In a shallow depression called "Yellowknife Bay," the NASA Mars rover Curiosity drove to an edge of the feature during the 130th Martian day, or sol, of the mission (December 17, 2012) and used its Navigation Camera to record this view of the ledge at the margin and a view across the "bay."
This 180-degree mosaic of images from the navigation camera on the NASA Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows terrain near the rover during the 3,153rd Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (December 6, 2012). West is at the center, south at the left edge, north at the right edge.
Opportunity had driven about 7 feet (2.2 meters) westward earlier on Sol 3153 to get close to the outcrop called "Copper Cliff," which is in the center of this scene. The location is on the east-central portion of "Matijevic Hill" on the "Cape York" segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater.
The view is presented as a cylindrical projection.
This full-circle panorama shows the terrain around the NASA Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity during the 3,105th Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (October 18, 2012). It was assembled from images taken by the rover's navigation camera. South is at the center. North is on both ends.
Opportunity had driven about 61 feet (18.5 meters) westward earlier on Sol 3105 to reach this location, which is on the northern portion of "Matijevic Hill" on the "Cape York" segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater. The wheel tracks created by the drive are visible. For scale, the distance between the two parallel tracks is about 3.3 feet (1 meter).
The basin of Endeavour Crater is in the left half of the image. Opportunity has been working on the western rim of Endeavour since mid-2011.
The panorama is presented as a cylindrical projection.
This full-circle panorama shows the terrain around the NASA Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity during the 3,071st Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (September 13, 2012). It was assembled from images taken by the rover's navigation camera. South is at the center. North is on both ends.
Opportunity had driven about 34 feet (10.3 meters) the preceding sol to reach this location, which is on part of a relatively flat, light-toned outcrop called "Whitewater Lake." A darker, adjacent outcrop, called "Kirkwood," lies just east of the rover's location and cuts a band through the middle of this view.
The basin of Endeavour Crater is in the left half of the image. Opportunity has been working on the western rim of Endeavour since mid-2011.
The panorama is presented as a cylindrical projection.
This circular crack is very odd-looking. When you zoom in to HiRISE scale, the crack looks a lot like a graben.
Canyonlands, Utah is a great place to see grabens on Earth. Grabens form when solid rock is pulled apart. Two cracks form at distinctive angles, and the material between the cracks collapses downward, forming a straight-walled canyon. Well, they're usually straight-walled, but this one is circular, which is unusual.
The first thing anyone thinks of when they see circular features on Mars is a crater. So one hypothesis about how this formed is that an ancient crater was buried by some material, maybe lava or even multiple layers of wet sediments. Because the center of the crater was deeper, more material settled there, and the high-standing rim was only thinly covered. The mantling material solidified and shrank, creating extensional forces.
The heavy central fill pulled downward, cracking the material at the rim where it was thinnest. That's just one guess, though - what else do you think it could be?
References
Buczkowski, D. L. and M. L. Cooke, 2004. Formation of double-ring circular grabens due to volumetric compaction over buried impact craters: Implications for thickness and nature of cover material in Utopia Planitia, Mars, J. Geophys. Res., 109, E02006, doi:10.1029/2003JE002144.
McGill, G. E., 1986. The giant polygons of Utopia, Northern Martian Plains GeoRL 13, 705-708. DOI:10.1029/GL013i008p00705
This is a stereo pair with ESP_029217_1795.
This impact site is located on the floor of a large fracture within Fortuna Fossae. This site formed sometime between September 2005 and May 2008 and consists of five distinct craters each displaying individual dark-toned ejecta patterns.
The resulting craters indicate that the impactor broke up into five parts prior to its collision with the surface. Craters continue to form on Mars today and repeat imaging of these recent impacts--especially in the color portion--provides information about how impact features change with time.
This image is from the high latitudes in the Southern hemisphere, about half-way through southern spring.
Just like on the Earth, the frost layer that accumulates over the winter will disappear as summer approaches and Mars heats up. However, most of this frost is not made of water ice and snow -- on Mars, most of the frost/ice is made of carbon dioxide (also known as "dry ice").
This material will not melt, but instead will go directly from solid into vapor (a process called sublimation) as it heats up (above approximately 147 K, which is -195 F, or -126 C). In doing so, it'll create all sorts of interesting landforms.
In this image, we can see sublimation spots (small spots where the frost/ice has sublimated away, exposing the darker ground). We also see small fans, which form when jets of gaseous carbon dioxide erupt through a weak spot in the surface ice, ejecting dark surface material that then gets smeared across the surface by the wind (so the different directions of the fans show us how the wind varies across this landscape).
