Astronomy Picture of the Day |
APOD: 2019 March 14 - Perseverance Valley Panorama
Explanation:
Mars exploration rover
Opportunity's parting panorama
from Perseverance Valley spans 360
degrees in this false color mosaic.
The scene is composed
of 354 individual images recorded through
3 different color filters by the rover's panoramic camera from
May 13 through
June 10, 2018.
A few frames remain in black and white at the lower left though.
Those were obtained through only one filter just
before a dust storm engulfed Mars in June 2018,
ultimately ending the solar-powered rover's
trailblazing 15 year mission.
Just right of center, the annotation identifies Opportunity's entry point
to Perseverance Valley along the Endeavor crater's western rim.
The rover's tracks begin there, extending
from over the horizon toward the far right and its
final resting
spot on the Red Planet.
APOD: 2019 February 17 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might have been the
Opportunity rover
exploring Mars.
Opportunity explored the
red planet from 2004 to 2018, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured here in 2004, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Caught in a dust storm
in 2018, last week NASA stopped trying to contact
Opportunity
and declared the
ground-breaking mission,
originally planned for only 92 days,
complete.
APOD: 2019 February 15 - Opportunity at Perseverance Valley
Explanation:
Opportunity had
already reached
Perseverance Valley by June of 2018.
Its
view is reconstructed in a colorized mosaic of images taken
by the Mars
Exploration Rover's Navcam.
In fact, Perseverance Valley is an appropriate name for
the destination.
Designed for a 90 day mission,
Opportunity had traveled across Mars for
over 5,000 sols (martian solar days) following a January 2004
landing in Eagle crater.
Covering a
total distance
of over 45 kilometers (28 miles),
its intrepid journey of exploration across the Martian landscape
has come to a close here.
On June 10, 2018,
the last transmission from the solar-powered rover was received as
a dust storm engulfed the Red Planet.
Though the storm has subsided, eight months of attempts to contact
Opportunity have not been successful and its trailblazing mission
ended after almost 15
years of exploring the surface of Mars.
APOD: 2018 October 4 - Opportunity After the Storm
Explanation:
On Mars
dust storms can't actually blow spacecraft over,
but they can blot out the Sun.
Over three months
ago a planet-wide dust storm caused
a severe lack of sunlight for the Mars rover Opportunity
at its location near the west rim of Endeavour crater.
The lack of sunlight sent the solar-powered Opportunity into
hibernation and for
over 115 sols
controllers have not
received any communication from the rover.
The dust is clearing
as the storm subsides though.
On September 20th, when this image was taken by the
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's HiRISE camera, about 25 percent of
the sunlight was reaching the surface again.
The white box marks a 47-meter-wide (154-foot-wide) area centered on a
blip identified as the
silent-for-now
Opportunity rover.
APOD: 2018 June 23 - Curiosity's Dusty Self
Explanation:
Winds on Mars
can't actually blow spacecraft over.
But in the low gravity, martian winds can loft fine dust
particles in planet-wide storms,
like the dust storm now
raging on the
Red Planet.
From the martian surface on sol 2082 (June 15),
this
self-portrait from the Curiosity rover shows the effects of
the dust storm,
reducing sunlight and visibility at the rover's location in Gale crater.
Made with the Mars Hand Lens Imager, its mechanical arm is edited out
of the mosaicked images.
Curiosity's recent drill site
Duluth
can be seen on the rock
just in front of the rover on the left.
The east-northeast Gale crater rim fading into the background is about
30 kilometers away.
Curiosity is powered by a radioisotope thermoelectric
generator and
is expected to be unaffected by the increase in dust at Gale crater.
On the other side of Mars,
the solar-powered Opportunity rover
has ceased its operations due to the even more severe lack of sunlight
at its location on the west rim of Endeavour crater.
APOD: 2018 June 16 - Dusty With a Chance of Dust
Explanation:
It's storm
season on Mars.
Dusty with a chance of dust is the weather report for Gale crater
as a recent planet-scale dust storm rages.
On June 10
looking toward
the east-northeast crater rim about 30 kilometers away,
the Curiosity rover's Mastcam captured this image of its local
conditions so far.
Meanwhile over 2,000 kilometers away, the Opportunity
rover ceased science operations as the storm grew thicker at its
location on the west rim of Endeavour crater,
and has stopped communicating,
waiting out the storm
for now.
Curiosity is
powered by
a radioisotope thermoelectric generator,
but the smaller Opportunity rover
uses solar panels to charge its batteries.
For Opportunity, the increasingly severe
lack
of sunlight has caused its batteries to run low.
APOD: 2018 April 4 - Intrepid Crater on Mars from Opportunity
Explanation:
The robotic rover Opportunity sometimes passes small craters on Mars.
Pictured here in 2010 is Intrepid Crater, a 20-meter across impact basin
slightly larger than
Nereus Crater that
Opportunity had chanced across previously.
The featured image is in approximately true color but horizontally
compressed to accommodate a
wide angle panorama.
Intrepid Crater was named after the
lunar module Intrepid that carried
Apollo 12 astronauts to
Earth's Moon 49 years ago.
Beyond Intrepid Crater and past long patches of
rusty Martian desert lie peaks from the rim of large
Endeavour Crater, visible on the horizon.
The Opportunity rover continues to explore Mars,
recently surpassing 5,000 Martian days on the red planet.
APOD: 2015 March 29 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might be the
Opportunity rover
currently exploring Mars.
Opportunity has been exploring the
red planet
since early 2004, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured above in 2004, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Opportunity is continuing on its
long trek exploring unusual terrain in
Meridiani Planum
which continues to yield clues to the ancient history of Mars, our Solar System, and even humanity.
APOD: 2014 September 29 - Unusual Rocks near Pahrump Hills on Mars
Explanation:
How did these Martian rocks form?
As the robotic
Curiosity rover
has approached
Pahrump Hills on
Mars,
it has seen an interesting and textured landscape dotted by some unusual rocks.
The featured image shows a
curiously round rock spanning about two centimeters across.
Seemingly a larger version of
numerous spherules
dubbed blueberries found by the
Opportunity rover on Mars in 2004,
what caused this roundness remains unknown.
Possibilities include
frequent tumbling in flowing water,
sprayed molten rock
in a volcanic eruption, or a
concretion mechanism.
The inset image, taken a few days later, shows another small but unusually shaped rock structure.
As Curiosity rolls around and up
Mount Sharp, different layers of the landscape will be imaged and studied to better understand the ancient history of the region and to investigate whether
Mars could once have
harbored life.
APOD: 2014 May 16 - Opportunity's Mars Analemma
Explanation:
Staring up into the martian sky, the
Opportunity rover
captured an image at 11:02 AM local mean
time nearly every 3rd sol, or martian day, for 1 martian year.
Of course, the result is this
martian analemma,
a curve tracing the Sun's motion through the
sky in the course of a year (668 sols)
on
the Red Planet.
Spanning Earth dates from July, 16, 2006 to June 2, 2008 the images
are shown composited in
this zenith-centered, fisheye projection.
North is at the top surrounded by a
panoramic sky and landscape made in
late 2007 from inside Victoria crater.
The tinted martian sky is blacked
out around the analemma images to clearly show the Sun's positions.
Unlike Earth's figure-8-shaped analemma,
Mars'
analemma is pear-shaped, because of its similar axial tilt
but more elliptical orbit.
When Mars is farther from the Sun, the Sun progresses slowly in
the martian sky creating the pointy top of the curve.
When close to the Sun and moving quickly, the apparent solar motion
is stretched into the rounded bottom.
For several sols some of the frames are missing due to
rover operations and dust storms.
APOD: 2014 March 2 - Martian Sunset
Explanation:
What would it be like to see a sunset on Mars?
To help find out, the robotic rover Spirit was deployed in 2005
to park and watch the Sun dip serenely below the distant lip of
Gusev crater.
Colors in the
above image have been slightly exaggerated but
would likely be apparent to a human
explorer's eye.
Fine martian dust particles suspended in the thin atmosphere
lend
the sky a reddish color,
but the dust also scatters blue light in the forward direction,
creating a
bluish sky glow near the setting Sun.
Because Mars is farther away, the Sun is less bright and
only about two thirds the diameter it appears from Earth.
Images like this help atmospheric scientists understand not only the
atmosphere of Mars, but atmospheres across the
Solar System,
including our
home Earth.
APOD: 2014 January 29 - Jelly Donut Shaped Rock Appears on Mars
Explanation:
What if a rock that looked like a jelly donut suddenly appeared on Mars?
That's just what happened in front of the
robotic Opportunity rover currently exploring the red planet.
