What NASA Discovered on Mars Raises New Questions

Bright Side

NASA just spotted something on Mars that made scientists do a double take. At first glance, it honestly looks like dragon bones scattered across the surface. No, it’s not proof of mythical creatures — but the real explanation is still wild. The shapes raise big questions about Mars’ ancient past and how it formed. And the more we look… the stranger Mars keeps getting.  Animation is created by Bright Side.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/   Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV  Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  Our Social Media:  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brightplanet/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.official?lang=en   Stock materials (photos, footages and other):  https://www.depositphotos.com  https://www.shutterstock.com  https://www.eastnews.ru  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.

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00:00Hold on to your space helmets because NASA's Curiosity rover has just stumbled upon the wildest rock formation ever.

00:07And on April Fool's Day, isn't that just the weirdest coincidence?

00:11The device captured some images with some rocks that look like dragon bones.

00:15Now, let me take you back to 2012 when Curiosity made its grand entrance on Martian soil.

00:21It was like the Queen Bee of rovers, the biggest and most capable one at the time.

00:25And boy has it been making waves since then.

00:28It's even discovered evidence of water and organic molecules on Mars.

00:32These findings were giant leaps in our quest to find out if Mars ever had its own little creatures.

00:37But hey, let's not forget that Curiosity is no spring chicken anymore.

00:42It's been trotting around Mars for a solid 11 years,

00:45and its heyday may have come and gone with the launch of the shiny new Perseverance rover.

00:50Nevertheless, Curiosity still manages to capture our imagination with its knack for spotting familiar-looking rocks.

00:57From objects shaped like fish backbones to ones that resemble traffic lights,

01:02Curiosity has given us plenty to marvel at.

01:05But now the internet is exploding with excitement over the jaw-dropping images from Curiosity's masked camera.

01:11People are going bonkers over what can only be described as dragon bones.

01:15One astrobiologist acknowledged we've seen our fair share of weird-looking objects on Mars.

01:20But this one exceeded all expectations.

01:22The current theory is that these unique ripples on the structure were formed after a whole lot of erosion,

01:28probably caused by the Martian winds.

01:30Now, you might be thinking,

01:32OK, cool, but what's the big deal about a funky rock?

01:35Well, for starters, it's a reminder of just how much we still have to uncover about our mysterious red neighbor.

01:40While we're gazing over potential dragon bones and daydreaming about interplanetary adventures,

01:46Curiosity has its serious hat on.

01:48Its main mission is to gather as much data as possible and figure out if Mars was ever a cozy home for teeny-tiny microbial life forms.

01:56It isn't the first time our trusty Curiosity rover has stumbled upon something truly out of this world.

02:02Our robotic explorer buddy has also given us a peek at a teeny-tiny rock on the red planet.

02:07It bears an uncanny resemblance to a fossilized book.

02:10Can you imagine stumbling upon a Martian library?

02:13On the 3,800th Martian day of its mission,

02:17our adventurous rover captured an intriguing snapshot of this unusual discovery.

02:22Using its nifty Mars hand lens imager attached to its robotic arm,

02:26Curiosity snapped a pic of this rock that looks like it's been plucked straight from a librarian's wildest dreams.

02:32Before you get too carried away with fantasies of outer space reading materials,

02:36let's clarify the dimensions of this rock.

02:39While it may resemble a book, it's pint-sized in comparison.

02:42In fact, it's only a mere one inch across.

02:45So don't go expecting the next Martian bestseller to hit the shelves anytime soon.

02:50It's more of a pocket-sized edition,

02:52perfect for a quick read during interplanetary commutes.

02:55Now before you get too excited about this discovery,

02:58do know that NASA officials commented that peculiarly shaped rocks are pretty common on Mars.

03:04Also, billions of years of relentless Martian winds have swept away everything except these uniquely shaped remnants.

03:10Curiosity has quite the eye for spotting unusual formations.

03:14Back in February 2022, our rover pal stumbled upon a mineral flower,

03:20with branching patterns that looked like it had been styled by a florist.

03:23It measured a petite 0.4 inch in width.