Large darker "flows" are also visible; these are avalanches of material that extend downslope (and scientists are still debating if flows are dry or wet features). In the next few weeks, more of these features will appear and grow, until Mars heats up enough for all of the frost and ice (and sublimation features) to disappear.
References:
Gardin, E., et al. (2010). Defrosting, dark flow features, and dune activity on Mars: Example in Russell crater. J. Geophys. Res. 115, E06016.
Hansen, C.J., et al. (2010). HiRISE observations of gas sublimation-driven activity in Mars' southern polar regions: I. Erosion of the surface. Icarus 205, 283-295.
Kereszturi, A., et al. (2009). Recent rheologic processes on dark polar dunes of Mars: Driven by interfacial water? Icarus 201, 492-503.
Hydrae Chasma is a deep, circular depression approximately 50 kilometers across, situated between Juventae Chasma to the north and the large canyon system Valles Marineris to the south. The Chasma has steep walls flanked by numerous landslides and a massive scarp along its southern boundary where the surface has collapsed into this depression.
This closeup is of an isolated flat-topped mountain (known as a mesa) rising out of a sea of dunes located in the center of Hydrae Chasma. Darker-toned dunes, likely composed of basaltic sands, form an apron along the base of the mesa's northern margin. The western side of the mesa is gently sloping and is composed of a highly fractured light-toned rubbly base. It is overlaid by alternating light and dark layered cliff-forming units and is covered by a sediment cap containing still more dunes.
The layered sequences are present only in the interior deposits and not in the walls of the Chasma. Similar deposits are located on the floors of Valles Marineris and other chasmata and may be the sediment remnants of ancient lakes formed within these canyon systems.
This color-coded overhead view is based on an ESA Mars Express HRSC digital terrain model of the region, from which the topography of the landscape can be derived. The color coding shows the very edge of the Charitum Montes mountain region at the top of the image, with the highest elevation, while the subtle pedestal craters that dot the image almost fade away with just a small amount of relief difference between the elevated ejecta and the surrounding area. Centered at around 53°S and 334°E, the image has a ground resolution of about 20 m per pixel. The image was taken during revolution 10778 on 18 June 2012.
Charitum Montes imaged during revolution 10778 on 18 June 2012 by ESA’s Mars Express using the High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC). Data from HRSC’s nadir channel and one stereo channel have been combined to produce this anaglyph 3D image that can be viewed using stereoscopic glasses with red–green or red–blue filters. Centered at around 53°S and 334°E, the image has a ground resolution of about 20 m per pixel.
How exactly can we tell if an impact crater is new?
In this observation, we see a dark spot with a larger, rayed "blast zone" that was also apparent in a Context Camera image taken in 2011 (an instrument with a larger footprint than HiRISE and also on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter). However, a THEMIS image of the same area acquired in 2009 does not show the dark spot at all.
This is a great example of using three different instruments to view the same area not only to look for changes in the Martian landscape, but also to use the resolution of HiRISE to determine if this is indeed a new impact site.
While HiRISE has imaged slope streaks before, bright streaks are not as common as dark ones, so they're of high interest.
Slope streaks are generally small features, and have an interior roughness that is finer than the width of the streak itself. A high resolution image can help identify the characteristics of this roughness.
Additionally, studying these streaks can shed light on the "life cycle" of a streak and the geologic processes that created them. We may also be able to study the photometric properties of the streaks.
(Note: the above image is not map-projected, so north is approximate down).
As the name suggests, pedestal craters usually have ejecta (material thrown out from impact) that is above the surrounding terrain. In some cases, the material can be more erosion-resistant. Some suggest that these units were once rich in volatiles (e.g., water ice).
This specific pedestal in Malea Planum is one of the largest on Mars, and fine layering is visible along its margins.
This image shows large sand dunes in the North Polar sand sea on Mars. It is one of a series of repeat images of the same dunes, taken at different times, in order to determine the type and extent of changes in the dunes over time.
Dunes tend to migrate slowly on Earth under continuous wind regimes (on the order of several to tens of meters per year), and we are just starting to verify movement on Martian dunes with these repeat HiRISE images.
In addition to migration of the dune, we will also use these repeat images to look for changes in the dune shape and avalanches down the slip face. Analyzing these changes will help us better understand the interaction between the atmosphere and the surface of Mars.
