|
Posted by baalke on August 29, 2007, 4:27 pm
Please log in for more thread options
http://cms-test.opi.arizona.edu/node/15715
HiRISE CAMERA RETURNS NEW VIEW OF DARK PIT ON MARS --
AND ADDS 930 MORE IMAGES TO NASA SPACE MISSION ARCHIVE
(From Lori Stiles, University Communications, 520-626-4402)
- Aug. 29, 2007
--------------------------------------------
Contact information, Web link information at the end
--------------------------------------------
The High Resolution Imaging Experiment (HiRISE) has confirmed that a
dark
pit seen on Mars in an earlier HiRISE image really is a vertical shaft
that
cuts through lava flow on the flank of the Arsia Mons volcano. Such
pits
form on similar volcanoes in Hawaii and are called "pit craters."
The HiRISE camera, orbiting the red planet on NASA's Mars
Reconnaissance
Orbiter, is the most powerful camera ever to orbit another planet. It
is
operated at The University of Arizona in Tucson. HiRISE Principal
Investigator Alfred McEwen of the UA's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory
and
his team released the new image of the dark pit on Arsia Mons and
several
other stunning images today on the HiRISE Web site,
http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu. New HiRISE images are released on the
site
every Wednesday.
The UA-based HiRISE team also released another 930 images to the
Planetary
Data System (PDS), the U.S. space agency's mission data archive,
today.
These images, taken between May and July 2007, include a view of what
at
first glance looks deceptively like a mesa set in Swiss cheese
terrain. But
it's a case of "trompe l'oeil," an eye trick -- the feature is a
crater.
The "Swiss cheese" terrain is carbon dioxide ice that "sublimates," or
thaws
from a solid directly into gas, during the summer, which it currently
is at
this south polar region of Mars. Carbon dioxide sublimating on steep
slopes
changes the shape of pits and mesas from year to year. The large
depression
in this image might be an impact crater, McEwen said, although it's
hard to
be sure because there's no raised rim or ejecta. Impact craters on the
ice
cap are modified as the ice-rich terrain "relaxes" over time and as
they are
resurfaced by the annual deposition and sublimation of frost and ice.
Another image shows a very recent "rayed" dark impact crater among
older
pocks in the lighter, dust-covered surface. An extremely recent
impact,
perhaps only a few years or decades ago, created the dark spot with
radial
and concentric patterns in this HiRISE image. The small central crater
is
only about 18 meters wide (60 feet), but it formed a dark spot 700
meters
wide (two-fifths mile) with rays of secondary craters reaching as far
as 3.7
kilometers (more than two miles) from the central crater, McEwen said.
Secondary craters are rocks ejected from the central crater. "This
region of
Mars is covered by dust, and the impact event must have removed or
disturbed
the dust to create the dark markings," McEwen said.
All HiRISE images released to the PDS can be viewed from the HiRISE
site.
There also is a direct link to the full directory listing at
http://hirise-pds.lpl.arizona.edu/PDS.
Today's release adds another 1.8 terabytes to the PDS. The project
turned
over its first 1,200 HiRISE images to PDS last May. The PDS now holds
a
total 3.5 terabytes of HiRISE data, one of the largest single datasets
returned from a spacecraft and archived in NASA's space mission
library.
Internet users can explore the images with the user-friendly "IAS
Viewer"
software that can be downloaded from the HiRISE Web site. IAS-Viewer
technology allows users to quickly explore part of an enormous HiRISE
image
because the software transmits only as much data as needed to render
any
selected part of the image on a computer screen. The tool delivers a
high-resolution view of the selected part of the image regardless of
slow or
limited Internet connections.
The HiRISE camera takes images of 3.5-mile wide (6 kilometer) swaths
as the
orbiter flies at about 7,800 mph between 155 and 196 miles (250 to 316
kilometers) above Mars' surface. HiRISE science imaging began in
November
2006 and will continue at least through November 2008.
Information about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft is online
at
http://www.nasa.gov/mro. The mission is managed by NASA's Jet
Propulsion
Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology,
Pasadena,
for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. Lockheed
Martin
Space Systems, Denver, is the prime contractor and built the
spacecraft.
Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo., built the
HiRISE
camera operated by The University of Arizona.
-------------------------------------------------------
Contact information
Alfred S. McEwen 520-621-4573 mcewen@pirl.lpl.arizona.edu
Eric Eliason 520-626-0564 eeliason@pirl.lpl.arizona.edu
-----------------------------------------------------
HiRISE Web site
http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu
------------------------------------------------------
Link to this story, photos on the UA News.org Website
http://cms-test.opi.arizona.edu/node/15715
-------------------------------------------------------
|
| Similar Threads | Posted | | HiRISE Camera on NASA Orbiter Gets Spectacular View of Rover at Victoria Crater | October 6, 2006, 7:06 pm |
| NASA's New Mars Camera Gives Dramatic View of Planet (MRO) | October 1, 2006, 11:47 pm |
| HiRISE Camera Will Take First Close-Up Pictures of Mars on Sept. 29 | September 25, 2006, 6:31 pm |
| HiRISE Camera Views Jupiter From Mars Orbit | January 31, 2007, 2:17 pm |
| Students Choose HiRISE Camera Targets on Mars | September 27, 2007, 5:31 pm |
| MRO's HiRISE Camera Turned On | September 7, 2005, 9:12 am |
| New Photos From NASA Orbiter's HiRISE Camera Detail Diverse Martian Terrain | October 2, 2006, 8:29 pm |
| Spongy-Looking Hyperion Tumbles Into View | July 11, 2005, 4:42 pm |
| SMART-1 View of Crater Sulpicius Gallus | July 14, 2006, 10:39 am |
| NASA's Stardust Findings May Alter View of Comet Formation | March 13, 2006, 4:24 pm |
|
XML Sitemap