Sol 3796: Software Upgrade Complete!

As Ken noted in his recent blog, our beloved rover spent much of the last week completing a software upgrade while the science team met virtually to synthesize and discuss results. That upgrade has been completed successfully, and Curiosity was back to work characterizing a local canyon in an effort to study the composition and sedimentology of the geologic units above "Tapo Caparo." While continually on the lookout for its next drill location, Curiosity will maintain a regular cadence of chemical and textural analyses of rocks along its canyon-transecting traverse.

Chemical analysis and imaging efforts were central to tosol's plan which focused on APXS and MAHLI on a brushed rock face, "Tarilandia," before the rover executed a planned drive of ~30 m. As APXS prefers colder temperatures and MAHLI benefits from midday illumination, a one-hour science block between these two arm activities rounded out the geologic science planned before the drive. The science block included a Mastcam crater rim extinction image and an extension of the "Tutu Kampu" mosaic. Mastcam also documented the targets "Loulouie" and Tarilandia. Lastly, ChemCam imaged and conducted laser analyses on the target "Bem Querer," the strikingly round stone captured in this blog's image, before a Mastcam image was acquired of the same target.

Towards the end of the drive Curiosity will acquire imaging that will support targeting in tomorrow's one-sol plan. The data will be relayed to Earth via the MAVEN spacecraft and should arrive around 09:00 PDT tomorrow. Tomorrow's shift will start later than usual as we wait for these data to arrive and take advantage of a favourable (for those of us located in North America) "Gale crater night shift."

Written by Scott VanBommel, Planetary Scientist at Washington University