Opportunity: A self-propelled self-propelled robot rolls 12 years on Mars

Opportunity, NASA's Mars self-propelled robot, is still reeling, after 12 years from its footing on the red planet.

Opportunity landed on Mars 12 years ago on Sunday 24 January, just weeks after his twin brother, Spirit , rolled on the red planet. (Opportunity landed on January 25, 2004 in the GMT time zone, but according to the PST time zone, where NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is located in California, it is still January 24). The two robots were tasked with finding signs of water's previous activity on Mars, and the two quickly found plenty of evidence near their landing site.

Opportunity is packed before launching to Mars.

Spirit and Opportunity started only planning to explore Mars for 90 days, but both self-propelled robots worked beyond their lifetime expectations. Spirit stopped contacting the Earth in 2010 and was declared shutdown a year later, and Opportunity still worked hard today.

While Opportunity has experienced some memory problems over the past year, its solar panels still work smoothly, according to the project team. The robot was able to function normally during the "energy-lacking" months by winter in the southern Martian hemisphere, instead of standing still to conserve energy.

"Opportunity has been very active this winter, partly because the solar panels are not as dusty as the previous winter , " said the self-driving robot project manager, John Callas of the Department. The Jet Propulsion Experiment, said in recent statements.

This month, Opportunity used its tool to dig the top surface layer of a new mission location under the nickname "Private John Potts" , named after a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

Opportunity to explore the surface of the "Private John Potts" target.

Over the years, Opportunity's controller has developed many new skills for this self-propelled robot to continue to function even in energy-poor situations. It takes advantage of sunny areas on Mars's surface and slightly windy locations to blow away dust on solar panels. This limits long-term outages, such as the quiet four-month period that Opportunity experienced during the first winter on Mars.

This self-propelled robot has just explored Endeavor crater, with a width of about 22km, from August 2011. Its Marathon journey at the Endeavor valley will be completed this year, NASA officially announced.

Opportunity has moved 42.65km on Mars to this day - more than a marathon and any robot that has been rolling on lands outside the Earth.

Opportunity is one of two self-propelled robots operating on Mars; The car-sized robot, Curiousity, landed in August 2012, still exploring the foothills of the 5km Mount Sharp high mountain, far from Opportunity's position.