The unexpectedly placed rock,
pictured above,
was imaged recently by Opportunity after not
appearing in other images taken as recently as twelve Martian days
(sols) before.
Given the intriguing mystery, the leading explanation is somewhat
tame -- the rock was recently scattered by one of the rover's tires.
Even so, the rock's unusual light tones surrounding a red interior created interest in its
composition --
as well as causing it to be nicknamed
Jelly Donut.
A subsequent chemical
analysis showed the rock has twice the abundance of
manganese
than any other rock yet examined -- an unexpected clue that doesn't yet fit into humanity's understanding of the
Martian geologic history.
Opportunity, just passing its
10th
anniversary on
Mars, continues to explore the
Murray Ridge section of the rim of 22-kilometer wide
Endeavor Crater.
APOD: 2014 January 25 - Opportunity's Decade on Mars
Explanation:
On January 25 (UT) 2004, the Opportunity rover fell to Mars, making
today the
10th
anniversary of
its landing.
After more than 3,500 sols
(Mars solar days)
the golf cart-sized robot from Earth is still actively
exploring
the Red Planet, though its original mission plan was for
three months.
This self-portrait was made
with Opportunity's panoramic camera earlier
this month.
The camera's supporting mast has been edited out of the image
mosaic but its shadow is visible on the
dusty
solar panels arrayed across the rover's deck.
For comparison, a similar
self-portrait from late 2004
is shown in the inset.
Having driven some 39 kilometers (24 miles) from its landing site,
Opportunity now rests
at Solander Point at the rim of Endeavour Crater.
APOD: 2013 December 8 - Everest Panorama from Mars
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see? Scroll right to find out.
The robotic Spirit rover
that rolled around Mars from 2004 to 2009
Mars climbed to the top of a hill in 2005
and took a series of images over three days that were then digitally combined into a 360 degree
panorama.
Spirit was instructed to take images having the same resolution as a
human with
20-20 eyesight.
The full panoramic result can be found by clicking on the
above image
and has a level of detail unparalleled in the history of Martian surface photography.
The panorama was taken from the pinnacle of
Husband Hill and has been dubbed the
Everest panorama,
in honor of the
view from the tallest mountain on Earth.
Visible in
Gusev Crater are rocks,
rusting sand, a
Martian sundial,
vast plains,
nearby peaks, faraway peaks, and sand drifts.
In the distance, fast moving
dust devils can be seen as slight apparitions of red,
green, or blue, the colors of filters used to build up
this natural color vista.
APOD: 2013 January 25 - Matijevic Hill Panorama
Explanation:
On January 25 (UT) 2004, the Opportunity rover fell to Mars, making today the
9th anniversary of
its landing.
After more than 3,200 sols
(Mars solar days)
the golf cart-sized robot from Earth is still
actively exploring
the Red Planet, though its original mission plan was for
three months.
Having driven some 35 kilometers (22 miles) from its landing site, Opportunity's
panoramic camera recorded the segments of this scene,
in November and December of last year.
The digitally stitched panorama
spans more than 210 degrees across the
Matijevic Hill area
along the western rim of Endeavour Crater.
Features dubbed Copper Cliff, a dark outcrop, appear at the left, and
Whitewater Lake, a bright outcrop, at the far right.
The image is presented here in a natural color approximation of what the scene
would look like to human eyes.
APOD: 2012 September 25 - Unusual Spheres on Mars
Explanation:
Why are these strange little spheres on Mars?
The robotic
rover Opportunity chanced across
these unusually shaped beads earlier this month while exploring a place named
Kirkwood near the rim of Mars'
Endeavour Crater.
The above image taken by Opportunity's
Microscopic Imager shows that some ground near the rover is filled with these unusual spheres, each spanning only about 3 millimeters.
At first glance, the sometimes-fractured balls appear similar to the small rocks dubbed
blueberries seen by Opportunity eight years ago, but these spheres are densely compacted and have little iron content.
Although it is thought that
these orbs formed naturally, which natural processes formed them remain unknown.
Opportunity, an older sibling to the recently deployed
Curiosity rover, will continue to study these spheres with the hope that they will provide a new clue to the ancient history of the surface of the
red planet.
APOD: 2012 July 11 - A Morning Line of Stars and Planets
Explanation:
Early morning dog walkers got a visual treat last week
as bright stars and planets appeared to line up.
Pictured above, easily visible from left to right, were the
Pleiades open star cluster,
Jupiter,
Venus, and the
"Follower" star
Aldebaran, all seen before a starry background.
The image was taken from the
Atacama desert
in western
South America.
The glow of the rising Sun can be seen over the eastern horizon.
Jupiter and Venus will
continue to dazzle pre-dawn strollers all over planet Earth
for the rest of the month,
although
even now the
morning planets
are seen projected away from the line connecting their distant stellar
sky mates.
APOD: 2012 July 9 - Greeley Panorama on Mars
Explanation:
What did you do over your winter vacation?
If you were the Opportunity rover on Mars, you spent four months of it
stationary and perched on the northern slope of
Greeley Haven -- and
tilted so that your solar panels could absorb as much sunlight as possible.
During its winter stopover,
the usually rolling robot
undertook several science activities including snapping over 800 images of its
surroundings, many of which have been combined into
this 360-degree digitally-compressed panorama
and shown in exaggerated colors to highlight different surface features.
Past tracks of
Opportunity
can be seen toward the left, while Opportunity's dust covered solar panels cross the image bottom.
Just below the horizon and right of center, an interior wall of 20-kilometer
Endeavour Crater can be seen.
Now that the northern Martian winter is over, Opportunity is rolling again, this time straight ahead (north).
The rover is
set to investigate
unusual light-colored soil patches as it begins again to further
explore the inside of Endeavour,
a crater that may hold some of the oldest features yet visited.
APOD: 2012 January 25 - Opportunity Rover Spots Greeley Haven on Mars
Explanation:
Where on Mars should you spend the winter?
As winter approached in the southern hemisphere of Mars last November, the
Opportunity rover had just this problem -- it needed a place to go.
The reduced amount of sunlight impacting
Opportunity's solar panels combined with the extra power needed to keep equipment warm could drain Opportunity's batteries.
Therefore
Opportunity
was instructed to climb onto the 15 degree incline of Greeley's Haven, shown as the
rocky slope ahead.
The incline increased power input as Opportunity's solar panels now have
greater exposure to sunlight, while also giving the rolling robot some interesting landscape to explore.
Visible in the distance, beyond Greeley Haven, lies expansive
Endeavour Crater, the ancient impact basin that Opportunity will continue exploring as the
Martian winter concludes in a few months, if it survives.
APOD: 2011 December 12 – An Unusual Vein of Deposited Rock on Mars
Explanation:
What could create this unusual vein of rock on Mars?
A leading hypothesis is that
this thin rock layer dubbed "Homestake" was deposited by a running liquid -- like most
mineral veins are here on Earth.
And the
running liquid of choice is water.
Therefore, this mineral streak -- rich in calcium and sulfur -- is the latest in the growing body of evidence that part of
Mars had a watery past.
This, in turn, increases the speculation that
Mars was once hospitable to life.
Pictured above is a vista taken near the western rim of
Endeavour Crater by the
Opportunity rover currently exploring Mars.
The
inset image shows a close up of the recently discovered mineral vein.
APOD: 2011 November 30 - Curiosity Rover Lifts Off for Mars
Explanation:
Next stop: Mars.
This past weekend the
Mars Science Laboratory carrying the Curiosity Rover
blasted off
for the red planet atop an
Atlas V rocket from
Cape Canaveral,
Florida,
USA, as
pictured above.
At five times the size of the Opportunity rover
currently operating on Mars,
Curiosity is like a
strange little car with six small wheels, a head-like camera mast, a rock crusher, a long robotic arm, and a plutonium power source.
Curiosity is scheduled to land on Mars next August and start a two year mission to explore
Gale crater, to help determine whether Mars could ever have
supported life, and to help determine how
humans might one day visit
Earth's planetary neighbor.
APOD: 2011 September 12 - Tisdale 2 Rock Formation on Mars
Explanation:
Why does this Martian rock have so much zinc?
Roughly the size and shape of a
tilted coffee-table, this oddly flat, light-topped rock outcropping was chanced upon a few weeks ago by the
robotic Opportunity rover currently rolling across Mars.
Early last month Opportunity reached
Endeavour crater, the largest surface feature it has ever encountered, and is now exploring Endeavour's rim for clues about how
wet Mars
was billions of years ago.
Pictured above and named
Tisdale 2, the unusual rock structure was probed by
Opportunity last week and is now thought to be a remnant thrown off during the impact that created nearby
Odyssey crater.
