NASA's 2020 Rover Will Be Manufacturing Oxygen On Mars

Oxygen is very vital, so far we know that in Mars there's plenty of water and snow but oxygen is missing.NASA said that their new mission to launch and operate Mars automated research station Mars 2020 Rover will include an experiment to produce oxygen from the local atmosphere. 

Basically America is hoping to rush to the Red Planet, NASA Acting Chief Administrator Robert Lightfoot, Jr. highlighted one possible way of getting oxygen onto Mars: via the next lander that’s going there but it should be clear that, the lander will manufacture the gas from the atmosphere over there.

“The next lander that is going to Mars, Mars 2020, has an experiment where we are going to try and actually generate oxygen out of the atmosphere on Mars,” Lightfoot, Jr. explained.

Mars’ atmosphere is incredibly thin It consists of 95.32% carbon dioxide, 2.7% nitrogen, 1.6% argon and about 0.13% oxygen, and also contains many other gases in smaller quantities. In the Earth's atmosphere, about 78% of nitrogen and 21% of oxygen. Its believed that Many millions of years ago, its atmosphere was far denser, and even contained Earth-like amounts of oxygen. However, its magnetic field failed, and the powerful solar wind stripped most of the gases away and propelled them into space thats why there are a bit of oxygen in the upper atmosphere.

One feasible way to boost oxygen levels is through nature processes like photosynthesis. Photosynthesis actively turns carbon dioxide into oxygen all the time, so if something similar to this process can be compressed down into a tiny box, it could be attached to a rover.

this is possible would be to use a powerful laser to “slice off” the extra carbon atom attached to the CO2 in Mars atmosphere to produce O2. Alternatively, electrolysis can also work

NASA is opting for the latter option, and they’ve installed MOXIE – Mars Oxygen In situ resource utilization Experiment – on the Mars 2020 rover. The goal is to produce small amounts of oxygen as purely as possible at the surface.

If successful, NASA plans to place a MOXIE-like instrument, but about 100 times larger, on Mars that would produce oxygen for future astronauts to use when they arrive. As a gas, it’s breathable; as a liquid, it’s literal rocket fuel.