APRIL 20: LET’S MAKE SOME OXYGEN

The list of firsts for Perseverance grew when NASA announced that an instrument on the rover had converted some of Mars’ thin, carbondioxide-rich atmosphere into oxygen. The toaster-sized experimental instrument is called the Mars

Oxygen In-situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE).

While the tech demonstration is in early days, it could lead to science fiction becoming science fact: isolating and storing oxygen on Mars to help power rockets that could lift astronauts off the planet’s surface. Such devices also might one day provide breathable air for astronauts themselves.

Not that anyone could live for long on the amount of gas MOXIE produced in its first one-hour test: about 5.4 grams, according to the instrument’s principal investigator, Michael Hecht of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Haystack Observatory. “That’s about enough to keep a typical active astronaut alive for 10 minutes,” he says.