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Hubble Takes Mars Portrait Near Close Approach
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By NASA
Explore Hubble Hubble Home Overview About Hubble The History of Hubble Hubble Timeline Why Have a Telescope in Space? Hubble by the Numbers At the Museum FAQs Impact & Benefits Hubble’s Impact & Benefits Science Impacts Cultural Impact Technology Benefits Impact on Human Spaceflight Astro Community Impacts Science Hubble Science Science Themes Science Highlights Science Behind Discoveries Universe Uncovered Hubble’s Partners in Science AI and Hubble Science Explore the Night Sky Observatory Hubble Observatory Hubble Design Mission Operations Science Operations Astronaut Missions to Hubble Hubble vs Webb Team Hubble Team Career Aspirations Hubble Astronauts Multimedia Images Videos Sonifications Podcasts e-Books Online Activities 3D Hubble Models Lithographs Fact Sheets Posters Hubble on the NASA App Glossary News Hubble News Social Media Media Resources More 35th Anniversary Online Activities 2 min read
Hubble Surveys Cloudy Cluster
This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the nebula LMC N44C. ESA/Hubble & NASA, C. Murray, J. Maíz Apellániz This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a cloudy starscape from an impressive star cluster. This scene is in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy situated about 160,000 light-years away in the constellations Dorado and Mensa. With a mass equal to 10–20% of the mass of the Milky Way, the Large Magellanic Cloud is the largest of the dozens of small galaxies that orbit our galaxy.
The Large Magellanic Cloud is home to several massive stellar nurseries where gas clouds, like those strewn across this image, coalesce into new stars. Today’s image depicts a portion of the galaxy’s second-largest star-forming region, which is called N11. (The most massive and prolific star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud, the Tarantula Nebula, is a frequent target for Hubble.) We see bright, young stars lighting up the gas clouds and sculpting clumps of dust with powerful ultraviolet radiation.
This image marries observations made roughly 20 years apart, a testament to Hubble’s longevity. The first set of observations, which were carried out in 2002–2003, capitalized on the exquisite sensitivity and resolution of the then-newly-installed Advanced Camera for Surveys. Astronomers turned Hubble toward the N11 star cluster to do something that had never been done before at the time: catalog all the stars in a young cluster with masses between 10% of the Sun’s mass and 100 times the Sun’s mass.
The second set of observations came from Hubble’s newest camera, the Wide Field Camera 3. These images focused on the dusty clouds that permeate the cluster, providing us with a new perspective on cosmic dust.
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Claire Andreoli (claire.andreoli@nasa.gov)
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD
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Last Updated Sep 11, 2025 Editor Andrea Gianopoulos Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
Astrophysics Astrophysics Division Goddard Space Flight Center Hubble Space Telescope Nebulae Star-forming Nebulae Keep Exploring Discover More Topics From Hubble
Hubble Space Telescope
Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe.
Hubble’s Nebulae
These ethereal veils of gas and dust tell the story of star birth and death.
Hubble’s Night Sky Challenge
35 Years of Hubble Images
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By NASA
This animation depicts water disappearing over time in the Martian river valley Neretva Vallis, where NASA’s Perseverance Mars takes the rock sample named “Sapphire Canyon” from a rock called “Cheyava Falls,” which was found in the “Bright Angel” formation. Credit: NASA Lee este comunicado de prensa en español aquí.
A sample collected by NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover from an ancient dry riverbed in Jezero Crater could preserve evidence of ancient microbial life. Taken from a rock named “Cheyava Falls” last year, the sample, called “Sapphire Canyon,” contains potential biosignatures, according to a paper published Wednesday in the journal Nature.
A potential biosignature is a substance or structure that might have a biological origin but requires more data or further study before a conclusion can be reached about the absence or presence of life.
“This finding by Perseverance, launched under President Trump in his first term, is the closest we have ever come to discovering life on Mars. The identification of a potential biosignature on the Red Planet is a groundbreaking discovery, and one that will advance our understanding of Mars,” said acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy. “NASA’s commitment to conducting Gold Standard Science will continue as we pursue our goal of putting American boots on Mars’ rocky soil.”
NASA’s Perseverance rover discovered leopard spots on a reddish rock nicknamed “Cheyava Falls” in Mars’ Jezero Crater in July 2024. Scientists think the spots may indicate that, billions of years ago, the chemical reactions in this rock could have supported microbial life; other explanations are being considered.Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover took this selfie, made up of 62 individual images, on July 23, 2024. A rock nicknamed “Cheyava Falls,” which has features that may bear on the question of whether the Red Planet was long ago home to microscopic life, is to the left of the rover near the center of the image.Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS Perseverance came upon Cheyava Falls in July 2024 while exploring the “Bright Angel” formation, a set of rocky outcrops on the northern and southern edges of Neretva Vallis, an ancient river valley measuring a quarter-mile (400 meters) wide that was carved by water rushing into Jezero Crater long ago.
“This finding is the direct result of NASA’s effort to strategically plan, develop, and execute a mission able to deliver exactly this type of science — the identification of a potential biosignature on Mars,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “With the publication of this peer-reviewed result, NASA makes this data available to the wider science community for further study to confirm or refute its biological potential.”
The rover’s science instruments found that the formation’s sedimentary rocks are composed of clay and silt, which, on Earth, are excellent preservers of past microbial life. They also are rich in organic carbon, sulfur, oxidized iron (rust), and phosphorous.
“The combination of chemical compounds we found in the Bright Angel formation could have been a rich source of energy for microbial metabolisms,” said Perseverance scientist Joel Hurowitz of Stony Brook University, New York and lead author of the paper. “But just because we saw all these compelling chemical signatures in the data didn’t mean we had a potential biosignature. We needed to analyze what that data could mean.”
First to collect data on this rock were Perseverance’s PIXL (Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry) and SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) instruments. While investigating Cheyava Falls, an arrowhead-shaped rock measuring 3.2 feet by 2 feet (1 meter by 0.6 meters), they found what appeared to be colorful spots. The spots on the rock could have been left behind by microbial life if it had used the raw ingredients, the organic carbon, sulfur, and phosphorus, in the rock as an energy source.
In higher-resolution images, the instruments found a distinct pattern of minerals arranged into reaction fronts (points of contact where chemical and physical reactions occur) the team called leopard spots. The spots carried the signature of two iron-rich minerals: vivianite (hydrated iron phosphate) and greigite (iron sulfide). Vivianite is frequently found on Earth in sediments, peat bogs, and around decaying organic matter. Similarly, certain forms of microbial life on Earth can produce greigite.
The combination of these minerals, which appear to have formed by electron-transfer reactions between the sediment and organic matter, is a potential fingerprint for microbial life, which would use these reactions to produce energy for growth. The minerals also can be generated abiotically, or without the presence of life. Hence, there are ways to produce them without biological reactions, including sustained high temperatures, acidic conditions, and binding by organic compounds. However, the rocks at Bright Angel do not show evidence that they experienced high temperatures or acidic conditions, and it is unknown whether the organic compounds present would’ve been capable of catalyzing the reaction at low temperatures.
The discovery was particularly surprising because it involves some of the youngest sedimentary rocks the mission has investigated. An earlier hypothesis assumed signs of ancient life would be confined to older rock formations. This finding suggests that Mars could have been habitable for a longer period or later in the planet’s history than previously thought, and that older rocks also might hold signs of life that are simply harder to detect.
“Astrobiological claims, particularly those related to the potential discovery of past extraterrestrial life, require extraordinary evidence,” said Katie Stack Morgan, Perseverance’s project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “Getting such a significant finding as a potential biosignature on Mars into a peer-reviewed publication is a crucial step in the scientific process because it ensures the rigor, validity, and significance of our results. And while abiotic explanations for what we see at Bright Angel are less likely given the paper’s findings, we cannot rule them out.”
The scientific community uses tools and frameworks like the CoLD scale and Standards of Evidence to assess whether data related to the search for life actually answers the question, Are we alone? Such tools help improve understanding of how much confidence to place in data suggesting a possible signal of life found outside our own planet.
Marked by seven benchmarks, the Confidence of Life Detection, or CoLD, scale outlines a progression in confidence that a set of observations stands as evidence of life. Credit: NASA Sapphire Canyon is one of 27 rock cores the rover has collected since landing at Jezero Crater in February 2021. Among the suite of science instruments is a weather station that provides environmental information for future human missions, as well as swatches of spacesuit material so that NASA can study how it fares on Mars.
Managed for NASA by Caltech, NASA JPL built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover on behalf of the agency’s Science Mission Directorate as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio.
