A photograph was taken from Mars by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity's Navcam last April 3 showing a mysterious light shining brightly on the planet. This led alien enthusiasts to speculate that an extraterrestrial being was on the planet. However, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s engineer Justin Maki told FoxNews that, “One possibility is that the light is the glint from a rock surface
reflecting the sun."
Maki said that the shot was taken through Curiosity Mars rover’s right eye and could mean that the image was just a “glinty rock”. The photo captured on the rover’s single eye means that the spot is situated in another location. As the right eye of the rover captured the image at the ground surface, this would mean that the beam was actually coming from the sun.
Maki said, “When these images were taken each day, the sun was in the same direction as the bright spot, west-northwest from the rover, and relatively low in the sky. The rover science team is also looking at the possibility that the bright spots could be sunlight reaching the camera's CCD directly through a vent hole in the camera housing, which has happened previously on other cameras on Curiosity and other Mars rovers when the geometry of the incoming sunlight relative to the camera is precisely aligned."
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