While NASA’s newer Perseverance rover tends to get all of the headlines nowadays, the Curiosity rover additionally continues to discover the floor of Mars greater than a decade after it reached the purple planet.
The crew at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which oversees the Mars rover missions, has simply given Curiosity a brand new lease of life after putting in its first main software program replace in seven years.
Among the 180 adjustments applied within the replace, one of the vital vital ones offers the hardy rover improved driving abilities that may allow it to cowl floor extra shortly.
Curiosity is designed to drive in segments, stopping after each to evaluate captured imagery of the close by terrain in order that it might probably plan a protected route ahead. This is in distinction with Perseverance, which has a devoted pc that enables it to snap imagery and course of it on the transfer.
While Curiosity will nonetheless have to halt after every phase, the brand new software program will allow the rover to course of the imagery a lot sooner than earlier than, serving to to hurry up its journey time.
“This gained’t let Curiosity drive as shortly as Perseverance, however as a substitute of stopping for a full minute after a drive phase, we’re stopping for only a second or two,” JPL’s Jonathan Denison defined in an internet publish. “Spending much less time idling between drive segments additionally means we use much less power every day. And although we’re nearly 11 years previous, we’re nonetheless implementing new concepts to make use of extra of our obtainable power for science actions.”
It’s price noting that Curiosity’s motion throughout the martian floor will nonetheless be one thing of a crawl as its high velocity is rather less than 1 mph, significantly slower than the common 3 mph velocity that people stroll at.
The latest software program replace may even result in much less put on and tear on the rover’s aluminum wheels, enhance the effectivity of Curiosity’s Earth-based human drivers, and pave the way in which for simpler operation of Curiosity’s robotic arm.
Other adjustments embody enhancements to the way in which Curiosity sends messages to JPL, and the simplification of pc code that has been altered by quite a few patches since Curiosity through the years.
“The largest adjustments will assist maintain Curiosity rolling extra effectively for years to come back,” JPL saiid.
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