NASA's Perseverance Mars rover embarks on key mission to search for signs of ancient alien life

Nasa's Perseverance rover has reached a key moment in its search for evidence of past life on Mars. The car-sized robot, which landed on the Red Planet in February last year, will today (Tuesday) begin climbing up an ancient delta to look for sampling sites that might contain ancient microbes and organics. This ascent will be for reconnaissance, as Perseverance goes'walkabout' looking for rocks with the best chance of holding secrets about whether alien life once existed on Mars. As it makes its way back down, the rover will then collect some of these specimens from the Jezero Crater and leave the samples at the base of the delta to be retrieved by future missions. Nasa's Perseverance rover (pictured) has reached a key moment in its search for evidence of past life on Mars. The engineering cameras give detailed information in colour about the terrain the rover has to cross.