Human mission
are 23 cameras, two ‘ears’ that will allow it to listen to Martian winds, and lasers used for chemical analysis.
Approximately the size of a car, the rover is equipped with six wheels like its predecessor Curiosity, allowing it to traverse rocky terrain. Speed is not a priority for the vehicle, which only has to cover around 200 yards per Martian day - approximately the same as a day on Earth.
Fuelled by a miniature nuclear reactor, Mars 2020 has seven-foot-long articulated arms and a drill to crack open rock samples in locations scientists identify as potentially suitable for life.
Ancient life
“What we’re looking for is ancient micro
To maximise its chance of unearthing traces of ancient life, Mars 2020 will land in a long dried-up delta called Jezero. The site, selected after years of scientific debate, is a crater that was once a 500-yard-deep lake.
It was formerly connected to a network of rivers that flowed some 3.5 to 3.9bn years ago. The crater measures just under 30 miles across, and experts hope it may have preserved ancient organic molecules.
The Mars 2020 mission also carries hopes for an even more ambitious target - a human mission to Mars. “I think of it, really, as the first human precursor mission to Mars," said Wallace.
The ambitions come as a new space race hots up, with Beijing increasingly vying to threaten US dominance.
China on Friday launched one of the world's most powerful rockets in a major step forward for its own planned mission to Mars next year.