03:26And just a few weeks later, on February 16th,

03:29Curiosity managed to capture some rocky evidence of ancient lakes,

03:33featuring teeny ripples and waves frozen in time.

03:36If you thought Mars was just a desolate red wasteland, think again.

03:40Scientists have even discovered larger scale shapes etched into the Martian surface by ancient water.

03:45For instance, there's a rock formation that bears an uncanny resemblance to the adorable face of a teddy bear.

03:51Who knew Mars had a cuddly side?

03:54And to top it off, there's another rock that looks like the spitting image of the frizzy-haired cartoon character.

03:59But curiosity isn't just about oddities and peculiarities.

04:03Remember that time on February 2nd when the rover unveiled the first clear images of sun rays on Mars?

04:09Picture this. As the sun dips below the Martian horizon during sunrises or sunsets,

04:15its rays create a mesmerizing sight as they pierce through gaps in the clouds.

04:20It's like Mother Nature's own laser light show.

04:23There are even images online with a so-called doorway on Mars.

04:27And no, it's not a secret passage for little green Martians to hop in and out of, if that's what you're thinking.

04:33The internet went bonkers when curiosity captured a snapshot that seemed to reveal an object resembling a door.

04:39Cue the weird theories and intergalactic excitement, nothing to worry about,

04:43as experts have chimed in with a down-to-earth explanation.

04:47According to specialists who know a thing or two about Mars geology,

04:50this particular structure is most likely the result of natural erosion.

04:54Boring answer, I know, but erosion is yet again to blame here.

04:58However, some scientists have also chimed in with a dash of humor on the matter.

05:03They pointed out that the door stands at a modest height of less than three feet.

05:07So even if we were to believe it's a doorway for Martians,

05:10we'd have to imagine a particular type of tiny extraterrestrial beings like Martian hobbits.

05:16But let's get back to reality, shall we?

05:19The consensus among experts is that this door is nothing more than a shallow opening in the rock,

05:24cleverly crafted by the forces of nature.

05:27Those visible layers were likely deposited around four billion years ago under sedimentary conditions,

05:33potentially in a river or a windblown dune.

05:36The winds on Mars have been hard at work, eroding these layers over time,

05:40leaving behind the intriguing features we see today.

05:43And if you look closely, you'll notice a few natural vertical fractures scattered throughout the image.

05:49These fractures are a result of rocks weathering on Mars,

05:53and the small cave-like structure we've affectionately nicknamed the Door

05:58seems to have formed at the intersection of these fractures and the aforementioned layers.

06:03It's almost as if a gigantic Martian boulder decided to take a tumble,

06:07creating this whimsical cave entrance.

06:10There's also a famous Mars crater that's not just your ordinary run-of-the-mill hole in the ground.

06:16It's chock full of shiny opal gemstones.

06:19According to a cool new study, those mysterious halos of rock surrounding cracks in the Martian crater

06:25might actually be made up of water-rich opal gemstones.

06:29Can you imagine that?

06:30Mars, the planet of bling!

06:33Curiosity yet again came to the rescue, and did some serious snooping around.

06:38It seems there's an ancient dried-up lake bed on Mars that is teeming with opal gemstones.

06:43These objects could be evidence that water and rock have been having a grand old time beneath the Martian surface,

06:49much more recently than anyone had previously thought, that is.

06:53Now, when scientists start talking about water, you know they're on the hunt for signs of life.

06:59After all, water is pretty crucial for life as we know it.

07:02But here's the catch. Water isn't flowing on Mars anymore.

07:06So these clever scientists have to put on their detective hats and search for geological signs that water once existed there.

07:13What does opal have to do with water on the Martian surface?

07:17Well, to make opal, you need rocks with a whole lot of silica and some good ol' H2O.

07:22There's more!

07:23Researchers also dove deep into the Curiosity rover's image archive,

07:27and discovered that these opal-rich halos are not just hanging out in one spot.

07:31Nope!

07:32They seem to be spread out all over the place in Gale Crater, which is like a huge ancient lake bed.

07:37So what did these clever scientists do next?

07:39They ran some tests, of course.

