NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover Selfie Image Explained | JPL

NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover Selfie Image Explained | JPL

These are cropped, annotated versions of a Perseverance Mars rover selfie. They highlight examples of the rover's components and of Martian surface features.

Perseverance Rover Image 1 Details:

A: aluminum plate with U.S. flag

B: Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC) calibration target

C: serial number on the front hazard-avoidance camera sunshade assembly

D: wire bundle that supports entry, descent, and landing (EDL) hardware

E: rover evolution plate

F: Mastcam-Z calibration target

G: high-gain antenna

H: ultra-high frequency antenna

I: JPL insignia plate

J: Perseverance's arm (not seen). Just like humans taking a selfie on Earth, Perseverance's imaging team does their best to keep the rover's arm out of the shot, as they have here. When the images are combined for the selfie, it looks like there is no arm on the rover. The rover's process for taking a selfie is explained in this video.

K: SkyCam

L: SuperCam calibration target

M: navigation cameras

N: Mastcam-Z imagers

O: SuperCam

Oa: SuperCam microphone

P: Mars dust accumulated on the rover's exterior

Q: differential, part of Perseverance's "rocker-bogie" suspension system. The differential pivots around the silver-colored disk in the center, connecting the rockers to the body and each other, helping even out loads and reducing rover-body tilt.

R: Multi-Mission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (MMRTG)

S: wheel

T: "Send Your Name to Mars" plate carrying 10,932,295 names on three fingernail-sized chips

U: robotic arm harness bulkhead

V: Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA)

Perseverance Rover Image 2 Details:

aluminum plate with U.S. flag

dust devil

Bell Island sample borehole

rover tracks

Celebrating 4+ Years on Mars
Mission Name: Mars 2020
Rover Name: Perseverance
Main Job: Seek signs of ancient life and collect samples of rock and regolith (broken rock and soil) for return to Earth.
Launch: July 30, 2020    
Landing: Feb. 18, 2021, Jezero Crater, Mars

Learn more about NASA's Perseverance Mars rover: https://science.nasa.gov/mission/mars-2020-perseverance/

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Release Date: May 21, 2025

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