The resulting chemical analysis of
Tisdale 2, however, has shown it to have a
strangely high amount of the element
zinc.
The reason for this is currently unknown, but might turn out to be a clue to the history of the entire region.
Opportunity is already finding rocks older than any previously studied and will
continue to explore several other
intriguing rock formations only now
glimpsed from a distance.
APOD: 2011 August 15 - Rover Arrives at Endeavour Crater on Mars
Explanation:
What can the present-day terrain in and around large Endeavour crater tell us about ancient Mars?
Starting three years ago,
NASA sent a
coffee-table sized robot named
Opportunity on a mission rolling across the red planet's Meridiani Planum to find out.
Last week, it finally arrived.
Expansive
Endeavour crater stretches 22 kilometers from rim to rim, making it the largest crater ever visited by a Mars Exploration Rover (MER).
It is hypothesized that the
impact that created the crater exposed ancient rock that possibly formed under wet conditions, and if so, this rock may yield unique clues to the
watery past of Mars.
Pictured above, the west rim of
Endeavour looms just ahead of the Opportunity rover.
Opportunity may well spend the rest of its
operational life exploring Endeavour,
taking pictures, spinning its wheels, and
boring into intriguing rocks.
APOD: 2011 July 31 - Metal on the Plains of Mars
Explanation:
What has the Opportunity rover found on Mars?
While traversing a vast empty plain in 2005 in
Meridiani Planum, one of Earth's
rolling robots on Mars
found a surprise when visiting the location of its own
metallic heat shield discarded last year during
descent.
The surprise is the rock visible on the lower left,
found to be made mostly of dense metals
iron and
nickel.
The large
cone-shaped object behind it -- and the
flank piece
on the right -- are parts of Opportunity's jettisoned heat shield.
Smaller shield debris is also visible.
Scientists do not think that the
basketball-sized metal
"Heat Shield Rock" originated on
Mars,
but rather is likely an
ancient metallic meteorite.
In hindsight, finding a
meteorite
in a vast empty dust plain on
Mars might be considered similar to
Earth meteorites found on the vast empty ice plains of
Antarctica.
The finding raises speculations about the general abundance of
rocks on Mars that have
fallen there from outer space.
APOD: 2011 May 30 - The Last Panorama of the Spirit Rover on Mars
Explanation:
This is the last thing that the Spirit rover on Mars ever saw.
Operating years beyond original expectations, Spirit eventually got
mired in martian dirt
and then ran out of power when
investigating the unusual
Home Plate
surface feature on Mars.
Visible in the above panorama are numerous rocks and slopes of the surrounding
Columbia Hills of Mars.
The strange hill with the light colored top, visible near the top center of the image, has been dubbed
von Braun
and was a future destination when Spirit got
bogged down.
A leading hypothesis holds that von Braun is related to martian volcanism.
Last week, NASA stopped trying to contact Spirit after numerous attempts.
Half a world away, Spirit's sister rover Opportunity continues to roll toward Endeavour Crater, which could become the largest crater yet visited by an
earthling-created robot.
APOD: 2011 May 8 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might be the
Opportunity rover
currently exploring Mars.
Opportunity and sister robot Spirit
have been probing the
red planet
since early 2004, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured above, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Although the
Spirit rover is now stuck, Opportunity is continuing on its
long trek to expansive
Endeavor crater.
APOD: 2011 January 29 - Opportunity at Santa Maria Crater
Explanation:
Celebrating 7 years
on the surface of
the Red Planet,
Mars exploration rover Opportunity now stands near the
rim of 90 meter wide
Santa
Maria crater.
Remarkably, Opportunity and its fellow
rover Spirit were initially
intended for a 3 month
long primary mission.
Still exploring, the golf cart-sized robot and shadow (far right)
appear in the foreground of this panoramic view of its
current location.
The mosaic was constructed using images from the rover's navigation
camera.
On its
7 year anniversary,
Opportunity can boast traversing a total of 26.7 kilometers
along
the martian surface.
After investigating Santa Maria crater, controllers plan to have
Opportunity resume a long-term trek toward Endeavour crater,
a large, 22 kilometer diameter crater about 6 kilometers from
Santa Maria.
The rim of Endeavour is visible in the mosaic on the horizon
at the right, just above the shadow of the rover's mast.
During coming days, communication with the rover will be more
difficult as Mars moves close to alignment with the Sun as seen
from planet Earth's
perspective.
APOD: 2010 December 8 - Intrepid Crater on Mars
Explanation:
The robotic rover Opportunity has chanced across another small crater on Mars.
Pictured above is Intrepid Crater, a 20-meter across impact basin
slightly larger than
Nereus Crater that
Opportunity chanced across last year.
The above image is in approximately true color but horizontally
compressed to accommodate a
wide angle panorama.
Intrepid Crater was named after the
lunar module Intrepid that carried
Apollo 12 astronauts to
Earth's Moon 41 years ago last month.
Beyond Intrepid Crater and past long patches of
rusty Martian desert lie peaks from the rim of large
Endeavour Crater, visible on the horizon.
If Opportunity can avoid ridged rocks and
soft sand,
it may reach Endeavour sometime next year.
APOD: 2010 October 4 - Rolling Across the Rocky Plains of Mars
Explanation:
You stare out across the rocky plains of Mars.
Before you, in every direction, is dark sand and bright rock.
Although little has changed here for millions of years, no one has ever seen
this view before.
You are being sent on a
long journey to a distant crater, the largest crater in the region.
Your human overlords
back on planet Earth wonder if the impact that created this distant crater might have also uncovered unique clues to the
distant past of Earth's neighboring planet, clues that might reveal if
life ever existed here.
Breaking the
monotony, visible toward the image center,
an unusual rock sticks out from the landscape.
Quite possibly,
this rock
is not from this world, and you divert to
inspect it.
You are the robotic
Opportunity rover, and you are the eyes for
countless humans following your trek back on planet Earth.
Rolling about a
football field
a day, you might reach
Endeavour crater sometime in 2012.
If you survive.
APOD: 2010 August 30 - Comanche Outcrop on Mars Indicates Hospitable Past
Explanation:
Could life once have survived on Mars?
Today, neither
animal nor
plant life from
Earth could survive for very long on
Mars because at least one key ingredient -- liquid
water -- is essentially absent on the red planet's rusty surface.
Although evidence from the
martian rovers indicates that long ago
Mars might once have had
liquid water on its surface, that water might also have been
too acidic for familiar life forms to thrive.
Recently, however, a newly detailed analysis of an unusual outcropping of rock and soil chanced upon in 2005 by the robotic
Spirit rover has uncovered a clue indicating that not all of Mars was always so acidic.
The mound in question, dubbed
Comanche Outcrop and visible near the top of the
above image, appears to contain unusually
high concentrations of elements such as magnesium iron
carbonate.
The above image is shown in colors exaggerated to highlight the differences in composition.
Since these
carbonates
dissolve in acid, the persistence of these mounds indicates that water perhaps less
acidic and more
favorable for life might have once flowed across Mars.
More detailed analyses and searches for other signs will surely continue.
APOD: 2010 May 25 - Looking Back Across Mars
Explanation:
It's been a long trip for the Martian rover Opportunity.
Last week Opportunity surpassed
Viking 1 as the
longest running mission on
Mars, now extending well over six years.
Pictured above, Opportunity's tire tracks cross a nearly featureless Martian desert, emanating from a distant horizon.
Landing in 2004 in
Meridiani
Planum, the
robotic Opportunity has
embarked
on its longest and most
dangerous trek yet, now aiming to reach large
Endeavor Crater sometime next year.
Endeavor, it is hoped, holds new clues to the ancient
geology of Mars and whether Mars could once have
harbored life.
APOD: 2010 March 7 - Spirit Rover at Engineering Flats on Mars
Explanation:
Is it art?
If so, the paintbrush was the
Spirit robotic rover,
the canvas was the
soil on Mars,
and the artists were the
scientists and engineers
of the Mars Exploration Rover Mission.
This panoramic picture, created in 2004 and shown above compressed horizontally, was mostly unintentional -- the
MERS
team was primarily instructing Spirit to investigate rocks in and around
Hank's Hollow in a location called
Engineering Flats on Mars.
After creating the ground display with its treads, the
Spirit rover was instructed to
photograph the area along with itself in
shadow.
In 2010 as winter approaches in northern Mars, Spirit, still
mired in sand,
has been
placed in an energy saving "hibernating" mode until
spring arrives and more direct sunlight might be used to
power the robotic explorer.
APOD: 2009 October 19 - Nereus Crater on Mars
Explanation:
It was along the way.
