Scientists are hoping for ancient microbial life on Mars, but NASA's Mars rover has just made a surprise discovery on the distant planet. That's why it's trash.

Perseverance's descent stage appears to have been attached to a piece of thermal blanket, as indicated in the pictured object. Perseverance descended with the descent stage and performed a controlled crash landing well clear of the rover last year. As the descent stage came down more than a mile from the blanket's position, the discovery of the foil piece was somewhat unexpected.

Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California speculated this week that the rover may have drifted to its new location during its landing phase, or may have been blown there by martian winds. There's certainly no indication that previously undiscovered Martian life may have played a role in it.

Perseverance's Twitter account stated, 'Something unexpected has been spotted.'. According to the account, the item is a thermal blanket thought to be from my descent stage, the rocket-powered jet pack that set me down on landing day.

The post adds: 'It's a surprise finding this here: My descent stage crashed about 2 km away. Thermal blankets protect a spacecraft's components by regulating temperatures.' 'Did this fall here after that or did the wind blow it here?”

The thermal blankets wrapped around the rover by JPL workers are also visible in the image. They sew together these materials using sewing machines and other tools, as the message says.  

Instead of stumbling across landing leftovers, Perseverance is mostly focused on searching for signs of past life on Mars, as well as collecting rocks from the planet for return to Earth. While it is at it, it might as well grab some trash as well.