The Mars Science Laboratory Organic Check Material

Mars Science Laboratory’s Curiosity rover carries a set of five external verification standards in hermetically sealed containers that can be sampled as would be a Martian rock, by drilling and then portioning into the solid sample inlet of the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) suite. Each organic check material (OCM) canister contains a porous ceramic solid, which has been doped with a fluorinated hydrocarbon marker that can be detected by SAM. The purpose of the OCM is to serve as a verification tool for the organic cleanliness of those parts of the sample chain that cannot be cleaned other than by dilution, i.e., repeated sampling of Martian rock. SAM possesses internal calibrants for verification of both its performance and its internal cleanliness, and the OCM is not used for that purpose. Each OCM unit is designed for one use only, and the choice to do so will be made by the project science group (PSG).

火星科学实验室的“好奇号”火星车在密封容器中携带了一组五个外部验证标准，这些标准可以像火星岩石一样被采样，即通过钻孔，然后将其分配到火星样本分析（SAM）设备组的固体样本入口。每个有机检测材料（OCM）罐都含有一种多孔陶瓷固体，其中掺杂了一种可以被SAM检测到的氟化烃标记物。OCM的目的是作为样本链中那些除了通过稀释（即对火星岩石进行重复采样）无法清洁的部分的有机清洁度的验证工具。SAM拥有用于验证其性能和内部清洁度的内部校准物，OCM不用于该目的。每个OCM单元仅设计用于一次使用，是否使用将由项目科学小组（PSG）决定。