The
robotic rover
Opportunity currently rolling across the
Meridiani Plain
on Mars has a destination of
Endeavour Crater,
a large crater over 20 kilometers across which may yield additional clues about the cryptic past of ancient Mars.
Besides passing open fields of
dark soil and
light rock,
Opportunity has chanced upon several interesting features.
One such feature, pictured above in a
digitally stitched and horizontally compressed panorama, is Nereus Crater, a small crater about 10 meters across that is
surrounded by jagged rock.
Besides Nereus, Opportunity recently also happened upon another unusual rock -- one that appears to be the
third
large
meteorite
found on Mars and the second for Opportunity during only this trip.
Opportunity has been
traveling toward
Endeavour Crater for over a year now, and if it can avoid ridged rocks and
soft sand along the way,
it may reach Endeavour sometime next year.
APOD: 2009 August 13 - Block Island Meteorite on Mars
Explanation:
What is this strange rock on Mars?
Sitting on a smooth plane,
the rock stands out for its isolation, odd shape, large size and unusual texture.
The rock was discovered by the
robotic Opportunity rover rolling across
Mars late last month.
Pictured,
Opportunity prepares to inspect the unusual rock.
After being X-rayed, poked, and chemically
analyzed, the rock has now been identified by
Opportunity as a fallen meteorite.
Now dubbed Block Island, the meteorite has been measured
to be about 2/3 of a meter across and is now known to be composed mostly of
nickel and iron.
This is the
second meteorite
found by a martian rover, and so far the largest.
Vast
smooth spaces on Mars and
Earth can make large meteorites stand out.
Opportunity continues its trip across
Meridiani Planum on Mars and is on schedule to reach expansive
Endeavour Crater
next year.
APOD: 2009 June 1 - Spirit Encounters Soft Ground on Mars
Explanation:
Will Spirit be able to free itself from soft ground on Mars?
The
robotic Spirit rover
currently rolling across
Mars ran into unexpectedly soft ground last month while exploring the red planet.
A worry is that the ground is so soft that Spirit won't be able to free itself, will have to stay put and thereafter study what it can from its current position near an unusual martian land feature named
Home Plate.
Pictured above, the front left wheel appears to be primarily digging itself in when
spun,
while on the other side, the front right wheel no longer
spins and is dragged by the five year old
mechanical explorer.
In the distance, rocks and rusty dirt fill the
alien landscape in front of the distant
Husband Hill.
NASA continues to study
the situation, and engineers and scientists have not yet run out of ideas of how to use Spirit's six wheels.
Far across Mars, Spirit's twin
Opportunity continues on its two year
trek toward
Endeavour crater.
APOD: 2009 March 24 - Martian Dunes and the Shadow of Opportunity
Explanation:
Human made robots continue to roll across the surface of Mars.
Both
Opportunity
and its sister
rover Spirit
are in their sixth year
on Mars,
exploring the red planet for years longer than original expectations.
Pictured above is a composite of recent images taken by the
navigation camera on top of the Opportunity rover in
Meridiani Planum.
Visible are
parallel rover tracks,
rippling sand dunes,
light-colored bedrock protrusions,
metallic rover parts, and the
dark shadow of the
sometimes-artistic robotic photographer.
Currently,
Opportunity is on its way toward huge Endeavor crater, while
Spirit is trying to climb an unusual rock structure known as Home Plate.
If it can survive the harsh martian environment,
Opportunity should arrive at
Endeavor crater in about two years, at which time it may revolutionize human knowledge of this ancient martian landform.
APOD: 2009 January 20 - Bonestell Panorama from Mars
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what could you see?
One memorable vista might be the
above 360-degree panoramic image taken by the
robotic Spirit rover over the last year.
The above image involved over 200 exposures and was released as part of
Spirit's
five year anniversary of landing on the red planet.
The image was
taken from the spot that Spirit stopped to spend the winter,
near an unusual plateau called
Home Plate.
Visible on the annotated image are
rocks,
hills,
peaks,
ridges,
plains inside
Gusev
crater,
and previous
tracks of the rolling Spirit rover.
The image color has been closely matched to what a human would see, and named for the famous
space artist
Chesley Bonestell.
APOD: 2009 January 10 - Martian Sunset
Explanation:
This month, the
Mars Exploration
Rovers are celebrating their 5th
anniversary of operations on the surface of the Red Planet.
The serene
sunset view, part of their extensive legacy of
images from the martian
surface, was recorded by the Spirit rover on May 19, 2005.
Colors in the image have been slightly exaggerated but
would likely be apparent to a human
explorer's eye.
Of course, fine martian dust particles suspended in the thin atmosphere
lend
the sky a reddish color,
but the dust also scatters blue light in the forward direction,
creating a bluish sky glow near the setting Sun.
The Sun is setting behind the
Gusev crater rim wall some 80 kilometers
(50 miles)
in the distance.
Because Mars is farther away, the Sun is less bright and
only about two thirds the size seen from planet Earth.
APOD: 2008 June 29 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might be the
Opportunity rover
currently exploring Mars.
Opportunity and sister robot Spirit
have been probing the
red planet
since early 2004, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured above, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Opportunity and Spirit have now spent over
four years exploring the red world,
find new clues into the wet ancient past of our Solar System's second
most habitable planet.
APOD: 2008 May 19 - Flying Over the Columbia Hills of Mars
Explanation:
What it would be like to fly over Mars?
Combining terrain data from the orbiting
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
spacecraft with information about the robotic
Spirit rover currently
rolling across
Mars
has resulted in a digital movie that shows
what a flight over the Columbia Hills might look like.
Dark rippled
sand dunes are highlighted against the
Columbia Hills in the above opening image.
Clicking on the
above image,
though, will launch you across Mars, approaching the
Columbia Hills.
On the far side of the hills, the dark sand dunes come into view.
Soon you pass an unusual white-rimmed structure, slightly raised, known as
Home Plate,
the origin of which is currently unknown and being researched.
Turning, you re-approach the hills from a different angle,
this time zooming in on Spirit, a curious alien
rover sent from
planet Earth.
A final zoom pans out over the region.
This coming Sunday,
NASA's
Phoenix Lander
will attempt to set down near the icy
North Pole of Mars
and search for signs of
ancient life.
APOD: 2008 January 29 - West Valley Panorama from the Spirit Rover on Mars
Explanation:
What does Mars look like from here?
Last September, before hiking across rugged and
slippery terrain to reach its winter hibernation point, the
robotic Spirit rover
climbed a small plateau known as
Home Plate
and captured the spectacular vista
pictured above.
Part of the curious flat-topped Home Plate is visible as the
light colored landscape across the panorama's foreground.
On the image left, visible about eight kilometers in the distance, is
Grissom Hill,
while on the left foreground is rock strewn
Tsiolkovski Ridge.
On the right, at about 800 meters distant, is
Husband Hill,
already explored by Spirit and notable as the
highest point visible in the westward looking panorama.
In the inset is a close-up of a tiny motionless feature
informally dubbed Little Bigfoot
that has
drawn
some
attention for it
superficial appearance to a
humanoid life form.
Tenacious image explorers might locate Little
Bigfoot
towards the front left of the
high resolution panorama.
Spirit successfully
reached
its energy-conserving
winter haven in December.
APOD: 2007 December 18 - Unusual Silica Rich Soil Discovered on Mars
Explanation:
You're rolling across Mars when you unexpectedly uncover some unusually light soil.
You stop. You turn. You return to inspect the soil and find out it is almost purely
silica -- the main ingredient in
quartz and
glass.
Such soil has never been found on
Mars before. What created this soil?
Since you are the robotic
rover Spirit currently rolling across Mars,
you send the images and data back to
Earth for analysis.
Your scientist friends from the blue water planet say that such soil on Earth is usually created by either volcanic steam or a
hot spring.
The second hypothesis in particular indicates, once again, a
wet past for part of Mars,
as possibly hot water saturated with silica deposited the white soil.
Intriguingly, on Earth, living
microbes
typically flourish under either condition.
Pictured above, the uncovered light soil is
visible on the right.
APOD: 2007 December 12 - Mars Rover Races to Survive
Explanation:
The Martian rover Spirit is now in the race of its life.
The rolling robot is trying to reach an
outpost to spend the winter, but it keeps getting
bogged down in
soft sand on Mars.
Earth scientists hope that
Spirit can
reach a slope on the northern edge of the unusual feature dubbed
Home Plate,
before the end of this month when
northern winter will be phasing in on
Mars.
Reaching this slope will likely allow the
rover to tilt enough toward the Sun to create a
needed increase in the efficiency of its energy-absorbing
solar panels.
This map shows the path of Spirit from July 2004 until just last month.
