Washington: NASA's Curiosity rover has tasted its first sample from a Martian region called "the clay-bearing unit" on Mount Sharp, the US space agency said. Curiosity drilled a piece of bedrock nicknamed "Aberlady" on April 6 -- the 2,370th Martian day, or sol, of the mission -- and delivered the sample to its internal mineralogy lab on Wednesday, NASA said in a statement.

The rover's drill chewed easily through the rock, unlike some of the tougher targets it faced nearby on Vera Rubin Ridge. It was so soft, in fact, that the drill did not need to use its percussive technique, which is helpful for snagging samples from harder rock. This was the mission's first sample obtained using only rotation of the drill bit. "Curiosity has been on the road for nearly seven years," said Curiosity Project Manager Jim Erickson of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, US.