This image shows a portion of the landing ellipse (circled) for NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover, which is expected to land within Jezero crater on 18 February 2021. The complete landing ellipse is 7.7 x 6.6 km, and is centered on an ancient river delta near the rim of Jezero that could hold clues about whether or not Mars was able to harbour life at some point during its ancient past. Jezero crater itself was once the site of a lake, and Perseverance will explore this region looking for signs of fossilized microbial life.

The image was taken by the CaSSIS camera on the ESA-Roscosmos Exomars Trace Gas Orbiter as part of an imaging campaign of the rover's future neighbourhood