APOD: 2007 October 22 - Victoria Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Scroll right to see the largest crater yet visited by a rover on Mars.
Reaching the expansive
Victoria Crater
has been a
goal for the
robotic Opportunity rover rolling across
Mars for the past two years.
Victoria crater has about five times the diameter of
Endurance Crater, which Opportunity spent six months exploring.
Opportunity reached Victoria last year,
and was cautiously probing the edges of the
stadium-sized
crevice while waiting for large
dust storms to clear.
A safe path was found, and
Opportunity has slowly entered into
Victoria Crater.
It is hoped that Victoria Crater will show a
deep stack of layers uncovered by
the initial impact,
and hence new clues into the ancient surface history of Mars.
Visible in the distance in the
above mosaic
is the far rim of Victoria Crater, lying about 800 meters away and rising about
70 meters above the crater floor.
The alcove in front has been dubbed
Duck Bay.
APOD: 2007 September 17 - Inside Victoria Crater on Mars
Explanation:
NASA's Opportunity rover is now inside
Victoria Crater on
Mars.
Last week the
robot rolled about 20 meters into the largest crater any
Martian rover
has yet encountered, the crater next to which Opportunity has been perched for months.
Currently, the rolling explorer is situated in
Duck Bay alcove,
peering across at the internal crater wall dubbed
Cape St. Vincent.
The above wide-angle view
is from Opportunity's front hazard-identification camera.
Over the next few weeks,
Opportunity
is scheduled to explore this telling alien indentation,
searching for clues to the ancient past of Mars before the huge impact that created
Victoria Crater ever took place.
APOD: 2007 September 4 - A Path Into Victoria Crater
Explanation:
What's inside Victoria Crater?
Now that the
dust has settled from the
regional Martian dust storms
that immobilized the
rolling Martian rovers,
the task ahead has become clear.
Opportunity arrived at
Victoria Crater last month and was poised to enter when the
dust storms flared
up unexpectedly.
The above image
was taken last week by the
Opportunity rover perched at a possibly traversable slope into the 750-meter impact feature.
Victoria Crater
is the largest crater that either Martian rover has come across during their explorations.
The crater walls might hold clues about the
Martian surface
before the tremendous impact that created Victoria Crater.
APOD: 2007 July 25 - Global Dust Storms Threaten Mars Rovers
Explanation:
Will
global dust storms terminate the robotic Martian rovers?
Over the past month,
windy dust storms
have blocked much needed sunlight from reaching the solar panels of both the
Spirit and
Opportunity rovers exploring Mars.
At times, as much as 99 percent of direct sunlight has been obscured,
causing worry that the
batteries
might run out of energy before the storms end --
which may be as long as weeks.
In an effort to weather these storms, Earth
controllers have programmed the rovers to restrict movements and to use as little power as possible.
Although the rovers have been working for a
remarkable three years past their planned three month lifetimes, their immediate
future is now uncertain.
Pictured above,
the Opportunity rover perched on the edge of
Victoria Crater peered for a month into the
distance as dust made the Martian air increasingly
opaque.
APOD: 2007 July 3 - At the Edge of Victoria Crater
Explanation:
We're going in.
The robotic Opportunity rover currently
rolling across
Mars has been
prowling around the edge of the largest crater it has visited since
landing over three years ago.
It has been studying
Victoria crater and looking for a way in.
Now
scientists on Earth
have decided to take a
calculated risk and plan to send Opportunity
right into this ancient
Martian crater over the next few weeks.
Pictured
is Cape St. Vincent, part of the wall of
Victoria Crater
next to where Opportunity will descend.
The wall itself appears to contain clues about the
Martian terrain before the impact
that created Victoria crater, and so will be
studied during the daring descent.
Above the crater wall, far in the distance, lies a relatively featureless
Martian horizon.
APOD: 2007 March 13 - Attacking Mars
Explanation:
The Spirit rover attacked Mars again in 2005 September.
What might look, above, like a military attack, though, was once again just a scientific one -
Spirit was instructed to closely inspect some interesting rocks near the summit of
Husband Hill.
Spirit's
Panoramic Camera
captured the rover's Instrument Deployment Device above as moved to
get a closer look at an outcrop of
rocks named
Hillary.
The Spirit rover, and its twin rover
Opportunity, have now been exploring the
red planet
for over three years.
Both Spirit and Opportunity have found evidence that parts of Mars were
once wet.
APOD: 2007 February 4 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might be the
Opportunity rover
currently exploring Mars.
Opportunity and sister robot Spirit
have been probing the
red planet
since early 2004, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured above, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Opportunity and Spirit have now spent over
three years exploring the red world,
find new clues into the wet ancient past of our Solar System's second
most habitable planet.
APOD: 2006 December 6 - Spirit Rover on Mars Imaged from Orbit
Explanation:
If you have the right equipment, you can see the Spirit rover currently rolling across Mars.
The right equipment, however, is currently limited to the
High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment
onboard the
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
MRO arrived at
Mars
in March and just started science observations of the red planet last month.
Visible in the above spectacularly high resolution image is the
Spirit rover in the
Columbia Hills of Mars.
Objects as small as one meter are resolved.
Also visible are the tracks made by the
robot explorer and a large plateau of layered rock dubbed Home Plate.
MRO will continue to image the
red planet in unprecedented detail,
creating images that will likely be important in better understanding the
geology and weather on Mars,
as well as indicating good candidate landing sites for
future missions to Mars.
APOD: 2006 November 1 - McMurdo Panorama from Mars
Explanation:
This was Spirit's view on Martian-day 1,000 of its 90-Martian-day mission.
The robotic Spirit rover
has stayed alive so long on Mars that it needed a place to wait out the cold and dim Martian winter.
Earth scientists selected Low Ridge hill, a place with sufficient slant to give Spirit's
solar panels enough
sunlight to keep powered up and making scientific observations.
From its Winter Haven, Spirit has been able to build up the
above 360-degree panorama, which has been digitally altered to
exaggerate colors
and compressed horizontally to
fit your screen.
The long winter is finally ending in the south of
Mars,
and with the increasing sunlight plans are now being made for Spirit to further explore the rocky
Columbia Hills inside intriguing
Gusev crater.
APOD: 2006 October 17 - Clouds and Sand on the Horizon of Mars
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see?
Like the
robotic Opportunity rover
rolling across the red planet,
you might well see vast plains of
red sand,
an orange tinted sky, and wispy light clouds.
The Opportunity rover captured just such a vista after arriving at Victoria Crater earlier this month, albeit in a completely
different direction from the large crater.
Unlike other Martian vistas,
few rocks are visible in
this exaggerated color
image mosaic.
The distant red horizon is so flat and
featureless that it appears similar to the horizon toward a calm blue ocean on Earth.
Clouds on Mars
can be composed of either
carbon dioxide ice or
water ice, and can move quickly,
like clouds move on Earth.
The red dust in the Martian air can change the
sky color above Mars from the
blue that occurs above Earth toward the red, with the
exact color depending on the density and particle size of the floating dust particles.
APOD: 2006 October 9 - Mars Rover at Victoria Crater Imaged from Orbit
Explanation:
An unusual spot has been found on Mars that scientists believe is not natural in origin.
The spot appears mobile and is now hypothesized to be a
robot created by an
intelligent species alien to Mars.
In fact, the spot appears to be NASA's robotic Opportunity rover currently rolling across Mars.
The ability to see the Martian rover from orbit has recently been demonstrated by the
High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment
on NASA's
Mars
Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The new spacecraft achieved orbit around Mars in 2006 March.
Last week, MRO imaged the location of
Victoria Crater
and the
rover Opportunity that had just arrived there.
In the
above image at spectacularly
high resolution, objects about one meter in size are resolved, and this includes the rolling rover.
Such images may help scientists better determine if any safe path exists for Opportunity to enter large crater.
In the inset image
on the upper left, the whole of
Victoria Crater
was also imaged by MRO.
APOD: 2006 October 2 - Victoria Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Scroll right to see the largest crater yet visited by a rover on Mars.
Reaching the expansive
Victoria Crater
has been a
goal for the
robotic Opportunity rover rolling across
Mars for the past 21 months.
Opportunity reached Victoria last week, and is cautiously probing the
stadium-sized crevice.
It is hoped that Victoria Crater will show a
deep stack of layers uncovered by the initial impact,
and hence new clues into the ancient surface history of Mars.
Visible in the distance of the
above image
mosaic is the far rim of Victoria Crater, lying about 800 meters away and rising about
70 meters above the crater floor. The alcove in front has been dubbed Duck Bay.
Victoria crater has about five times the diameter of
Endurance Crater, which Opportunity spent six months exploring.
