NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover is readying itself to collect rock samples that’ll become the first-ever Martian material delivered to Earth. The rover made its touchdown back in April, has been spending its time testing its systems and assisting its chopper buddy Ingenuity by relaying flight instructions.

But the space agency’s most advanced rover to date is about to get down to business as it plans to extract a rock sample as part of its efforts to discover if the Red Planet once fostered any form of life. In the coming days, the rover will head to another location inside the Jezero Crater.

Small rock sample to be collected

The area covers about 1.5-square-miles (4-square-km) and the space agency says it could feature the crater’s deepest and most ancient layers of exposed bedrock. Perseverance will start the operation by analyzing a small patch of light-colored paver stone at the site. If the scientists find it of greater interest, the rover will then drill a small sample of the rock “about the size of a piece of chalk.”

Once collected and stored, other instruments will analyze it further. The rover will then deposit the sample in a special container that will be collected during a future mission. The sample will be transported back to Earth where scientists will use advanced tools to research it further.

The search will continue

While many will be hoping to find any evidence of past life on Mars, Perseverance project scientist Ken Farley cautioned against such expectations. There’s a possibility that the sample is just a normal rock.

“Not every sample Perseverance is collecting will be done in the quest for ancient life, and we don’t expect this first sample to provide definitive proof one way or the other,” Farley said. “While the rocks located in this geologic unit are not great time capsules for organics, we believe they have been around since the formation of Jezero Crater and incredibly valuable to fill gaps in our geologic understanding of this region — things we’ll desperately need to know if we find life once existed on Mars.”