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Sample souvenir boarding pass to Mars (NASA screenshot)

NASA’s Perseverance rover, which has spent the past week on Mars, bears a plate containing the names of 10,932,295 earthlings.

They’re the names of people who took part in an online “Send Your Name to Mars” event held by NASA between May and September 2019.

NASA used an electron beam to stencil the names on three fingernail-sized chips, which were then placed on a trapezoid-shaped nameplate and installed on the Perseverance. In effect, the participants were given a boarding pass for a virtual journey to Mars.

On Feb. 23, NASA shared the nationality distribution of the 10.9 million people whose names were sent to Mars. The largest number of names were from Turkey (2,528,844), followed by India (1,778,277) and the US (1,733,559).

A total of 203,814 applicants identified themselves as South Korean, ranking eighth overall. Another 2,044 applicants were from North Korea. The numbers from China and Japan were relatively small at 292,071 and 31,920, respectively.

Over 250 countries and territories had at least one name listed. In terms of sheer number of countries, the entire world has now traveled to Mars — albeit in name only. For NASA, it has been a successful global PR coup.

“Send Your Name” placard attached to the rover Perseverance (NASA screenshot)

According to NASA, the names are written at a scale of less than one micrometer (one-millionth of a meter). Also included on the chips are the names of 155 students who reached the final round of a “Name the Rover” essay contest.

The nameplate additionally bears a laser-drawn picture showing Earth and Mars on either side of the sun, connected by its rays. Among the rays in the image is a message in Morse code reading “explore as one.”

The message is meant to signify how Earth and Mars are connected as part of the solar system. The nameplate has been affixed at the center of the Perseverance’s aft crossbeam.

NASA is currently taking reservations for its next “tickets to Mars” on its website. Around 6 million applications had been received as of Feb. 24.

By Kwak No-pil, senior staff reporter

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