Image courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS.
Joel Kontinen
Can gems be found on Mars. Now according to the latest research,
it seems that are found.
The
Perseverance rover has found precious stones inside Martian pebbles. These
gem grains are made of a substance called corundum, which is also known as ruby
or sapphire depending on the traces of metals within it.
Ann Ollila at
Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and her colleagues first spotted
hints of corundum while using Perseverance’s SuperCam instrument to examine a
rock called Hampden River. SuperCam has several different ways to test a
material’s composition, using two different lasers to either burn off its
surface or provoke luminescence, then two cameras to examine the resulting
light. In both tests, the results for Hampden River were nearly identical to
the results from rubies measured in the lab, indicating the presence of tiny
grains of corundum in the rock.
Source:
Leah Crane 2026 Fluor escent ruby-like gems have been found on Mars for the first time | New Scientist 18 March
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