To learn more about Perseverance visit:
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-2020-perseverance
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Bethany Stevens / Karen Fox
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
bethany.c.stevens@nasa.gov / karen.c.fox@nasa.gov
DC Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-9011
agle@jpl.nasa.gov
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Last Updated Sep 10, 2025 EditorJessica TaveauLocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
Perseverance (Rover) Astrobiology Mars Mars 2020 Planetary Science Science Mission Directorate View the full article
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By NASA
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover took this selfie on September 10, 2021, the 198th Martian day, or sol of its mission.Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA will host a news conference at 11 a.m. EDT Wednesday, to discuss the analysis of a rock sampled by the agency’s Perseverance Mars rover last year, which is the subject of a forthcoming science paper. The agency previously announced this event as a teleconference.
Watch the news conference on NASA’s YouTube channel and the agency’s website. Learn how to watch NASA content through a variety of platforms, including social media.
Participants include:
Acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy NASA Associate Administrator Amit Kshatriya Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington Lindsay Hays, senior scientist for Mars Exploration, Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters Katie Stack Morgan, Perseverance project scientist, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California Joel Hurowitz, planetary scientist, Stony Brook University, New York To ask questions by phone, members of the media must RSVP no later than one hour before the start of the event to: rexana.v.vizza@jpl.nasa.gov. Media who registered for the earlier teleconference-only version of this event do not need to re-register. NASA’s media accreditation policy is available online.
The sample, called “Sapphire Canyon,” was collected in July 2024 from a set of rocky outcrops on the edges of Neretva Vallis, a river valley carved by water rushing into Jezero Crater long ago.
Since landing in the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater in February 2021, Perseverance has collected 30 samples. The rover still has six empty sample tubes to fill, and it continues to collect detailed information about geologic targets that it hasn’t sampled by using its abrasion tool. Among the rover’s science instruments is a weather station that provides environmental information for future human missions, as well as swatches of spacesuit material so that NASA can study how it fares on Mars.
Managed for NASA by Caltech, JPL built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover on behalf of the agency’s Science Mission Directorate as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio.
To learn more about Perseverance visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/perseverance
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Bethany Stevens / Karen Fox
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
bethany.c.stevens@nasa.gov / karen.c.fox@nasa.gov
DC Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-9011
agle@jpl.nasa.gov
Share
Details
Last Updated Sep 10, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
Perseverance (Rover) Mars 2020 Planetary Science Division Science Mission Directorate
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By NASA
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover took this selfie on September 10, 2021, the 198th Martian day, or sol of its mission. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA will host a media teleconference at 11 a.m. EDT Wednesday, Sept. 10, to discuss the analysis of a rock sampled by the agency’s Perseverance Mars rover last year, which is the subject of a forthcoming science paper.
The sample, called “Sapphire Canyon,” was collected in July 2024 from a set of rocky outcrops on the edges of Neretva Vallis, a river valley carved by water rushing into Jezero Crater long ago.
Audio and visuals of the call will stream on the agency’s website at:
https://www.nasa.gov/live
Participants in the teleconference include:
Acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington Lindsay Hays, Senior Scientist for Mars Exploration, Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters Katie Stack Morgan, Perseverance Project Scientist, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California Joel Hurowitz, planetary scientist, Stony Brook University, New York To ask questions by phone, members of the media must RSVP no later than two hours before the start of the event to: rexana.v.vizza@jpl.nasa.gov. NASA’s media accreditation policy is available online.
Since landing in the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater in February 2021, Perseverance has collected 30 samples. The rover still has six empty sample tubes to fill, and it continues to collect detailed information about geologic targets that it hasn’t sampled by using its abrasion tool. Among the rover’s science instruments is a weather station that provides environmental information for future human missions, as well as swatches of spacesuit material so that NASA can study how it fares on Mars.
Managed for NASA by Caltech, JPL built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover on behalf of the agency’s Science Mission Directorate as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program portfolio.
To learn more about Perseverance visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/perseverance
-end-
Bethany Stevens / Karen Fox
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
bethany.c.stevens@nasa.gov / karen.c.fox@nasa.gov
DC Agle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-9011
agle@jpl.nasa.gov
Share
Details
Last Updated Sep 08, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
Perseverance (Rover) Mars Mars 2020 Planetary Science Division Science Mission Directorate View the full article
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