NASA has described the mission of the Mars Rover as its most ambitious to date to the fourth planet in the solar system, beginning with a flyby by the Mariner spacecraft in 1965 and including two Viking landers in 1976. 

After traveling nearly 300 million miles and surviving a nerve-wracking 7-minute descent to the surface of Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover ("Percy") landed in Jezero Crater on Thursday, Feb. 18. Scientists hope that Percy will collect evidence that microscopic organisms once lived in the crater.

Watch the touchdown (Fun fact: 204 days from launch on July 30 to touchdown).

Some new books in Hekman's collection about Mars:

• The Design and Engineering of Curiosity: How the Mars Rover Performs Its Job
• Next Stop Mars: the Why, How and When of Human Missions