[ad_1]
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Perseverance Mars rover that made a historic landing on Mars last month is being controlled by the Indian-born scientist, Professor Sanjeev Gupta, particularly from his one-bedroom apartment. in London, UK. The robotic rover traveled for almost seven months before landing on the Martian planet and is also the most advanced astrobiology laboratory ever sent to another world. While another roboticist of Indian origin was driving the rover to the Red Planet, Sanjeev Gupta is the one who now controls the £ 3 billion life on Mars mission.
Gupta, 55, a geology expert at Imperial College London, leads the team of scientists on the project to bring back rock samples from Mars and determine if the Martian planet could harbor life. According to the Daily Mail report, over the next several weeks, Gupta along with his colleagues will chart the tasks required for NASA’s Perseverance rover while giving instructions on locations to drill for samples on Mars. These samples will eventually be transported back to Earth in 2027 through a separate UK-backed project.
While speaking to the news outlet, Gupta said: “It should be in the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, in a series of offices each about three times the size of this room, filled with hundreds of scientists and engineers with heads buried in laptops surrounded by big screens … NASA headquarters is certainly a long way from being a one-bedroom apartment. “
Read – ‘New postcard from Mars’: NASA publishes a panorama of the landing site taken by the perseverance vehicle
Read – NASA’s Perseverance Rover shows ‘close-up of perseverance on the Martian surface’
Why does Gupta work from a one-bedroom apartment?
While NASA added another feather to its cap amid the COVID-19 pandemic, several mission scientists have been unable to go to their office due to travel restrictions. Gupta, who has a Ph.D. from Oxford University’s St Cross College, he has rented the one-bedroom apartment so his family can sleep soundly. A day on Mars is apparently 40 minutes longer than on Earth and the entire team of experts has been working around the clock, which, according to Gupta, is “like having permanent jet lag.”
In the conversation with the media outlet, the 55-year-old also narrated an incident with a teenage son of one of his friends and said: “The teenage son of a friend of mine asked me if he could order the rover to do a wheelie to he. I said, ‘Not with my racing skills.’ Many of the 400 scientists on the £ 3 billion Life to Mars mission are working from home due to travel restrictions. “Gupta followed the rover’s landing on Mars on February 18 from his Lewisham nerve center using at least five computers: two Apple Macs, an iPad, and two other screens for Zoom-style meetings with fellow scientists.
Read – Vandi Verma: Meet the Indian-born roboticist who drove NASA’s Perseverance Rover to Mars
Read – The euphoric reaction of a NASA engineer to the perseverance landing leaves netizens excited: Watch
[ad_2]
