NASA rover captures breathtaking Martian dawn as mysterious cliffs emerge from the darkness

By WILIAM HUNTER, SENIOR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY REPORTER

Published: 05:00 EDT, 9 October 2026 | Updated: 05:28 EDT, 9 October 2026

NASA’s Curiosity rover has captured breathtaking images of a Martian dawn, revealing mysterious cliffs emerging from the darkness.

Striking blue hues appear in the foreground as the morning light illuminates a series of crags known as yardangs in the distance.

The striking scene was snapped at 8.30am Mars time on August 11, the 4,982nd Martian day of the rover’s lonely pilgrimage across the Red Planet.

Using Curiosity’s Mastcam, NASA took six images of the strange landscape and stitched them into a single stunning panorama back on Earth.

Unlike most scientific photos captured with the Mastcam, this image wasn’t corrected for white balance, meaning you can see the true colours of Mars’ early morning glow.

However, for the scientists back on Earth, the beautiful light is far less entrancing than the mystery of the looming ‘yardang layer’.

These rugged cliffs extend roughly 10 miles (16km) across the northwestern reaches of Mount Sharp, a three-mile-high (5km) mountain that Curiosity has been climbing since 2014.

And until Curiosity completes the long journey to its base, scientists can’t be entirely sure how it formed.

NASA’s Curiosity rover has captured breathtaking images of a Martian dawn, revealing mysterious cliffs emerging from the darkness

Curiosity snapped the striking scene at 08:30 Mars time on August 11, the 4,982nd Martian day of the rover’s lonely pilgrimage across the Red Planet

These images arrive shortly after Curiosity passed a key milestone, having recently passed 0.6 miles (one km) of elevation – the most ever climbed on Mars.

Now into the fifth year of an extended mission exploring the network of boxwork ridges along Mount Sharp’s northwest slopes, Curiosity has revealed a striking change in the landscape.

Dr Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity project scientist of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, told the Daily Mail: ‘The lower half formed from mud in ancient lakes, while the upper half formed in a dry desert environment, with occasional streams weaving among the dunes.’

However, Dr Vasavada says that the yardang layer is ‘an unknown’.

‘Depending on how it formed, it might reveal that lakes returned to the area after the desert, or that the environment was quite harsh for a period of time, with volcanic ash raining down,’ he explains.

The mystery doesn’t stem from understanding how yardangs form in general, since scientists actually have a good understanding of this process.

Professor Matt Balme, Professor of Planetary Geoscience at the Open University and part of the European Space Agency’s ExoMars programme, told the Daily Mail: ‘A yardang is a wind-eroded landform; you get them on Earth and Mars.’

They form in places where strong winds blow in the same direction for long periods, carving ‘inverted boat hull shapes’ with a blunt upwind nose and a long, tapered tail.

The image revealed a series of mysterious structures known as yardangs, which appear to be made from a different type of rock from those Curiosity has passed over before

This usually occurs when there is a strong layer of rock over a weaker one, as the wind breaks through the top layer and quickly carves out pits that collapse into parallel ridges.

While this process is well understood, the big question is why these Martian yardangs have formed in such an unusual way.

Professor Balme says: ‘The yardangs in Gale Crater seem to be forming in a totally separate material from the rocks Curiosity has been travelling on in the rest of its mission.

‘They could be formed from very different minerals, or have been altered in different ways. It could be that the rocks that form the yardangs were laid down many millions of years later than the rocks Curiosity has sampled already – and perhaps in very different conditions.

‘For example, it might be that the yardang-bearing rocks were laid down in a drier period, or experienced far less alteration by groundwater.’

However, scientists won’t know exactly what they are made of and how they formed until Curiosity gets there.

The rover will spend the next year or so driving through an area containing rocks enriched with sulphates and carbonates, both signs of ancient waters drying up.

Then, at some time in 2027, Curiosity will arrive at the base of the yardangs where it will use its robotic arm to collect ‘one-of-a-kind data’ on these mysterious features.

Curiosity has now climbed over one kilometre up the face of Mount Sharp, revealing how this area would have once been a wet, potentially habitable environment. Pictured: The view back down Mount Sharp captured on September 5

Curiosity is expected to climb up Mount Sharp (pictured) and reach the yardang layer by next year, where it will conduct tests to see why they are so different from the surrounding rock

This could reveal what the yardangs are made from, and why they seem so different from the layers that make up most of the mountain.

For example, Curiosity could find that the yardangs are made of an ancient ash layer, revealing new details about ancient volcanic activity on Mars.

Dr Keyron Hickman-Lewis, an expert on planetary exploration from Birkbeck University of London, told the Daily Mail: ‘We can expect detailed investigations using the cameras and chemical instruments aboard Curiosity, which should provide more details about the composition and processes of formation of these yardangs.

‘In contrast to typical rover observations, which focus on water activity on Mars in its most ancient history, we should anticipate that the yardangs will reveal new information about the more recent history of Mars, during which time the planet has been dry and dominated by wind-driven processes.’

Length of day: 24 hours, 39 minutes, and 35 seconds

Moons: 82 with formal designations; innumerable additional moonlets