If a safe path is found, Opportunity may actually
attempt to enter Victoria Crater.
APOD: 2006 September 19 - Beagle Crater on Mars
Explanation:
What have we found on the way to large Victoria Crater?
Smaller Beagle Crater.
The robotic
Opportunity rover rolling across
Mars stopped at Beagle Crater early last month and took an
impressively detailed 360-degree
panorama of the alien Martian landscape.
Beagle crater appears in the center as a dip exposing relatively
dark sand.
Surrounding 35-meter Beagle Crater are many of the rocks ejected during its creation impact.
Opportunity's
detailed images
show significant
erosion on the rocks and walls of
Beagle Crater, indicating that the crater is not fresh.
Beagle Crater's
unofficial name derives from the ship
HMS Beagle where
Charles Darwin
observations led him to postulate his theory of
natural selection.
That ship was named after the dog breed of
beagle.
Opportunity is scheduled to roll up to expansive
Victoria Crater this week.
APOD: 2006 August 4 - Burns Cliff Anaglyph
Explanation:
Get out your red/blue glasses and gaze
across
Burns Cliff along the inner wall of
Endurance crater on Mars!
The view from the perspective of Mars rover Opportunity
is a color anaglyph
- two different images are presented to the left and right eyes
by color filters to produce the 3D effect.
Scroll the picture to the right to see the full 180 degree
panorama.
Still returning science data and images, both
Spirit and Opportunity rovers
completed 2 years of Mars exploration in January.
Opportunity
spent
the month of July on the
road to Victoria crater.
The stereo pair of images used to create this view
are based on image data recorded in
November 2004.
APOD: 2006 July 21 - Strangers on Mars
Explanation:
This view
from the winter station of Mars Exploration Rover
Spirit, looks across the rock strewn landscape of
Gusev
Crater.
The dark boulders and distant hills are characteristic of the region,
but the two light colored rocks in the foreground of
this cropped image are - like Spirit itself -
most probably strangers to the Red Planet, believed
to be iron
meteorites.
Informally named for sites in Antarctica
they have been dubbed "Zhong Shan" and "Allan Hills."
Zhong Shan is the Antarctic base of the People's Republic of China.
Allan Hills is the icy location where many Martian meteorites
have been found
on planet Earth, including the controversial
ALH84001,
suggested to contain evidence for fossilized Martian microbial life.
APOD: 2006 July 3 - The View toward Husband Hill on Mars
Explanation:
This Martian vista is only part of one of the
greatest panoramic views of Mars
that has ever been attempted.
The expansive mosaic is helping to keep the
robotic Spirit rover
busy over the energy draining winter in the
southern hemisphere of Mars.
During the winter, Spirit is constrained to stay on the side of
McCool Hill in order to keep its
solar panels pointed toward the
Sun.
The panorama has so far involved over 800 exposures, very little
digital compression, and will take over a month to complete.
The view shown is toward
Husband Hill, a hill that Spirit climbed last year.
A careful inspection of the
above image shows
tracks crossing from the center to the right.
APOD: 2006 June 5 - The Road to Victoria Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Here is a
road never traveled.
To get to
Victoria Crater on
Mars, the rolling robotic rover Opportunity must traverse the landscape
shown above.
Victoria Crater lies about one
kilometer ahead.
The intervening terrain shows a series of
light rock outcrops that appears like some sort of
cobblestone road.
Surrounding this naturally-occurring Martian road, is Martian
sand ripples that must be
navigated around.
Inspection of the outcrop road shows it to be sprinkled with many
small round rocks dubbed
blueberries.
Opportunity and its sister robot Spirit
continue
their third year exploring Mars.
Within the next month, planetary scientists hope to maneuver
Opportunity across
Meridiani Planum
to get a good view of 800-meter diameter Victoria Crater.
APOD: 2006 May 15 - Volcanic Bumpy Boulder on Mars
Explanation:
What created this unusually textured rock on Mars?
Most probably: a volcano.
Dubbed Bumpy Boulder, the strange stone measuring just under a
half-meter high was found by the
robotic Spirit rover
currently rolling across Mars.
Pits on the
ragged rock are likely
vesicles and arise from hot gas bubbling out of
hot rock ejected by an active Martian volcano.
Several similar rocks are visible near Bumpy Boulder that
likely have a similar past.
The above true-color image was taken about one month ago.
The Spirit rover, now in its third year of operation on Mars,
is weathering the low sunlight winter of Mar's northern hemisphere on a
hillside slope in order to maximize the amount of absorbable
battery-refreshing sunlight.
APOD: 2006 April 6 - Unusual Bright Soil on Mars
Explanation:
What is this bright soil on Mars?
Several times while rolling across Mars, the treads of the
robotic rover Spirit have serendipitously uncovered
unusually bright soil.
Spirit uncovered another batch unexpectedly last month while
rolling toward its winter hibernation location on
McCool Hill.
The physics and chemistry
instruments on Spirit have determined the soil,
shown above, contains a high content of
salts
including iron-bearing
sulfates.
A leading hypothesis holds that these salts record the presence of past
water,
with the salts becoming concentrated as the water
evaporated.
APOD: 2006 March 15 - McCool Hill on Mars
Explanation:
You can make it.
Winter is rapidly advancing on the southern hemisphere on
Mars,
and the lack of sunlight could be dangerous unless you find a good place to
hibernate.
There it is ahead: McCool Hill.
As the
robotic Spirit rover
rolling across Mars, you are told that this will be a good place to spend the
Martian winter.
On the north slope of
McCool Hill,
you can tilt your
solar panels
toward the Sun enough to generate the power you need to keep running through the winter.
Between you and McCool Hill is an unusual reddish outcropping of rocks.
Also visible above,
unusual layered rocks lie to your right, while
other scattered rocks appear either
smooth or
sponge-like.
Fortunately, there is still some time to explore,
and the landscape before you may hold more clues to the history of
ancient Mars.
APOD: 2006 January 26 - An Unusual Two Toned Rock on Mars
Explanation:
How did this unusual Martian rock form?
The atypical two-toned rock, visible in the lower right of the above image, was photographed a few days ago by the
robotic Spirit rover
currently rolling across
Mars.
For now, the
environmental processes
that created the rock remain a matter of
speculation.
Finding unusual rocks is not unusual for
Spirit or its twin rover
Opportunity, however.
Over the past two years, for example, the rovers have unexpectedly discovered very
small gray pebbles dubbed
blueberries, and a rock out in the
middle of nowhere
now thought to be a
meteorite.
Having investigated
alien terrain and having found clear
evidence that part of Mars had a
wet past, the Earth-launched Martian rovers
are now entering their
third spectacular year exploring the red planet.
APOD: 2006 January 5 - New Year Mars Panorama
Explanation:
According to an
Earth-based calendar, the Spirit rover spent
the first day of 2006 gathering data to complete
this
panoramic view from Gusev crater on Mars.
That day corresponded to Spirit's 710th
Martian day or sol on the Red Planet.
Scrolling right the view spans 160 degrees, looking up a slope
and across rippled sand deposits in a dark field dubbed "El Dorado".
The Spirit rover
is traveling in
a down hill direction after reaching the summit of
Husband Hill.
This month, both Spirit and Opportunity rovers will celebrate
two years of Mars exploration, a remarkable achievement
considering their original
90 day warranty.
During that time Spirit has traveled over 3.5 miles and Opportunity
over 4 miles across
the
Martian surface.
APOD: 2005 December 14 - A Digital Opportunity Rover on Mars
Explanation:
If you could see one of the robot rovers currently rolling across Mars, what would it look like?
To gain this perspective useful in planning explorations, the
above synthetic image was produced digitally.
Above, a digital model of the Opportunity rover was added to a
real image
of the inside of
Endurance Crater on
Mars
taken earlier by Opportunity itself.
The size of the six-wheeled robot was scaled to the size of the
tracks that the Opportunity rover actually created.
In actuality, both the
Opportunity and
Spirit rovers currently rolling across
Mars each span about two meters and so are similar in
size to a large rolling
desk.
Also visible in the image is dark
soil, ancient
light rock and numerous
small gray pellets known as blueberries.
APOD: 2005 November 28 - Vista Inside Gusev Crater on Mars
Explanation:
What is the geologic history of Mars?
To help find out, the
robot Spirit rover
explored the terrain on the way up to the top of Husband Hill and took pictures along the way.
Earth-bound team members later combined images from one camera with
colors from another to create this semi-realistic vista from near the top of the rugged hill.
Many rock faces were imaged and probed along the way.
The above image captures not only a high and distant Mars inside
Gusev crater,
but also more of the refrigerator-sized Spirit rover
than other
similar
vistas.
