NASA’s Curiosity rover sends super cool selfie from Mars

The latest self-portrait from NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover shows the car-size mobile laboratory beside a dark dune where it has been scooping and sieving samples of sand.

The 57 images for the composite were taken on January 19 using the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera, which is fixed on the robotic arm of Curiosity Mars rover.

NASA’s Curiosity rover is checking out some sand dunes on Mars, and like any good traveler in an exotic locale, it has a selfie to prove it.

For more information about Curiosity’s dune study and the recent challenges it has faced, read the NASA news update.

The next project could include rock-powder samples from a bedrock on the red planet and hopefully more selfies of the rover’s hard work.

The designers and makers of Curiosity rover, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., explained how composite image was processed.

The selfie, which NASA released on Friday, is at least the third that Curiosity has beamed back to Earth since first landing on the planet on August 6, 2012.

“To think that I can view Mars on my phone and 20 years ago, I couldn’t even send a text with one”.

The camera also enables space enthusiasts to virtually explore Mars through other photos and videos posted on the rover’s active Facebook page. Meanwhile, when the processing was being undertaken, a sample-processing device’s actuator failed to operate in the desired manner.

According to NASA, the exploration of “active sand dunes” on Mars will continue despite the “unexpected” technical challenges. The next step of the rover will be determined by the team along with a new objective.