NASA rover

NASA’s Curiosity Rover has begun a test drive from its launch site on Mars, which combined forward, turn and reverse segments, marking its first movement on the Martian surface.

Following its landing in Gale Crater on the Red Planet on 06 August 2012, the $2.5bn Curiosity Rover moved a 4m distance, made a right turn at a 90 degree angle and then moved a few more metres in the opposite direction.

Confirming the health of Curiosity’s mobility system, the test drive will further allow it to begin its two-year mission to explore Mars.

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Mars mission lead rover driver Matt Heverly said: "We have a fully functioning mobility system with lots of amazing exploration ahead."

According to the space agency, the rover will be spending several days beside the Bradbury Landing, its landing spot and perform instrument checks and observe surroundings, prior to embarking on its initial driving destination close to 1,300ft (400m) to the east-southeast.

JPL Curiosity project manager Pete Theisinger said that Curiosity is a much more complex vehicle than earlier Mars rovers.

"Confirming the health of Curiosity’s mobility system, the test drive will further allow it to begin its two-year mission to explore Mars."

"The testing and characterisation activities during the initial weeks of the mission lay important groundwork for operating our precious national resource with appropriate care," Theisinger added.

To explore specific targets of interest near and far of Mars, NASA’s science team has embarked on pointing instruments on the rover’s pole.

The spacecraft’s chemistry and camera instrument had deployed a laser and spectrometers to observe the composition of Martian rocks when landing engines of spacecraft blew away overlying material.

Los Alamos National Laboratory Chemistry and Camera principal investigator Roger Weins said that measurements made on the rocks in the scoured-out feature called Goulburn suggest a basaltic composition."These may be pieces of basalt within a sedimentary deposit," Weins added.

Image: The image showing the rover’s first track marks on the Martian region. Photo: courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech.