Zooming in on Perseverance Rover's 'Kenmore' Abrasion Patch

This close-up view of an abrasion made by NASA's Perseverance rover on June 5, 2025 (the 1,526th day, or sol, of its mission to Mars), shows distinctive "tool marks" formed as the abrasion bit interacted with the rock. These radiating patterns of lines tend to indicate that the rock is relatively hard. The image was taken from approximately 2.76 inches (7 centimeters) away by the rover's WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and eNgineering) imager.

A maroon-brown rock coating can be seen at the far edges and corners of the image. This coating was chipped off and removed within the area of the patch by the abrasion process.

Most of the distinctive white, millimeter-sized grains set within a finer-grained gray matrix contain feldspar (an aluminum silicate mineral). The irregularly shaped dark patches in the upper right quadrant as well as those within the fracture that cuts through the lower half of the abrasion are composed chiefly of manganese and nickel.

WATSON, part of an instrument called SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals), was built by Malin Space Science Systems (MSSS) in San Diego and is operated jointly by MSSS and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

JPL, which is managed for the agency by Caltech, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.

For more about Perseverance:
mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/