Small spherical objects fill the field in this mosaic combining four images from the Microscopic Imager on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity. The view covers an area about 2.4 inches (6 centimeters) across, at an outcrop called "Kirkwood" in the Cape York segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater. The individual spherules are up to about one-eighth inch (3 millimeters) in diameter.
The Microscopic Imager took the component images during the 3,064th Martian day, or sol, of Opportunity's work on Mars (September 6, 2012). For a color view of the Kirkwood outcrop as Opportunity was approaching it two weeks earlier, see PIA16128.
Opportunity discovered spherules at its landing site more than eight-and-a-half years earlier. Those spherules were nicknamed "blueberries." They provided important evidence about long-ago wet environmental conditions on Mars because researchers using Opportunity's science instruments identified them as concretions rich in the mineral hematite deposited by water saturating the bedrock. A picture of the "blueberries" from the same Microscopic Imager is PIA05564.
The spherules at Kirkwood do not have the iron-rich composition of the blueberries. They also differ in concentration, distribution and structure. Some of the spherules in this image have been partially eroded away, revealing concentric internal structure. Opportunity's science team plans to use the rover for further investigation of these spherules to determine what evidence they can provide about ancient Martian environmental conditions.
This image of a wind streak monitoring site northwest of Uranius Tholus shows dramatic differences from earlier images and evidence for two distinct processes of Martian wind erosion.
Located near the northern end of the Tharsis rise at a moderate elevation (1800 meters above datum), the site is in a region of high albedo and low thermal inertia that suggest a thick mantle of dust. The first subimage shows some of the changes that have occurred since the site was last imaged in January, 2009 (ESP_011465_2075). Bright dust has been scoured from the surface by strong southerly winds (blowing from the top right in these unprojected images). Bright streaks trail downwind from impact craters, protected from the wind in the lee of the crater rims. Sharp dark streaks edged upwind as the dust was stripped away. At least two different episodes of erosion with slightly different wind directions can be inferred from the orientations of the dark streaks. Yet another wind direction is indicated by the few dune-like ripples that can be seen in the floor of the valley. These features were shaped by much older winds that were probably controlled by local topography.
The second subimage shows the second erosion process, the tracks of dust-devils across the newly cleaned surface (just south of the first subimage). What makes these tracks interesting is that they are bright! Most dust-devil tracks on Mars are dark, forming when a whirlwind lifts bright dust off the surface and exposes a darker substrate. These tracks were neither visible in the earlier HiRISE image, nor in an earlier image (PSP_002222_2075) acquired in January, 2007. The cause of the bright tracks is unclear.
Bright dust-devil tracks were also spotted by the Mars Orbital Camera in southern Schiaparelli Crater, a region also dominated at the time by wind streaks. One way to make bright tracks would be to excavate through dark material (such as a lag of basaltic sand) to a brighter substrate. Another possibility is that the dust-devils stir up the remaining pockets of bright dust that are hiding from the prevailing winds in the shelter of topographic obstacles.
This enhanced-color image shows a surface with diverse colors just southwest of Nili Fossae. The color diversity of this mesa suggests that the surface has a varied composition, perhaps recording chemical processes of ancient Mars.
Much of the surface shows a chaotic mix of colors, but the northern impact crater exposes distinct layers. Different layers have different colors. There are several possible reasons for this: the events that formed the layers could have drawn material from different sources, or the layers could have been altered differently after they formed, for reasons such as varying porosity.
This is a stereo pair with ESP_019898_2000.
The mounds in this observation may have been formed by a process called "diapirism," where material at depth is more buoyant (i.e., lower density) than the surrounding rocks so it rises to the surface.
Why might this be of interest? At HiRISE resolution, we might be able to study the uplifted material more closely, such as if there are clays or other aqueous materials present. If these mounds were formed by diapirism, it offers a deeper window into the Martian past. This area could also be an interesting site for a future exploration rover.
This is a stereo pair with ESP_026284_2060.
Observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have detected carbon-dioxide snow clouds on Mars and evidence of carbon-dioxide snow falling to the surface.
Deposits of small particles of carbon-dioxide ice are formed by snowfall from carbon-dioxide clouds. This map shows the distribution of small-grain carbon-dioxide ice deposits formed by snowfall over the south polar cap of Mars. It is based on infrared measurements by the Mars Climate Sounder instrument on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
This 3-D image from NASA's Curiosity was taken from the rover's Bradbury Landing site inside Gale Crater, Mars, using the left and right eyes of its Navigation camera. Between the rover on the right, and its shadow on the left, looms the rover's eventual target: Mount Sharp. The mountain's highest peak is not visible to the rover from the landing site.
This full-resolution, 360-degree stereo panorama was taken on sols 2 and 12 of the mission, or the 2nd and 12th Martian days since landing (Aug. 8 and 18, 2012). It requires viewing with the traditional red-blue 3-D glasses, with red going over the left eye.
After a rocket-powered descent stage, also known as the sky crane, delivered NASA's Curiosity rover to Mars on August 5 PDT (August 6 EDT), 2012, it flew away and fell to the surface. Possible multiple impacts from that collision are revealed in blue in this enhanced-color view taken by the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
The main crash site is seen at right, shaped like a fan. Farther from the site are several smaller dark spots, which are thought to be secondary impacts from debris that continued to travel outward. The impact sites are darker because the lighter, reddish top layer of soil was disturbed, revealing darker basaltic sands underneath.
The full image for these observations can be seen at http://uahirise.org/releases/msl-tracks.php.
This 360-degree panorama assembled from images taken by the navigation camera on NASA's Mars Exporation Rover Opportunity shows terrain surrounding the position where the rover spent its 3,000th Martian day, or sol, working on Mars (July 2, 2012). Opportunity completed its 90-sol prime mission in April 2004. It has continued to explore the Meridiani Planum region of Mars for more than eight years of bonus extended missions.
The Sol 3000 site is near the northern tip of the Cape York segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater. Bright toned material lines the perimeter of Cape York.
This panoramic view is centered to the south, with north at both ends. The component images were taken during sols 2989 through 2991.
Opportunity arrived at this location on Sol 2989 (June 20, 2012) with a drive bringing the mission's total driving distance as of Sol 3000 to 21.432 miles (34,492 meters). Here it examined a rock target called "Grasberg" with its microscopic imager and alpha particle X-ray spectrometer, both before and after grinding the surface off the target with the rover's rock abrasion tool. Opportunity departed this location with an eastward drive of about 105 feet (32 meters) on Sol 3008 (July 10, 2012).
The scene is presented as a cylindrical projection in this image.
Rock fins up to about 1 foot (30 centimeters) tall dominate this scene from the panoramic camera (Pancam) on NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity. The component images were taken during the 3,058th Martian day, or sol, of Opportunity's work on Mars (August 23, 2012). The view spans an area of terrain about 30 feet (9 meters) wide.
Orbital investigation of the area has identified a possibility of clay minerals in this area of the Cape York segment of the western rim of Endeavour Crater.
The view combines exposures taken through Pancam filters centered on wavelengths of 753 nanometers (near infrared), 535 nanometers (green) and 432 nanometers (violet). It [the top image] is presented in approximate true color, the camera team's best estimate of what the scene would look like if humans were there and able to see it with their own eyes.
High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) nadir and color channel data taken during revolution 10572 on 9 April 2012 by ESA’s Mars Express have been combined to form a natural-color view of Hadley Crater. Centered at around 19°S and 157°E, the image has a ground resolution of about 19 m per pixel. The image shows the main 120 km wide crater, with subsequent impacts at later epochs within it. Evidence of these subsequent impacts occurring over large timescales is shown by some of the craters being buried.
Coprates Chasma exposes several kilometers of rock that tell scientists about processes that occurred in the ancient past and in the subsurface. In this HiRISE image, rocks that display several colors and brightness are visible along the chasma wall.
Some of the brighter rocks could be minerals that formed when basaltic rock was altered by water flowing deep underground a long time ago before the chasma opened up. Alternatively, the light-toned rocks may be sediments that were deposited when water filled up portions of the chasma.
Dark dunes that could still be active are at the bottom of the image, attesting to more recent activity in this location.
This is a stereo pair with ESP_025441_1650.
Mars Express HRSC (High Resolution Stereo Camera) image of Phobos taken on 9 January 2011 at a distance of 100 km with a resolution of 8.1 m/pixel. Use red-blue glasses to fully appreciate this image.
Phobos is approximately 27 × 22 × 18 km and orbits Mars at a distance of 6000 km above the planet’s surface, or 9400 km from the center of the planet.
This color image from NASA's Curiosity rover shows an area excavated by the blast of the Mars Science Laboratory's descent stage rocket engines. This is part of a larger, high-resolution color mosaic made from images obtained by Curiosity's Mast Camera.