Visible technology includes a wide array of energy-absorbing
solar panels, a
sundial, and the
circular
high gain communications antenna.
APOD: 2005 November 14 - Everest Panorama from Mars
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see? Scroll right to find out.
The robotic Spirit rover
currently rolling across
Mars climbed to the top of hill and took a series of images that were digitally combined into a
360 degree panorama
over three days early last month.
Spirit was instructed to take images having the same resolution as a
human with
20-20 eyesight.
The full panoramic result can be found by clicking on the
above image
and has a level of detail unparalleled in the history of Martian surface photography.
The panorama was taken from the pinnacle of
Husband Hill and has been dubbed the
Everest panorama,
in honor of the
view from the tallest mountain on Earth.
Visible in
Gusev Crater are rocks,
rusting sand, a
Martian sundial,
vast plains,
nearby peaks, faraway peaks, and sand drifts.
In the distance, fast moving
dust devils can be seen as slight apparitions of red,
green, or blue, the colors of filters used to build up
this natural color vista.
APOD: 2005 November 8 - The Drifts of Mars
Explanation:
What would it be like to walk across Mars?
The robot
Opportunity rover is currently experiencing what it is like to
roll across part of the red planet.
It's not always easy -- the rover is being instructed to dodge the deeper
drifts of dark sand.
During its exploration of
Erebus Crater, the rover stopped and took the
above picture.
Inside this part of
Erebus Crater,
the surface of mars is covered not only by dark
sand but also
light outcrops of rock.
Scattered across the exposed rock are numerous small round pebbles known as
blueberries .
Typically smaller than
marbles, these unexpected and
unusual rocks likely formed by
accretion in an ancient wet environment.
Also visible are some strange protruding edges known as
razorbacks.
The above image
was taken early last month.
APOD: 2005 October 24 - Angular Sand on Martian Hills
Explanation:
Why isn't this sand round?
The robotic
Spirit rover currently rolling across
Mars has found
notably angular sand
in the Columbia Hills on Mars.
Previously, small bits of sand found in the plains of
Gusev Crater were significantly
more round.
The finding indicates that angular hill
sand
has tumbled less and likely traveled a shorter distance than the
corresponding round plain sand.
Such tumbling has the general effect of making sand and rocks
increasingly round and with fewer sharp edges.
Pictured above, as taken last month, are angular sand grains magnified by Spirit's
Microscopic Imager.
The above frame spans about three centimeters.
APOD: 2005 September 7 - The View from Husband Hill on Mars
Explanation:
Scroll right to see a breathtaking panorama of
Mars from the top of Husband Hill.
The image was taken by the robotic rover Spirit now exploring the
red planet.
Spirit, situated in expansive
Gusev Crater, has been exploring the
Columbia Hills
for some time including climbing
Husband Hill over the last few months.
On the way up, Spirit took in a color vista from
Larry's Lookout.
Visible in the
above image is the vast eastern landscape
previously blocked from view by the Columbia Hills themselves.
The horizon is mostly defined by the rim of
Thira crater visible some 15 kilometers in the distance.
Spirit
will now examine rocks and soil
at the top of
Husband Hill, looking for clues as to how the hills and
local rocks formed in the
distant past.
APOD: 2005 August 22 - Desolate Mars: Rub al Khali
Explanation:
Sometimes on
Mars,
there is nothing to see but red sand.
Traveling two kilometers south of
Endurance Crater, the
robotic rover Opportunity now exploring Mars stopped
and took a 360 degree panorama of a desolate and
rusted Martian landscape.
The site was dubbed
Rub al Khali
for its similarity to a barren part of the
Saudi Arabian
desert on
Earth.
In the center of the frame,
the tracks from the rover's grated wheels can be
seen receding far into the distance.
Near the bottom, several parts of Opportunity itself are recorded,
including, on the far right, a
Martian sundial.
Nearly 100 images in three colors to generate the
above spectacular real-color image mosaic.
To display the full high-resolution image would require about 300
computer monitors -- or one good
large format printer.
APOD: 2005 June 20 - Sunset Over Gusev Crater
Explanation:
What would it be like to see a sunset on Mars?
To help find out, the
robotic rover Spirit was deployed last month
to park and serenely watch the Sun dip below the distant lip of
Gusev crater.
It was a tough job, but some robot had to do it.
Now on Earth a red sunset is caused by two effects -- by blue light being
preferentially scattered out of sunlight by
oxygen and
nitrogen molecules in the atmosphere,
and by scattering off a small amount of impurities like
volcanic dust.
(The magnitude of the first effect was computed in one of Albert
Einstein's most cited
papers.)
Although Mars lacks oxygen and nitrogen, it is covered in
red dust frequently
hoisted into the atmosphere by
fast but
thin winds.
Analyses of images like the
above photograph show that at least some
Martian days are capped by a
sunset significantly
longer and redder than typical on Earth.
For up to two hours after twilight, sunlight continued to reflect off
Martian dust high in the atmosphere, casting a diffuse glow.
The result helps atmospheric scientists understand not only the
atmosphere of Mars, but atmospheres across the
Solar System,
including our
home Earth.
APOD: 2005 May 17 - A Panorama of Mars from Larrys Lookout
Explanation:
Scroll right to see a breathtaking panorama of Mars from Larry's Lookout.
The lookout occurs near the peak of
Husband Hill in the Columbia Hills.
The summit of Husband Hill is visible 200 meters in the distance
toward the center of the 360-degree near-true-color picture.
The robot rover Spirit took images that compose the
above mosaic over four
Martian days.
After taking the image sequence,
Spirit carefully
picked its way to toward Husband Hill's summit.
On the far right, near distant rover tracks,
is a recently investigated area dubbed
Paso Robles that was found to contain high amounts of
sulfur.
APOD: 2005 May 2 - Methuselah Outcrop on Mars
Explanation:
What is the history of the outcropping of rock called Methuselah?
The unusual rock group is visible on the left of the
above image taken by the
robot Spirit rover current exploring
Mars.
Methuselah
was discovered while
maneuvering
over hilly terrain
and shows unusual multiple layering that caught the attention of the
rover science team.
Since the
above representative color image was taken about three weeks ago,
Spirit has moved in to get a closer look.
Also visible in the
above image are another rock outcrop dubbed
Larry's Lookout on the upper right and a larger
Clark Hill in the left background.
On the far right is a more distant peak of the
Columbia Hills.
APOD: 2005 April 26 - A Martian Dust Devil Passes
Explanation:
What goes there across the plains of Mars?
A dust devil.
For the first time,
definitive movies of the famous spinning
dust towers have been created from
ground level.
The robot rover Spirit has now imaged several
dust devils
from its hillside perch just within the past two months.
Each image in the above sequence
was taken about 20 seconds apart.
Inspection of the digitally resized images show the passing
dust devil
raising Martian dust so thick that it casts a
shadow.
The new dust devil movies have been made possible
by a new hybrid interaction system where the
robot Spirit on
Mars
takes many images and humans on Earth inspect thumbnails
and decide which full resolution images to send back.
APOD: 2005 April 12 - Earth or Mars?
Explanation:
Which image is Earth, and which is Mars?
One of the
above images was taken by the
robot Spirit rover
currently climbing
Husband Hill on Mars.
The other image was taken by a human across the desert south of
Morocco on Earth.
Both images show vast plains covered with
rocks and sand.
Neither shows water or obvious
signs of life.
Each planet has a surface so
complex that any one image
does not do that planet justice.
Understanding either one, it turns out, helps understand the other.
Does the one on the left look like home?
Possibly not, but it is Earth.
APOD: 2005 March 23 - A Dust Devil Swirling on Mars
Explanation:
What is that wisp on the horizon?
Scientists think that the slight white apparition is actually a
Martian dust devil that was caught swirling across
Mars.
The above image was taken earlier this month by the
robotic rover Spirit.
The swirling cloud was found by comparing the
above image to a previous image of the same area.
Fresh dust devil tracks
have been seen on Mars before, but actually seeing
one up close was a surprise.
The most similar phenomena to Martian dust devils on Earth are terrestrial dust devils,
tornadoes and waterspouts.
The ultimate
cause of Martian dust devils remains unknown,
but might be related to rising air heated by sun-warmed
rocks and soil.
Just the previous day, Spirit's power acquisition
increased unexpectedly, possibly the result of a
dust devil
passing near or over the Spirit rover and effectively cleaning its
solar panels.
APOD: 2005 February 9 - Heat Shield Impact Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Broken metal and scorched
Mars
make the impact site of Opportunity's heat shield one
of the more interesting sites inspected by the
rolling robot.