07:41Using Curiosity's fancy instruments, they confirmed that these light-colored halos do, in fact, contain opal.

07:49All this data, and those cool fracture halo pictures from earlier in the mission, led the researchers to a mind-boggling conclusion.

07:57Water must have been hanging out all over Gale Crater for a long time, after the ancient lake dried up.

08:03This means that life might have existed on Mars, and for a bit longer than we'd been guessing.

08:08Who knows, maybe even into Mars' modern geological period, which, get this, started a whopping 2.9 billion years ago.

08:14On Mars, nothing is ordinary.

08:19That's why a single rock, spotted by NASA's Perseverance rover in Jezero Crater, has drawn everyone's attention.

08:26Its surface is covered with tiny spheres.

08:29This texture is both bizarre, and weirdly, painfully familiar.

08:34Haven't we seen something similar on Earth?

08:37Yes, we have.

08:38Does it mean there's a mysterious connection between Earth and the Red Planet?

08:43NASA's Perseverance rover has been busy exploring Mars, and on August 5th, 2025, it spotted something unusual.

08:51A rock that looks like it came straight out of a medieval armory.

08:56It looks like a knight's helmet, forgotten after a battle.

08:59Or maybe, it's the hat of a witch that crash-landed on the Red Planet.

09:04Researchers officially nicknamed the rock Horniflaia.

09:08It has a dome-shaped top with a pointed tip and a rim that flares out.

09:13Its surface is rough and covered with tiny bumps.

09:16But the coolest thing is that the rock isn't just lumpy.

09:19It's made up almost entirely of little round spheres.

09:23Imagine bubble wrap that someone balled up and spray-painted Mars red.

09:28Here you go!

09:29Geologists aren't too impressed by the rock's shape, but its composition makes them raise their eyebrows.

09:35Such little spheres could have formed in a few days.

09:38Chemical weathering, volcanic activity, or if rock vaporized by a meteorite cooled down and condensed.

09:46On Earth, rocks with similar textures sometimes come from processes involving water.

09:52And this is one of the reasons why everyone is so excited now.

09:57If underground waters had a hand in shaping the rock, it could mean there was a lot of water on Mars in the past.

10:04And water means life.

10:07Now, another cool thing about this helmet is that it's a floating rock.

10:11The term means that it looks completely different from those around it.

10:15Basically, this rock doesn't belong to the area where the rover found it.

10:19The best guess is that it was launched from another location.

10:23Maybe it was a volcanic eruption.

10:26Or more likely, an asteroid smacked into the Martian surface and flung it across the landscape.

10:32Interestingly, this isn't the first bubble rock Perseverance has seen.

10:37Back in March 2025, it found another sphere-covered rock.

10:41And some of the tiny balls had holes in them.

10:44If you look closely at Horniflaia, you can see a bunch of those too.

10:49That might mean they're what geologists call...

10:52OOIDS.

10:53Small, spherical, layered grains.

10:55On Earth, OOIDS form when calcium carbonate builds up layer by layer in shallow water.

11:01Picture a warm, shallow sea near the equator.

11:04The water is a little choppy and waves are constantly moving things around.

11:08That's the kind of place OOIDS are born.

11:11They grow like pearls in oysters.

11:14An OOIDS starts small, usually with a tiny grain of sand or some other speck.

11:20The water is overloaded with calcium carbonate.

11:23So every time the waves move that grain around, a new layer builds up.

11:27Over time, the layers pile on and you've got yourself a neat little ball.

11:32Sometimes the center isn't as tough as the layers surrounding it.

11:36That's why the core can dissolve or even disappear completely, leaving behind a hole.

11:42If those Martian spheres formed in the same way, this might be the reason why they have those tiny cavities inside them.

11:50But there's another possibility.

11:52On Earth, the other way of OOID formation is biological.

11:56In other words, they sometimes start with the remains of tiny living organisms.

12:01Could the OOIDS on the red planet have formed in the same way?

12:05Of course.

12:06This doesn't mean we can slap a life found on Mars headline on it just yet.

12:11But the fact that these holes exist is a clue that hints that Mars might have had the right kind of conditions for life.