With the loose debris blasted away by the rockets, details of the underlying materials are clearly seen. Of particular note is a well-defined, topmost layer that contains fragments of rock embedded in a matrix of finer material. Shown in the inset in the figure are pebbles up to 1.25 inches (about 3 centimeters) across (upper two arrows) and a larger clast 4 inches (11.5 centimeters) long protruding up by about 2 inches (10 centimeters) from the layer in which it is embedded. Clast-rich sedimentary layers can form in a number of ways. Their mechanisms of formation can be distinguished by the size, shape, surface textures and positioning with respect to each other of the fragments in the layers.
The images in this mosaic were acquired by the 34-millimeter Mastcam over about an hour of time on August 8, 2012 PDT (Aug. 9, 2012 EDT), each at 1,200 by 1,200 pixels in size.
In the main version, the colors portrayed are unmodified from those returned by the camera. The view is what a cell phone or camcorder would record since the Mastcam takes color pictures in the exact same manner that consumer cameras acquire color images. The second version (Figure 1), shows the colors modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight. This processing, called "white balancing," is useful for scientists to be able to recognize and distinguish rocks by color in more familiar lighting.
This computer-generated perspective view was created using data obtained from the High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on ESA’s Mars Express. Centered at around 18°S and 329°E, this image has a ground resolution of about 20 m per pixel. Sigli and Shambe dominate this image, which highlights the deep fracturing within the crater walls. The shape of the craters leads scientists to believe they were formed from the same impactor, which fragmented into two pieces just before hitting Mars.
This color image from NASA's Curiosity rover shows part of the wall of Gale Crater, the location on Mars where the rover landed on August 5, 2012 PDT (August 6, 2012 EDT). This is part of a larger, high-resolution color mosaic made from images obtained by Curiosity's Mast Camera.
This image of the crater wall is north of the landing site, or behind the rover. Here, a network of valleys believed to have formed by water erosion enters Gale Crater from the outside. This is the first view scientists have had of a fluvial system -- one relating to a river or stream -- from the surface of Mars. Known and studied since the 1970s beginning with NASA's Viking missions, such networks date from a period in Martian history when water flowed freely across the surface. The main channel deposit seen here resembles a dirt road ascending into the mountains, which are actually the north wall and rim of Gale Crater. The colors in a second version (Figure 1) have been modified as if the scene were transported to Earth and illuminated by terrestrial sunlight. This processing, called "white balancing," is useful for scientists to be able to recognize and distinguish rocks by color in more familiar lighting.
Although Curiosity is about 11 miles (18 kilometers) away from this area and the view is obscured somewhat by dust and haze, the image provides new insights into the style of sediment transport within this system. Curiosity has no current plans to visit this valley system, since the primary objective of the rover is south of the landing site. But images taken later and with the 100-millimeter Mastcam are likely to allow scientists to study the area in significantly more detail.
The images in this mosaic were acquired by the 34-millimeter MastCam over about an hour of time on August 8, 2012 PDT (Aug. 9, 2012 EDT), each at 1,200 by 1,200 pixels in size.
This image illustrates how spacecraft landings on Mars have become more and more precise over the years. Since NASA's first Mars landing of Viking in 1976, the targeted landing regions, or ellipses, have shrunk. Improvements in interplanetary navigation tightened the ellipses between the 1997 and 2008 landings of NASA's Pathfinder and Phoenix.
NASA's Curiosity used those improvements, in addition to hypersonic guided entry similar to that used by astronauts returning to Earth during NASA's Apollo program, to further reduce the ellipse size and land just north of the slopes of Mount Sharp. The area of Curiosity's landing ellipse was just seven percent the size of the previous best landing ellipse for Phoenix. This guided entry technique also allowed a much heavier rover to land on Mars.
The background picture is from the European Space Agency's Mars Express overlaid with topographical data from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor.
This full-resolution self-portrait shows the deck of NASA's Curiosity rover from the rover's Navigation cameras. The back of the rover can be seen at the top left of the image, and two of the rover's right side wheels can be seen on the left. Part of the pointy rim of Gale Crater forms the lighter color strip in the background. Bits of gravel, about 0.4 inches (1 centimeter) in size, are visible on the deck of the rover.
This mosaic is made of eight images, each of 1,024 by 1,024 pixels, taken late at night on August 7 PDT (early morning August 8 EDT). It uses an average of the Navcam positions to synthesize the point of view of a single camera, with a field of view of 120 degrees. Seams between the images have been minimized, but a few are still visible. The wide field of view introduces some distortion at the edges of the mosaic.
