ASU has a role in NASA's most recent Mars exploration

PHOENIX - Does life exist on other planets? That's what NASA is trying to figure out on its latest mission to Mars and Arizona State University researchers are playing a role.

After departing July, 30, 2021, the Perseverance Rover is set to land in Jezero Crater Thursday afternoon. It's an area in Mars where scientists believe contained water at one point.

Dr. Jim Bell with ASU is the principal investigator of the Mastcam Z, the cameras that will study the landscape and identify the best rocks for coring and caching.

The goal behind the mission is to collect samples of Mars and have it returned back to Earth, which will take years. But scientists hope to one day study it and determine if there was ancient life on Mars.

It’s a moment that Bell and his team of researchers have been anxiously waiting for.

"This is unlike any rover that has ever gone ... parts of this rover coming back to the Earth with Mars rocks and Mars air and Mars dirt," Bell explained.

He and his team were in charge of designing and building the Mastcam Z. "Our idea was that, let's make cameras that zoom from wide-angle together to telephoto together so we can always have a left and right just like our eyes," he said.

Every image taken can be built into a 3D reconstruction to help the rover drivers avoid obstacles.

"We’re going to a place where a river flowed down a mountain and deposited these beautiful sediments into a delta, like at the end of the Mississippi River. We’re hoping that maybe there is some evidence to preserve ancient life on Mars or ancient conditions on Mars," Bell said.

He’s hopeful and confident what they’ll find will nonetheless be out of this world. 

"In a decade or so we may get to see those with our own eyes for real here in the building. We could be working with them and analyzing them in detail and I’m excited about that too."

Watch the landing event on Feb. 18 here.