NEW YORK—The Mars rover Curiosity just endured a second setback in two weeks, scientists said Monday.
The NASA robot, which discovered the first life-friendly chemistry in space, was supposed to resume its activity on Sunday evening but a computer problem came up, reported Reuters.
“This is not something that is rare or even uncommon,” said John Grotzinger, a lead scientist at California Institute of Technology during the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston.
The technical difficulty will merely delay the new science results for a few more days.
The rover landed on Mars on Aug. 6, 2012, to find out if the planet most similar to Earth has microbial life-supporting chemical elements. The results from last week confirmed that it is possible for Mars to support life.
According to Reuters, scientists also announced additional evidence on Monday that Curiosity is located in an area once flush with water, a key ingredient for life to flourish.
The rover is seven months into a two-year, $2.5 billion mission at Gale Crater, a giant impact basin located near the Martian equator.
Scientists plan to explore a 3-mile mountain of sediment rising from the crater floor.
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