The "augmented reality" or AR tag seen in the middle of the image can be used in the future with smart phones to obtain more information about the mission.
This full-resolution image shows part of the deck of NASA's Curiosity rover taken from one of the rover's Navigation cameras looking toward the back left of the rover.
On the left of this image, part of the rover's power supply is visible. To the right of the power supply can be seen the pointy low-gain antenna and side of the paddle-shaped high-gain antenna for communications directly to Earth. The rim of Gale Crater is the lighter colored band across the horizon. The effects of the descent stage's rocket engines blasting the ground can be seen on the right side of the image, next to the rover.
This full-resolution image is 1,024 by 1,024 pixels. The image was taken on August 7 PDT (August 8 EDT).
This is the first 360-degree panorama in color of the Gale Crater landing site taken by NASA's Curiosity rover. The panorama was made from thumbnail versions of images taken by the Mast Camera.
Scientists will be taking a closer look at several splotches in the foreground that appear gray. These areas show the effects of the descent stage's rocket engines blasting the ground. What appeared as a dark strip of dunes in previous, black-and-white pictures from Curiosity can also be seen along the top of this mosaic, but the color images also reveal additional shades of reddish brown around the dunes, likely indicating different textures or materials.
The images were taken late August 8 PDT (August 9 EDT) by the 34-millimeter Mast Camera. This panorama mosaic was made of 130 images of 144 by 144 pixels each. Selected full frames from this panorama, which are 1,200 by 1,200 pixels each, are expected to be transmitted to Earth later. The images in this panorama were brightened in the processing. Mars only receives half the sunlight Earth does and this image was taken in the late Martian afternoon.
This image shows the quadrangle where NASA's Curiosity rover landed, now called Yellowknife. The mission's science team has divided the landing region into several square quadrangles, or quads, of interest about 1-mile (1.3-kilometers) wide. This will allow groups of team members to focus their analysis on a particular part of the surface.
Yellowknife is a city in northwestern Canada and a group of rocks from the same region. The rocks were formed 2.7 billion years ago from both volcanoes and sediments laid down by water, and were deposited over 4-billion-year-old rocks, the oldest known on Earth.
The image was obtained by the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
These are the first two full-resolution images of the Martian surface from the Navigation cameras on NASA's Curiosity rover, which are located on the rover's "head" or mast. The rim of Gale Crater can be seen in the distance beyond the pebbly ground.
The topography of the rim is very mountainous due to erosion. The ground seen in the middle shows low-relief scarps and plains. The foreground shows two distinct zones of excavation likely carved out by blasts from the rover's descent stage thrusters.
These are full-resolution images, 1024 by 1024 pixels in size.
This Picasso-like self portrait of NASA's Curiosity rover was taken by its Navigation cameras, located on the now-upright mast. The camera snapped pictures 360-degrees around the rover, while pointing down at the rover deck, up and straight ahead. Those images are shown here in a polar projection. Most of the tiles are thumbnails, or small copies of the full-resolution images that have not been sent back to Earth yet. Two of the tiles are full-resolution.
Gale Crater is 154 km wide and is located at latitude 5.4 degrees south and longitude 137.9 degrees east. This image, taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) of Mars Express, has a resolution of 100 meters per pixel. It is color-coded based on a digital terrain model derived from stereo image data.
This color full-resolution image showing the heat shield of NASA's Curiosity rover was obtained during descent to the surface of Mars on August 5 PDT (August 6 EDT). The image was obtained by the Mars Descent Imager instrument known as MARDI and shows the 15-foot (4.5-meter) diameter heat shield when it was about 50 feet (16 meters) from the spacecraft.
This image shows the inside surface of the heat shield, with its protective multi-layered insulation. The bright patches are calibration targets for MARDI. Also seen in this image is the Mars Science Laboratory Entry, Descent, and Landing Instrument (MEDLI) hardware attached to the inside surface.
At this range, the image has a spatial scale of 0.4 inches (1 cm) per pixel. It is the 36th MARDI image, obtained about three seconds after heat shield separation and about two and one-half minutes before touchdown. The original image from MARDI has been geometrically corrected to look flat. The thumbnail version of this image is available at PIA15988.
Curiosity landed inside of a crater known as Gale Crater.
This close-up image of a dust storm on Mars was acquired by the Mars Color Imager instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on November 7, 2007, around 3 p.m. local time on Mars. Scientists working with NASA's Curiosity rover, which is set to land on Mars on Aug. 5 PDT (August 6 EDT), are monitoring Mars each day for similar small storms that could either drift over the landing site or stir up dust that moves as haze over the site.
