These instruments will determine the rock sample's precise chemistry and mineralogy, and identify any interesting carbon chemistry that may be present.
Drilling a few centimetres inside a rock provides a fresh sample that is free from the alteration that can occur at the surface as a result of weathering or radiation damage.
This image from NASA's Curiosity rover shows the first sample of powdered rock extracted by the rover's drill.
Held in a scoop on the rover's mechanical arm, the tablespoon of pulverized gray rock offers planetary scientists their first sample from the planet's interior, where it may have been sheltered from the harsh surface chemistry and ultra-violet radiation.
Eventually, though, the drill will go deep enough to push rock powder into the drill's sample-gathering chamber.
Earlier this month, the Mars Curiosity rover drilled into the Martian surface, in the hopes of collecting a sample from the interior of a rock.
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The second sample is a piece of dolomite (a rock made of calcium magnesium carbonate).
Almost five years later, diners are still packing the house to sample his crispy rice cakes filled with Florida rock shrimp and smoky chorizo as well as ceviche made with a local catch, papaya, red onion, citrus and avocado.
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It could vaporize a rock and identify its minerals from the spectrum of light they emitted, or drill a sample and tease apart its chemical constituents.
Scientists need to be sure that when the big hammer tool turns in a rock it breaks the surface into a useable powder that will not clog or damage the sample handling mechanism.
"This is the first time any robot has drilled in any rock on Mars" or anywhere else beyond Earth, said Louise Jandura, chief engineer for Curiosity's sample system at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
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