12:18Well, maybe not seashells and oysters, but definitely something worth paying attention to.

12:24Weird Earth-like formations aren't the only intriguing things found on Mars.

12:29In March 2025, NASA's Perseverance rover spotted something that looked like a bunch of tiny spider eggs.

12:36That something was made up of hundreds of little round balls stuck together.

12:41It was just sitting there on a hill called Witch Hazel, near the edge of Jezero Crater.

12:47On closer inspection, it turned out to be a weirdly shaped rock with a bit of red Martian dust on it.

12:53Yeah, sadly, or luckily, those weren't Martian spider eggs.

12:58Even so, the formation really stood out from everything else around it.

13:03The Perseverance team named the weird rock St. Paul's Bay.

13:07It's a floating rock too, just like Horniflaya.

13:10Something once moved this rock from its original spot.

13:13One theory claims that it could have been created when a meteorite smashed into Mars.

13:18The powerful impact must have blasted rocks into the air.

13:23Then, those bits could have cooled down and formed those tiny balls.

13:27If that's true, the rock might have come from really far away.

13:31Another cool find occurred in April 2023,

13:35when NASA's Curiosity rover took a little break from searching for signs of ancient water on Mars

13:41and stumbled upon a travel book.

13:44Later, scientists figured out that it wasn't really a book, just a rock.

13:49But it does look like a little hardcover with a page frozen mid-turn.

13:54This book rock is tiny, measuring only about one inch wide.

14:00In February 2022, the Curiosity rover spotted something that could only be described as a tiny flower made of minerals.

14:09It looked like little coral branches, but it was actually a mineral deposit.

14:14Pretty rare to see in a flower-like shape.

14:17Most of these kinds of deposits form when ancient water mixes with rocks on the Martian surface,

14:23so they're not exactly new to scientists.

14:26But that one was unique, since it looked like a tiny plant or flower.

14:31In January 2023, the University of Arizona shared another bizarre image.

14:37A rock formation on Mars that looked like the face of a giant teddy bear.

14:42It had two distinct beady eyes, a button nose, and an upturned mouth.

14:47It was captured by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which was orbiting the red planet at the time.

14:52Scientists from the University of Arizona explained that the teddy bear face was likely just a natural formation,

15:00like a broken uphill or mound in the center of an ancient crater.

15:05But let's get back to Horniflion.

15:07Perseverance snapped that strange bumpy rock photo during its 234th week on Mars,

15:13and NASA even picked it as the rover's best shot of the week.

15:17Of course, the rover's main job isn't collecting cool-looking rocks.

15:22Perseverance was launched on July 30th, 2020, with a big goal.

15:27To search for traces of ancient microbial life and figure out if Mars was ever truly habitable.

15:34That mission is connected directly to NASA's Artemis program.

15:38It's focused on setting up a long-term base on the Moon.

15:42The idea is that such colonies on Earth's natural satellite will help manage and support the first astronaut landing on Mars.

15:50At the same time, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has his own ideas.

15:56He wants to send uncrewed missions to Mars as soon as the end of 2026.

16:01In the meantime, Perseverance has been busy.

16:05Its first assignment was exploring Jezero Crater, a site chosen because it once held water.

16:11After three years of work, the rover wrapped up its full survey of the crater.

16:16It happened in December 2024.

16:19NASA explained why this mattered.

16:22If Mars really went through long, wet periods, Jezero's lake beds or shorelines could be some of the best places to look for fossilized signs of past life.

16:32Perseverance isn't alone either.

16:35Four other rovers have reached Mars over the years.

16:38The very first Sojourner landed in July 1997.

16:43Then came Opportunity, which was expected to last just three months, but ended up operating for an incredible 15 years until 2018.

16:53As for the bubbly rocks, scientists want to know more than just what they're made of.

16:58They're curious about where those rocks originally formed, and whether they lie in layers that could reveal how different materials build up over time.

17:08Studying their unusual makeup could tell researchers a lot about Mars' inner processes and how its environment shaped the planet's surface over billions of years.

17:18And maybe we could finally find out if there was life on the red planet.

17:23That's it for today.

17:24So hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your friends.

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