This image is centered on Utopia Planitia (53.6 degrees north latitude, 147.9 degrees east longitude), along the north seasonal polar cap edge in late northern winter. When NASA's Curiosity rover lands on Mars, it will be late southern winter. Scientists are looking at similar small storms that form near the south seasonal polar cap edge. The dust storm pictured here was short-lived, lasting less than 24 hours. The image also shows the seasonal north polar cap (at top of figure) and gravity-wave water ice clouds coming off of Mie crater, just south of the storm. Gravity-wave clouds, also called lee-wave clouds, are clouds that result from changes in atmospheric pressure, temperature and height because of vertical displacement, such as when wind blows over a mountain or crater wall.
The projection of the image is polar stereographic and the image has a resolution of about 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) per pixel. North is indicated with an arrow in this image. The white scale bar is 93 miles (150 kilometers).
The four main pieces of hardware that arrived on Mars with NASA's Curiosity rover were spotted by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera captured this image about 24 hours after landing. The large, reduced-scale image points out the strewn hardware: the heat shield was the first piece to hit the ground, followed by the back shell attached to the parachute, then the rover itself touched down, and finally, after cables were cut, the sky crane flew away to the northwest and crashed. Relatively dark areas in all four spots are from disturbances of the bright dust on Mars, revealing the darker material below the surface dust.
Around the rover, this disturbance was from the sky crane thrusters, and forms a bilaterally symmetrical pattern. The darkened radial jets from the sky crane are downrange from the point of oblique impact, much like the oblique impacts of asteroids. In fact, they make an arrow pointing to Curiosity.
This image was acquired from a special 41-degree roll of MRO, larger than the normal 30-degree limit. It rolled towards the west and towards the sun, which increases visible scattering by atmospheric dust as well as the amount of atmosphere the orbiter has to look through, thereby reducing the contrast of surface features. Future images will show the hardware in greater detail. Our view is tilted about 45 degrees from the surface (more than the 41-degree roll due to planetary curvature), like a view out of an airplane window. Tilt the images 90 degrees clockwise to see the surface better from this perspective. The views are primarily of the shadowed side of the rover and other objects.
The Curiosity rover is approximately 4,900 feet (1,500 meters) away from the heat shield; about 2,020 feet (615 meters) away from the parachute and back shell; and approximately 2,100 feet (650 meters) away from the discoloration consistent with the impact of the sky crane.
The image scale is 39 centimeters (15.3 inches) per pixel.
This image shows a fresh impact crater about 2 kilometer (1.2 miles) across. How do we know it is fresh?
The crater walls are steep and rocky, and fine striated texture is still visible on the ejecta. Over time, erosion and dust settling out of the atmosphere will smooth out such details. However, these processes are slow on Mars, and the crater is probably at least several million years old.
Craters like this are important targets for HiRISE for several reasons. The details of the fresh crater are interesting in themselves for studying impact processes, but crater walls can also provide great exposures of bedrock. The steep slopes are also good places to look for active processes like rockfalls happening today, especially when we can compare a series of images taken over several years.
NASA's Curiosity rover and its parachute were spotted by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as Curiosity descended to the surface on August 5 PDT (August 6 EDT). The High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera captured this image of Curiosity while the orbiter was listening to transmissions from the rover. Curiosity and its parachute are in the center of the white box; the inset image is a cutout of the rover stretched to avoid saturation. The rover is descending toward the etched plains just north of the sand dunes that fringe "Mt. Sharp." From the perspective of the orbiter, the parachute and Curiosity are flying at an angle relative to the surface, so the landing site does not appear directly below the rover.
The parachute appears fully inflated and performing perfectly. Details in the parachute, such as the band gap at the edges and the central hole, are clearly seen. The cords connecting the parachute to the back shell cannot be seen, although they were seen in the image of NASA's Phoenix lander descending, perhaps due to the difference in lighting angles. The bright spot on the back shell containing Curiosity might be a specular reflection off of a shiny area. Curiosity was released from the back shell sometime after this image was acquired.
This view is one product from an observation made by HiRISE targeted to the expected location of Curiosity about one minute prior to landing. It was captured in HiRISE CCD RED1, near the eastern edge of the swath width (there is a RED0 at the very edge). This means that the rover was a bit further east or downrange than predicted.
