Curiosity's Stunt Double

This image from NASA's Curiosity rover looks south of the rover's landing site on Mars towards Mount Sharp.

This panorama is a mosaic of images taken by the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on the NASA Mars rover Curiosity during the 106th Martian day, or sol, of the mission (Nov. 22, 2012).

This photo shows 70 members of the Mars Science Laboratory team in Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Spacecraft Assembly Facility after they have prepared the spacecraft to go to a different area for the...

A conventional X-ray diffraction instrument (left) is the size of a large refrigerator, in contrast to the compact size of the Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument on NASA's Curiosity rover...

This view from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Mars rover Curiosity shows an example of cross-bedding that results from water passing over a loose bed of sediment.

This is one of the first images taken by NASA's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of Aug. 5 PDT (morning of Aug. 6 EDT).

A landscape scene from NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows rock rows at "Junda" forming striations in the foreground, with Mount Sharp on the horizon. The component images were taken by the rover's N...

This Sept. 25, 2015, view from the Mast Camera on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows a dark sand dune in the middle distance. The rover's examination of dunes on the way toward higher layers of Moun...

In the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians work beneath NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission aeroshell, (containing the compact car-s...

Lozenge-shaped crystals are evident in this magnified view of a Martian rock target called "Mojave," taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) instrument on the arm of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover.

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover captured this image with its left front Hazard-Avoidance Camera (Hazcam) just after completing a drive that took the mission's total driving distance past the 1 kilomete...

Goal1: Determine whether life ever arose on Mars

This version of a self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover at a drilling site called "Buckskin" is presented as a stereographic projection, which shows the horizon as a circle. The MAHLI camera...

The extended robotic arm of NASA's Mars rover Curiosity can be seen in this mosaic of full-resolution images from Curiosity's Navigation camera (Navcam). Curiosity extended its arm on Aug. 20, 2012.

This grouping of two test rovers and a flight spare provides a graphic comparison of three generations of Mars rovers developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. The setting is ...

This mosaic of images shows layers of sediment on a boulder-sized rock called "Strathdon," as seen by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera carried by NASA's Curiosity rover. The images were tak...

This artist's concept depicts the moment immediately after NASA's Curiosity rover touches down onto the Martian surface.

This panorama is a mosaic of images taken by the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on the NASA Mars rover Curiosity while the rover was working at a site called "Rocknest" in October and November 2012.

Curiosity performs the first investigation of active sand dunes on another planet. Studying the Bagnold Dunes on Mars will help scientists understand the physics of Martian dunes and how they move.

Curiosity Landing Area, Up-Close

In a shallow depression called "Yellowknife Bay," the NASA Mars rover Curiosity drove to an edge of the feature during the 130th Martian day, or sol, of the mission (Dec. 17, 2012) and used its Nav...

The distant blob seen in the view on left, taken by a Hazard-Avoidance camera on NASA's Curiosity rover, may be a cloud created during the crash of the rover's descent stage. Pictures taken about 4...

This view from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows a network of two-tone mineral veins at an area called "Garden City" on lower Mount Sharp.

This panorama of the landscape surrounding NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on July 31, 2014, offers a view into sandy lower terrain called "Hidden Valley," which is on the planned route ahead.

NASA's Curiosity rover landed in the Martian crater known as Gale Crater, which is approximately the size of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined.