NASA's Perseverance rover discovers shiny metallic rock on Mars that could be a meteorite from an ancient asteroid, containing high levels of iron and nickel.

When a Mars rover accidentally crushed a small rock and exposed a flash of vivid yellow inside, it turned a routine drive into one of the most intriguing discoveries of the mission. The fractured fragment,

NASA scientists were baffled after uncovering a rock on Mars that didn’t belong there — with a composition pointing to potentially interstellar origins. “This rock was identified as a target of interest,” the space agency wrote in a recent blog post detailing the potentially intergalactic gravelstone.

NASA's Perseverance rover found a peculiar rock on Mars. Its composition suggests it may have originated from beyond our solar system. The rock, named Phippsaksla, stands out due to its unique shape and high iron and nickel content.

Interest in Martian life had been spurred by a now infamous announcement from the White House lawn in 1996, when President Bill Clinton declared that signs of life had been detected in a Martian meteorite found in Antarctica. That claim was later refuted—but it caused enough clamor to put the search for Martian life at the top of NASA’s agenda.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientists have been startled by the latest discovery of the space agency’s rover on Mars.The Perseverance rover has found a rock on

In a first for the Perseverance rover, it appears to have found an iron-nickel meteorite near the Jezero Crater.

The rover utilized its Left Mastcam-Z camera to document this fascinating find during Sol 1629 of the Mars 2020 mission, at a local mean solar time of 12:11:25. Recent analysis using Perseverance's SuperCam instrument revealed that Phippsaksla is high in iron and nickel content.