The image scale is 13.2 inches (33.6 centimeters) per pixel.
High-Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) nadir and colour channel data taken during revolution 10602 on 27 April 2012 by ESA’s Mars Express have been combined to form a natural-color view of the Ladon Valles region. Centered at around 18°S and 329°E, this image has a ground resolution of about 20 m per pixel. The image shows the interconnected craters Sigli and Shambe, believed to have formed when a large meteorite fragmented in to two pieces just before impact. Extensive fracturing can be seen within the craters. Above the craters (west), creek-like flow channels can be seen leading in to the wider impact basin region to the right (north).
This image shows one of the first views from NASA's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of August 5 PDT (early morning hours August 6 EDT). It was taken through a "fisheye" wide-angle lens on one of the rover's Hazard-Avoidance cameras. These engineering cameras are located at the rover's base. As planned, the early images are lower resolution. Larger color images are expected later in the week when the rover's mast, carrying high-resolution cameras, is deployed.
This is one of the first images taken by NASA's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars the evening of August 5 PDT (morning of August 6 EDT). It was taken through a "fisheye" wide-angle lens on the left "eye" of a stereo pair of Hazard-Avoidance cameras on the left-rear side of the rover. The image is one-half of full resolution. The clear dust cover that protected the camera during landing has been sprung open. Part of the spring that released the dust cover can be seen at the bottom right, near the rover's wheel.
On the top left, part of the rover's power supply is visible.
Some dust appears on the lens even with the dust cover off.
The cameras are looking directly into the sun, so the top of the image is saturated. Looking straight into the sun does not harm the cameras. The lines across the top are an artifact called "blooming" that occurs in the camera's detector because of the saturation.
As planned, the rover's early engineering images are lower resolution. Larger color images from other cameras are expected later in the week when the rover's mast, carrying high-resolution cameras, is deployed.
This global map of Mars was acquired on August 2, 2012, by the Mars Color Imager instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. One global map is generated each day to forecast weather conditions for the entry, descent and landing of NASA's Curiosity rover. The active dust storm observed south of Curiosity's landing site on July 31 has dissipated, leaving behind a dust cloud that will not pose a threat to the landing.
The map is a rectangular projection of Mars (from 90 degrees latitude to minus 90 degrees latitude, and minus 180 degrees longitude to 180 degrees east longitude). The landing site is located on the right side of the map, near 137 degrees east longitude and 4.5 degrees south latitude. The map shows water ice clouds at equatorial latitudes that are typical for late southern winter, when Mars is farther from the sun. Along the southern (bottom) part of the map there are patches of orange clouds, indicating dust lofted into the atmosphere. Small, short-lived dust storms are common at this time of year on Mars and were taken into account when Curiosity's landing system was designed and tested. Larger and more long-lived dust storms are very rare at this time of year.
This global map of Mars was acquired on October 28, 2008, by the Mars Color Imager instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. It was acquired during the same season that NASA's Curiosity rover will land in, but two Mars years earlier. It is remarkably free of water ice clouds when compared with the maps acquired this year in the days leading up to Curiosity's landing.
In 2008, during this season, the planet was dustier than usual. Larger amounts of dust cause sunlight to warm the atmosphere and make it less dense, which means less stopping power for a landing rover. What's more, dusty conditions can lead to an increased chance for small, intense dust storms, another challenge for rover landings. So far, the weather forecast for Curiosity calls for a clearer atmosphere; nonetheless, the spacecraft has been designed to land safely under conditions similar to those observed in 2008.
The map is a rectangular projection of Mars (from 90 degrees latitude to minus 90 degrees latitude, and minus 180 degrees longitude to 180 degrees east longitude). The landing site is located on the right side of the map, near 137 degrees east longitude and 4.5 degrees south latitude. Along the northern (top) and southern (bottom) parts of the map there are patches of orange clouds, indicating dust lofted into the atmosphere.
Impact craters that are only a few kilometers in size on Mars usually have simple bowl shaped interiors with craters in weaker material being larger than craters in stronger material.
Occasionally though, nature is more complicated and these simple rules don't apply. One such case is shown here where is appears as if there are craters nested within each other. These nested craters are probably caused by changes in the strength of the target material. This usually happens when a weaker material overlies a stronger material.
We can use craters like this to tell us something about what lies below the surface. What could be causing the change in strength in the subsurface? Mars has a lot of ice in its terrain near the surface. This ice-rich layer could be the weaker material and the deeper ice-free layer could be the stronger material.
