Ken Farley, W. M. Keck Foundation professor of Geochemistry, Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences and the project scientist for the Mars 2020 mission, continues the 2020–2021 Watson Lecture season with a talk about, “Perseverance on Mars,” Wednesday, March 10, at 5:00 p.m., via Zoom.
After eight years of development at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Perseverance rover successfully landed on Mars on February 18, 2021. In this Watson Lecture, Farley will describe how this highly capable rover will investigate rocks deposited billions of years ago at the bottom of a large lake (long since disappeared), seeking evidence of possible Martian life at that time. He will also look at how the rocks carefully collected by Perseverance during these explorations will provide the cargo for the first-ever effort to bring samples back to Earth from another planet.