NASA to Launch Mars Rover in 2020

The Mars Helicopter, a small, autonomous rotorcraft, will travel with NASA’s Mars 2020 rover, currently scheduled to launch in July 2020, to demonstrate the viability and potential of heavier-than-...

This is an artist's concept of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft during its cruise phase between launch and final approach to Mars.

​This illustration depicts NASA's Perseverance rover operating on the surface of Mars. Perseverance will land at the Red Planet's Jezero Crater a little after 3:40 p.m. EST (12:40 p.m. PST) on Feb....

This illustration depicts the mechanism and conceptual research targets for an instrument named Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals, or SHERLOC.

Collecting samples from Mars and bringing them back to Earth is a historic undertaking that starts with the launch of NASA's Mars 2020 rover. 

JPL mechanical technician Eddie Castro uses a paint meter to measure the paint thickness on the Mars 2020 rover chassis.

This diagram illustrates the current iteration (July 2015) of the lens packaging for the Mars 2020 Rover's instrument, Mastcam-Z.

On June 21, 2019, engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory install the main robotic arm on the Mars 2020 rover.

This high-definition image was taken on Sept. 7, 2018, during the third and final test flight of the ASPIRE payload. It was the fastest inflation of this size parachute in history and created a pea...

Seeking signs of past life on Mars would be a multi-step process, according to the Science Definition Team for NASA's Mars 2020 mission.

Landing a spacecraft on Mars is one of the trickiest things we do. This 60-second video explains how it's done, and the three landing systems we use at the Red Planet.

This image depicts the demonstration vehicle used to prove that controlled, and sustained flight is feasible in a Martian atmosphere.

This is the top-down view into a sample tube is the type of image CacheCam provides to the Mars 2020 team.

Chile's Atacama Desert is the driest place on Earth -- and a ready analog for Mars' rugged, arid terrain.

Members of the NASA Mars Helicopter team inspect the flight model (the actual vehicle going to the Red Planet), inside the Space Simulator.

This image of the flight model of NASA’s Mars Helicopter was taken on Feb. 14, 2019, in a cleanroom at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Illustrated here, the aluminum wheels of NASA's Curiosity (left) and Perseverance rovers. Slightly larger in diameter and narrower, 20.7 inches (52.6 centimeters) versus 20 inches (50.8 centimeters...

How can you communicate with Mars spacecraft when the Sun is in the way? Learn more about 'solar conjunction' in this 60-second video.

This is the first Mars flight hardware that has been designed, assembled & tested at NASA-Johnson Space Center, led by Jacobs/JETS Chief Scientist Trevor Graff.

A technician works on the descent stage for NASA’s Mars 2020 mission inside JPL’s Spacecraft Assembly Facility. Mars 2020 is slated to carry NASA’s next Mars rover to the Red Planet in July of 2020.

Scientists from NASA's Mars 2020 and ESA's ExoMars projects study stromatolites, the oldest confirmed fossilized lifeforms on Earth, in the Pilbara region of North West Australia. The image was tak...

In this image, taken on June 13, 2019, engineers at JPL install the starboard legs and wheels — otherwise known as the mobility suspension — on the Mars 2020 rover.

Engineers prepare the Mars 2020 spacecraft for a thermal vacuum (TVAC) test in the Space Simulator Facility at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Members of NASA’s Mars Helicopter team attach a thermal film enclosure to the fuselage of the flight model (the actual vehicle going to the Red Planet). 

Figure 2. This figure demonstrates that the PIXL instrument detects important trace elements (red) at 10’s ppm. Insert: Rb, Sr, Y, Zr are clearly detected due to the lack of interfering excitation ...