Mars Exploration Rover 25, 2011, bringing the elapsed mission time to 6 years 2 months 19 days, or over 25 times the original planned mission duration. In recognition of the vast amount of scientific information amassed by both rovers, two asteroids have been named in their honor: 37452 Spirit and 39382 Opportunity. The mission is managed for NASA by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which designed, built, and is operating the rovers. On January 24, 2014, NASA reported that current studies by the remaining rover "Opportunity" as well as by the newer Mars Science Laboratory rover "Curiosity" will now be searching for evidence of
Opportunity mission timeline may clear the dust from its solar panels, as it has happened before. Some of the craters MER-B has investigated Some excitement from finding meteorites, new types of rock or signatures detected from orbit, and speculations on ancient alien fossils which as of yet lean towards geological processes. "Examples" Some other famous targets are the "blueberries" (2004) and "newberries", aka Kirkwood spheres (2012) See also List of rocks on Mars#Opportunity and List of surface features of Mars imaged by "Opportunity" Opportunity mission timeline Opportunity, MER-B (Mars Exploration Rover – B), is a robotic rover active on the planet Mars since