Curiosity In It for the Long Haul

In recent days, Curiosity has accomplished a number of firsts, including the first use of its laser to zap a nearby rock and its first short drive. Many more such firsts lie ahead. But as the rover prepares to head off on a journey of discovery across previously unexplored territory, it seems like a good time to pause and remind ourselves just what it was that Curiosity was sent to Mars to do.

MSL (Mars Science Laboratory) is not a life-detection mission. Its goal is not to look not for life, but rather to investigate whether Mars was ever capable of supporting life. It is searching for signs of habitability.

Some people are disappointed by that.

But, says Pan Conrad, “I don’t think we have broad enough consensus in the scientific community about how to define life so universally that we would recognize it on Mars.” Conrad is the deputy principal investigator for SAM (Sample Analysis at Mars), one of Curiosity’s scientific instruments. “I can't think of a single thing that we would see that any of us would say, ‘Aha, we have found life.’"