What role does the strategic depositing of sterilized sample tubes on the surface serve for the Sample Return campaign?
Answer
It acts as a critical test case and backup retrieval point for the future return architecture.
By depositing tubes in a dedicated caching depot, Perseverance provides a critical test case for the return architecture; if the rover were to fail before this step, the subsequent Sample Return mission would face substantially more risk collecting directly from unprepared sites.
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