After a seven-month-long journey, NASA’s Perseverance Rover successfully touched down on the Red Planet on Feb. 18, 2021. Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California celebrate landing NASA's fifth -- and most ambitious -- rover on Mars.

A key objective for Perseverance’s mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet’s geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith.

Also flying with Perseverance is NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, which will attempt to show controlled, powered flight is possible in the very thin Martian atmosphere.

For more about Perseverance, visit http://mars.nasa.gov/perseverance​

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech