Most astronomers agree that humanity will go to Mars at one point. Living there for a long period of time is certainly out of the question for the moment, but the first step of landing on the Red Planet is crucial.
NASA is now asking for help, and you could be the one able to lend them a hand! The American space agency’s Perseverance rover will take plenty of photos of our neighboring planet, and there’s a new project that could need your help!
Al4Mars is coming!
According to Space.com, the Al4Mars project represents NASA’s idea to seek help from citizen scientists to label specific features from photos of Mars that can provide important scientific value.
An official statement from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA says:
Images from Perseverance will further improve [the algorithm] by expanding the kinds of identifying labels that can be applied to features on the Martian surface,
AI4Mars now provides labels to identify more refined details, allowing people to choose options like float rocks (“islands” of rocks) or nodules (BB-size balls, often formed by water, of minerals that have been cemented together).
We’re eager to find out how NASA’s new intentions will unfold. Mars is becoming more and more important for astronomers, and there’s no wonder why. Organic molecules were also found on the Red Planet, and this grants a more wide perspective upon Mars. The new findings represent a premiere in astronomy, and they were detailed in Nature Astronomy. The weird part, if it can be called likewise, that the scientists who discovered the organic molecules were actually looking for something else.
If everything goes well, NASA should send the first humans to the Red Planet by the end of the current decade.
Do you also hope for humanity to reach Mars?