Figure A

NASA's Curiosity Mars rover looks back down at "Marker Band Valley" after climbing a steep slope. This mosaic, made of five images that were stitched together after being sent to Earth, was captured by the rover's Mastcam on June 21, 2023, the 3,865th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. The color has been adjusted to match lighting conditions as the human eye would see them on Earth.

Figure A is the same image annotated to point out rover tracks in the gray terrain of the Marker Band.

Curiosity struggled to climb a 23-degree slope that had slippery sand and wheel-size boulders. These three factors – the incline, the sand, and the large boulders – combined to make this Curiosity's toughest climb yet.

Curiosity was built by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California. JPL leads the mission on behalf of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego built and operates Mastcam.

For more about Curiosity, visit: http://mars.nasa.gov/msl or https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html.