NASA's Perseverance rover has now produced enough oxygen to keep a small dog alive on Mars for 10 hours, NASA has announced, despite no plans to weird a dog out shortly before its demise.

When Perseverance landed on Mars in February 2021, it took with it the Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE) aimed at extracting oxygen from the Martian atmosphere. Since then it has generated oxygen 16 times, finally completing its run of experiments on August 7, 2023. 

During this time it produced 12 grams (0.4 ounces) of oxygen an hour at its most efficient, twice as much as NASA had originally hoped for. As well as this, the oxygen produced was at 98 percent purity or higher. 

In a press release announcing the success of the mission, NASA explained that the total 122 grams (4.3 ounces) of oxygen produced would be enough to keep a small dog alive for 10 hours. Humans need about 840 grams (30 ounces) of oxygen a day to survive according to NASA, meaning the oxygen produced by the rover would sustain an astronaut for just under 3 and a half hours.

“MOXIE’s impressive performance shows that it is feasible to extract oxygen from Mars’ atmosphere – oxygen that could help supply breathable air or rocket propellant to future astronauts,” NASA's Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy said in the press release. “Developing technologies that let us use resources on the Moon and Mars is critical to build a long-term lunar presence, create a robust lunar economy, and allow us to support an initial human exploration campaign to Mars.”

While keeping astronauts and their dogs not dead for a bit is impressive, NASA explains that leaving the planet will require "industrial quantities" of propellent, and would be the main purpose of producing our own oxygen while we are there.

The team plans to refine MOXIE, as well as create a way to liquify and store the oxygen it produces. Maybe one day, when we're all headed to Mars for our holidays LIKE SCI-FI PROMISED, we won't have to pack our own air.