.
NASA/JPL-Caltech

Over the past week, Perseverance has been parked at a location called “Tablelands,” an area containing the “Serpentine Lake” abrasion patch acquired a few weeks ago. The Mars 2020 team has been diligently analyzing the data from the abrasion patch, and these findings led to the decision to return to Tablelands and attempt a sample at this location. Due to the disaggregated material thwarting our last sample attempt at “Cat Arm Reservoir,” the team was eagerly awaiting results from this sampling attempt at a target called “Green Gardens.”

Then, very early Monday morning, the CacheCam images came down confirming that Perseverance had collected another core on Mars! The team will be working next on sealing this sample tube.

A color photograph shows a bright yellowish-tan circle in the middle of the frame, surrounded by a very dark brown-gray background. Inside the circle, steaks of gold line the farthest edge, like veins in an ore deposit. The center part of the circle is uneven, looking like an orbital view of a tiny, rocky planet. In the two o’clock position on the circle, a shadow or depression resembles a perched bird, facing to the left.
NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using its onboard Sample Caching System Camera (CacheCam), located inside the rover underbelly. It looks down into the top of a sample tube to take close-up pictures of the sampled material and the tube as it’s prepared for sealing and storage. The material seen inside the coring bit is the Green Gardens sample. This image was acquired on Feb. 17, 2025 (sol 1420, or Martian day 1,420 of the Mars 2020 mission) at the local mean solar time of 19:16:24.
NASA/JPL-Caltech

Tablelands, the rock from which the Green Gardens core comes, is exciting to the Science Team because it contains serpentine minerals. These serpentine minerals likely formed several billion years ago when water interacted with rocks before Jezero crater formed. Water altered the minerals originally present in the rock into serpentine, which is often green in color. This characteristic green color is why the team chose the name “Green Gardens” for this sample target. These minerals are especially exciting because their structure and composition can tell us about the history of water on Mars. The formation of serpentine on Earth can support microbial communities, and the same might have been true on Mars. A sample like this from the Jezero crater rim is an important piece of the puzzle to Jezero’s watery past!

Perseverance is planning to conclude its time at Serpentine Lake with more science observations of the Tablelands outcrop. These measurements could include a reexamination of the Serpentine Lake abrasion patch and analysis of the tailings pile produced by the Green Gardens drill. After snaking around this area for a couple weeks, our next drives will take us further down the slope of the crater rim. We’ll head toward our next stop at a site called “Broom Point,” where more exciting discoveries await!

Written by Eleanor Moreland, Ph.D. Student Collaborator at Rice University

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Feb 24, 2025

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