02:29 PM
Wednesday, December 21, 2022
The US space agency, NASA, published, in a tweet on its Twitter account, a picture that may be the last sent by the Insight probe to Mars, about 3 years after its journey, which is nearing the end.
The InSight probe, which began collecting data in early 2019 and revolutionizing our understanding of Mars, now faces its painful fate: its solar panels are covered in dust, its power supply is poor, and it is waiting to be turned off forever.
Described as the forerunner of Mars, InSight is a stationary probe rather than a moving one, settling at the boundary between the cratered southern highlands and the smoother, more monotonous northern lowlands. There, the probe, equipped with a set of instruments designed to monitor inner planetary activity, discovered that Mars is not dead as we had long assumed, but rather that the interior of the Red Planet is marred by seismic and possibly volcanic activity.
Its instruments are also sensitive enough to detect meteorites hitting Mars, which scientists have tracked down to fresh craters. This information can help scientists better understand the history of the influence of Mars, according to the specialized scientific site ScienceAlert.