The Perseverance rover has found tiny crystals that seem to be rubies or sapphires inside pebbles on Mars, where they have never been seen before

It appears hostile alien contact may have occured soon after this image

/s pyro of course…

    • Skua@kbin.earth
      13·
      1 day ago

      Because the grains of corundum are so small, less than 0.2 millimetres across, it was impossible to tell in images whether they are rubies or sapphires and what they might look like to the human eye.

      “I would love to be able to pick one of those up and analyse it and see if it looks red – it’s pretty disappointing that all you can see is this white pebble,” said Ollila. But when hit with the SuperCam laser, they shone brightly.

      Too small, unfortunately

  • Beacon@fedia.io
    5·
    1 day ago

    Cool!

    So many discoveries of mars’ surface are scientifically very important and interesting but not like cool in the traditional sense. But rubies from mars, now that’s cool!