"NASA has drafted its Mars rover Perseverance to help monitor the sun's activity. Every day for the next two months, the rover will image the sun with its Mastcam-Z cameras, capturing crucial information about sunspots and other large features that can give clues to solar activity. Mars is currently passing behind the sun, giving the rover a view of the star's far sidea perspective we can't see from Earth."
"Perseverance's Mastcam-Z, which consists of zoomable cameras attached to its mast, isn't designed for solar monitoring; the rover points the system at the sun once a day to measure the dust in the Martian air, critical information for weather forecasting on the Red Planet. But it is sensitive enough to see large sunspots. This is not the first time NASA has recruited Perseverance as a solar observatorythe agency also used the rover to image sunspots in 2024."
NASA is using the Perseverance rover to image the sun daily for two months to monitor sunspots and other large solar features. Mars's current position behind the sun gives Perseverance a far-side view that cannot be seen from Earth. Mastcam-Z, a pair of zoomable mast-mounted cameras, normally measures Martian atmospheric dust for weather forecasting but is sensitive enough to detect large sunspots. Sunspots mark active regions where solar flares and coronal mass ejections can originate; such events can produce auroras and disrupt satellites and radio systems. Perseverance previously imaged sunspots in 2024.
Read at www.scientificamerican.com
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