page_title: Jezero (crater)
section_title: Mars 2020 mission
hierarchical_section_title: Jezero (crater) / Mars 2020 mission
caption_attribution_description: English: PIA19303: A Possible Landing Site for the 2020 Mission: Jezero Crater It's not only when trying to find a scientifically interesting place to land that the high-resolution images from HiRISE come in handy: it's also to identify potential hazards within a landing ellipse. This is one of the trickier aspects of selecting landing sites on Mars: a place to do good science but also where the risks of landing are low. Jezero Crater is an ancient crater where clay minerals have been detected, and with a delta deposit indicating that water was once flowing into a lake. Since clays form the in presence of water, this crater would be a very good candidate for a lander to explore and build on what we've learned from the Mars Science Laboratory. Could some form of ancient life have existed here and for how long? This image shows a possible landing site for the 2020 Mission: Jezero Crater, as seen by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. North-northwest is to the left. The location depicted is in the southeast quadrant of Jezero Crater. NOTE Drbogdan (talk) 17:07, 10 March 2015 (UTC): Original image rotated &amp; cropped via JASC Paint Shop Pro, v6.02
context_page_description: Jezero is a crater on Mars located at 18.38°N 77.58°E in the Syrtis Major quadrangle. The diameter of the crater is about 49.0 km. Thought to have once been flooded with water, the crater contains a fan-delta deposit rich in clays. The lake in the crater was present when valley networks were forming on Mars. Besides having a delta, the crater shows point bars and inverted channels. From a study of the delta and channels, it was concluded that the lake inside the crater probably formed during a period when there was continual surface runoff.
  In 2007, following the discovery of its ancient lake, the crater was named for Jezero in Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of several eponymous towns in the country. In several Slavic languages, including Czech, Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian and Slovene, the word jezero means 'lake' and is correctly pronounced as ['je.ze.ro], not [ˈjɛ.zə.ɹoʊ] or ['dʒɛ.zə.ɹoʊ].
  In November 2018, it was announced that Jezero crater had been chosen as the landing site for the Mars 2020 rover mission.
context_section_description: Jezero crater, once considered a site for the Mars Science Laboratory, was later proposed as a landing site for the Mars 2020 rover mission. In early 2017 it was selected to be among the top three candidate sites for the landing, along with Northeast Syrtis, 30 km to the southwest.
  A primary aim of the Mars 2020 mission is to search for signs of ancient life. It is hoped that a later mission could then return samples from sites identified as probably containing remains of life. To safely bring the craft down, a 12-mile (20 km) wide, smooth, flat circular area is needed. Geologists hope to examine places where water once ponded. They would like to examine sediment layers.
  In November 2018, Jezero crater was selected as the target landing site for the Mars 2020 rover mission.
caption: Proposed Mars 2020 landing site
   inside Jezero crater.
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