Credit: NASA

The Curiosity rover has temporarily stopped work on Mars while NASA engineers investigate a short circuit.

The space agency said Tuesday that the electrical problem was discovered over the weekend as Curiosity tried to transfer bits of powder from a rock that it had drilled into.

The stopped the rover's robotic arm. Engineers are diagnosing the issue, and the testing is expected to take several days.

Curiosity landed in a Martian crater in 2012. Since then, it has uncovered geologic evidence of an environment that could have supported microbial life early in the planet's history.