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November 28, 2025<\/p>\n
1 min read<\/p>\n
NASA Recruits Mars Perseverance Rover to Monitor Sun\u2019s Activity<\/p>\n
Mars is passing behind the sun, giving NASA’s Perseverance rover a view of the star\u2019s far side<\/p>\n
By Claire Cameron edited by Jeanna Bryner<\/span><\/p>\n NASA has drafted its Mars rover Perseverance to help monitor the sun\u2019s activity. Every day for the next two months, the rover will image the sun with its Mastcam-Z cameras, capturing crucial information about sunspots and other large features that can give clues to solar activity.<\/p>\n Mars is currently passing behind the sun, giving the rover a view of the star\u2019s far side\u2014a perspective we can\u2019t see from Earth. Perseverance\u2019s Mastcam-Z, which consists of zoomable cameras attached to its mast, isn\u2019t designed for solar monitoring; the rover points the system at the sun once a day to measure the dust in the Martian air, critical information for weather forecasting on the Red Planet. But it is sensitive enough to see large sunspots.<\/p>\n If you’re enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.<\/p>\n This is not the first time NASA has recruited Perseverance as a solar observatory\u2014the agency also used the rover to image sunspots in 2024.<\/p>\n Sunspots are temporary dark areas on the sun that occur when intense magnetic fields block out heat from the interior of the sun. Concentrated in active regions, they can last days or months and typically coincide with other phenomena such as solar flares and coronal mass ejections. If these energetic explosions are pointed toward Earth, they can cause auroras and even disruptions to satellite and radio systems.<\/p>\n If you enjoyed this article, I\u2019d like to ask for your support. 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I hope it does that for you, too.<\/p>\n If you subscribe to Scientific American<\/span>, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.<\/p>\n In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can’t-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world’s best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.<\/p>\n There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you\u2019ll support us in that mission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" November 28, 2025 1 min read NASA Recruits Mars Perseverance Rover to Monitor Sun\u2019s Activity Mars is passing behind the sun, giving NASA’s Perseverance rover a view of the star\u2019s far side By Claire Cameron edited by Jeanna Bryner NASA has drafted its Mars rover Perseverance to help monitor the sun\u2019s activity. Every day for<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35609,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[2215,369,9641,3331,20027,4505,13275,1308],"class_list":{"0":"post-35608","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-activity","9":"tag-mars","10":"tag-monitor","11":"tag-nasa","12":"tag-perseverance","13":"tag-recruits","14":"tag-rover","15":"tag-suns"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=35608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/35609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=35608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=35608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=35608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}On supporting science journalism<\/h2>\n
It\u2019s Time to Stand Up for Science<\/h2>\n