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A secret message hidden on the parachute used to drop Nasa's Perseverance rover down on Mars has been revealed.

Clever online detectives claim to have "cracked a code" hidden in images from the rover's landing last week.

Special red and white patterns in the parachute appear to represent the secret coded phrase: "Dare mighty things".

This is a motto used at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, USA, which serves as mission control for the Perseverance rover mission, but so far the space agency hasn't confirmed fans are correct.

But the secret code is not the only hidden gem to be placed on to the Mars rover. Keep reading to find out five more special surprises that have been placed on board.

Almost 11 million names

Three microchips carrying 10,932,295 names from Nasa's "Send Your Name To Mars" campaign have been placed on Perseverance.

This is a regular tradition for the space agency's Mars rovers. Previously, the Curiosity rover carried a microchip with 1.2 million names.

The microchips also contain 155 essays from students who got through to the finals of the contest to the name the spacecraft, which was won by 13-year-old Alex Mather from Virginia.

Tribute to Covid healthcare workers

The rover also carries a tribute to the healthcare workers who've been fighting the coronavirus pandemic.

Perseverance blasted off into space in July 2020, just a few months after the virus began to affect the whole world.

Nasa's team wanted to recognise those people on the frontlines of the pandemic helping to protect people.

So, an aluminium plate was put on the rover's left side showing the Rod of Asclepius - a serpent wrapped around a staff that is used as a symbol of the ancient Greek symbol for healing and medicine - holding up the Earth.

Mastcam-Z made you look

Unlike the plates carrying names and honouring healthcare workers, which are decorative, some of the hidden objects on Perseverance have special functions.

One of these is Mastcam-Z, a pair of cameras on the rover to snap wide view colour photographs of Mars.

But Nasa also added an important message to Mastcam-Z: "Are we alone? We came here to look for signs of life, and to collect samples of Mars for study on Earth. To those who follow, we wish a safe journey and the joy of discovery."

Mastcam-Z also carries images of Earth's early life forms like cyanobacteria, a fern and a dinosaur, and line drawings of a man and woman.

Well done SHERLOC!

To the millions of people who geocache, a treasure-hunting game where you use your smartphone GPS to hunt for hidden objects, Nasa has hidden one geocache more remotely than any other - a special coin aboard Perseverance.

The coin is part of the SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals) instrument which is studying the landscape and atmosphere of Mars, and it is marked with the address of the famous fictional detective, 221B Baker Street in London.

SHERLOC also carries a slice of Martian meteorite and four other samples of spacesuit materials, which Nasa will watch to see how it holds up on the Martian surface.

SuperCam's Mars meteorite

The scientists who built Perseverance's SuperCam have also added their own slice of Martian meteorite.

SuperCam is a laser instrument that zaps rocks and "soil" on the Martian surface in order to find out what they are made up of.

This particular piece of rock on SuperCam made a roundtrip voyage to the International Space Station before scientists added it to Perseverance.