For many years, the Curiosity rover has been making impressive records for Mars. Now, the robotic rover of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has captured a photo that has caused surprise and fueled speculation among professionals and the general public. That’s because the instrument’s lens captured a picture of what appears to be a portal on the surface of the Red Planet.
Social network users started a heated discussion about the photo, trying to find an explanation for the mysterious picture. Some theorists have even hypothesized that the “gate” is the work of intelligent extraterrestrial life. But according to scientists, the formation will be the result of the geological activity of Mars.
Sanjeev Gupta, a professor at Imperial College London and one of the scientists on the Curiosity mission, said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph that the structure was formed through “natural geological processes”. According to him, a deep crack appears inside the “gate”, which indicates a break in the rock. This is something that happens on both Mars and Earth and could have happened at any time in the past hundreds of millions of years.
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Zooming in also helped create confusion. Although the ‘gate’ looks huge, it is only 30cm by 45cm. This isn’t the first time that artificial structures have been seen on Mars. These optical illusions can also be explained by pareidolia, which NASA describes as “a psychological phenomenon in which people see recognizable shapes in clouds, rock formations, or objects.”