Visible on the image left is the conical outer hull of the shattered
heat shield expelled by
Opportunity as it plummeted toward Mars last year.
Scrolling right will show not only another section of the
heat shield but the
impact site itself.
The site is of interest partly because
its creation was relatively well understood.
The impact splattered subsurface light red dirt,
while a darker material appears to track toward the large debris.
Behind the impromptu space exhibit lies a vast
alien landscape of featureless plains and
rust-tinted sky.
APOD: 2005 January 21 - Metal on the Plains of Mars
Explanation:
What has the Opportunity rover found on Mars?
While traversing a vast empty plain in
Meridiani Planum, one of Earth's
yearling rolling robots
found a surprise when visiting the location of its own
metallic heat shield discarded last year during descent.
The surprise is the rock visible on the lower left,
found to be made mostly of dense metals
iron and
nickel.
The large
cone-shaped object behind it -- and the
flank piece
on the right -- are parts of Opportunity's jettisoned heat shield.
Smaller shield debris is also visible.
Scientists do not think that the
basketball-sized metal
"Heat Shield Rock" originated on
Mars,
but rather is likely an
ancient metallic meteorite.
In hindsight, finding a
meteorite
in a vast empty dust plain on
Mars might be considered similar to
Earth meteorites found on the vast empty ice plains of
Antarctica.
The finding raises speculations about the general abundance of
rocks on Mars that have fallen there from outer space.
APOD: 2004 December 31 - A Year of Mars Roving
Explanation:
Landing
on Mars in January, NASA's twin rovers Spirit and
Opportunity have now each spent over 330
sols
roving
the martian surface.
Still healthy and well in to extended missions, the
golfcart sized
robots
have operated five times longer than planned.
Ranging
across the floor of Gusev crater,
the Spirit rover has reached the
Columbia Hills
and journeyed nearly four kilometers.
Half a planet away, Opportunity has spent much of
its tour
on Meridiani Planum
exploring the 130 meter wide
Endurance Crater.
Opportunity recently returned
this panoramic view
of rock outcrops and steep crater walls.
Both
rovers have uncovered
strong
evidence that ancient salty
oceans left their mark on the alluring
Red Planet.
APOD: 2004 December 15 - Looking Back Over Mars
Explanation:
Pictured above, the path of the
robot rover Spirit
on Mars can be traced far into the distance.
Spirit has now crossed kilometers of plains
covered with rocks and sand, approached the lip of a
crater 200-meters across,
and climbed a series of hills.
Spirit's path has been not only one of
adventure but discovery.
Landing inside vast
Gusev crater near the beginning of this year, Spirit,
along with its sister
robot Opportunity across the planet,
has uncovered key evidence for
ancient Martian water.
The recent discovery of
goethite, a
mineral only known to form on Earth in the presence of water,
bolsters the case.
Spirit and Opportunity
continue to roam the red planet in search of different and more detailed clues to the unfolding ancient past of
Mars.
APOD: 2004 November 15 - Burns Cliff on Mars
Explanation:
The majestic walls of
Endurance Crater contain layers
of clues about the ancient past of
Mars.
In fact, the deeper the layer, the older the clue.
The particular crater wall
imaged above was dubbed
Burns Cliff and was in front of the
robot rover Opportunity last week.
Close inspection of different layers has found slightly different compositions as well as interesting trends in relative
compositions.
For example, deeper
layers contain similarly decreasing amounts of both
magnesium and
sulfur,
indicating a common reason for their decline -- possibly
dissolution
in water.
Today, more practically,
Burns Cliff blocks one exit direction for Opportunity to leave
Endurance Crater.
When combined with
slippery sand elsewhere on the crater floor, controllers have decided to
program Opportunity to
back out of the crater the way it came in - after a few more days exploration.
APOD: 2004 October 11 - Mosaic of Endurance Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Where should this Martian rover explore next?
Possible choices for the
Opportunity rover team
on Earth
in early August were to send the
Martian robot inside
Endurance crater toward the arc-shaped
sand dunes on the left, the unusually shaped
rock on the right slope dubbed
Wopmay, and lower parts of Burns Cliff at the top of the
craters inner slopes.
The Opportunity rover team on
Earth chose 1-meter diameter rock
Wopmay as their next target, and
closer photographs are already being returned.
Below center of the
above mosaic is an area already explored by the rover.
Opportunity has recently found rocks in Endurance crater with a
network of cracks potentially indicative of
dried mud,
bolstering the case that Mars had a wet ancient past.
APOD: 2004 September 22 - Spirit Rover at Engineering Flats on Mars
Explanation:
Is it art?
Here the paintbrush was the
Spirit robotic rover,
the canvas was the
soil on Mars,
and the artists were the
scientists and engineers
of the Mars Exploration Rover Mission.
The picture created was mostly unintentional -- the
MERS
team was primarily instructing Spirit to investigate rocks
in and around
Hank's Hollow in a location called
Engineering Flats on Mars.
After creating the ground display with its treads, the
Spirit rover was instructed to
photograph the area along with itself in
silhouette.
Both Mars rovers,
Spirit and
Opportunity, are now back in contact
after an expected
radio blackout caused by Mars moving behind the Sun.
NASA has also
announced that it is extending the rovers missions
for six months, so long as they keep working.
APOD: 2004 August 23 - Looking Out Over Mars
Explanation:
What would it be like to climb a hill and look out over Mars?
That opportunity was afforded the
Spirit rover
earlier this month as it rolled to a
high perch in the
Columbia Hills.
Peering out, the rolling robot
spied the interior plains and distant rim of
Gusev Crater,
beyond an outcrop of rocks called
Longhorn.
Spirit continues to find evidence that many rock shapes have been
altered by ancient water.
Both Spirit and her sister robot
Opportunity have
completed their primary three-month mission but
remain in good enough condition to continue to
explore Mars.
APOD: 2004 August 17 - The Unusual Blueberries at Bylot Rock
Explanation:
Why aren't these Martian rocks round?
Small rocks dubbed
blueberries have been found by the
Opportunity rover all over
Meridiani Planum on
Mars,
but the ones perched on Bylot rock have unusually non-spherical shapes.
The strangely shaped blueberry rocks are
shown above in an image taken by Opportunity's
microscopic imager on August 9.
Dark sand also covers much of
Bylot rock.
One hypothesis for the lack of
blueberry roundness here is a coating relatively resistant to erosion.
The average diameter of a
blueberry is about 4 millimeters.
The study of these and other
rock features
is allowing a better understanding of the
wet past of ancient Mars.
APOD: 2004 August 3 - Shadow of a Martian Robot
Explanation:
What if you saw your shadow on Mars and it wasn't
human?
Then you might be the
Opportunity rover
currently exploring Mars.
Opportunity and sister robot Spirit
have been probing the
red planet
since January, finding
evidence of ancient water,
and sending breathtaking images across the inner
Solar System.
Pictured above, Opportunity looks opposite the Sun into
Endurance Crater and sees its own
shadow.
Two wheels are visible on the lower left and right,
while the floor and walls of the unusual crater are
visible in the background.
Opportunity is cautiously edging its way into this
enigmatic crater,
hoping to find new clues into the wet ancient past of our
Solar System's second
most habitable planet.
APOD: 2004 July 27 - Razorbacks in Endurance Crater
Explanation:
Over one year after its launch,
robot geologist Opportunity
has been spending recent sols on Mars
inching its way down the slopes of
Endurance crater.
Littered with martian blueberries,
some flat rocks within the crater also seem to have
surprising razorbacks -- narrow
slabs sticking up along their edges.
Like the blueberries, it's possible that the sharp, narrow
features are related to water.
They could be
formed by minerals deposited by water in cracks, with
the surrounding softer material subsequently eroded away.
How narrow are they?
The ones pictured here in
an
enhanced color image from
Opportunity's panoramic camera are
actually only a few centimeters high and about half
a centimeter wide.
Impressive 3D
views have been constructed by stereo experimenter
P. Vantuyne based on the camera's left and right eye
images of the region.
APOD: 2004 July 19 - Attacking Mars
Explanation:
The Spirit rover attacked Mars again late last month.
What might look, above, like a military attack, though, was once again just a scientific one - Spirit was instructed to closely inspect some interesting rocks near Columbia Hills.
Spirits Front Hazard Avoidance Camera
captured the rover's Instrument Deployment Device above as it guided the Microscopic Imager to get a closer look at a
rock dubbed
Breadbox.
Images taken by the Microscopic Imager show a rock surface
consistent with
basalt corroded by ancient
groundwater.
Structures with similar origins can be found, for example, in the
Western Desert of
Egypt on
Earth.
The above picture taken on June 30, the 175th
Martian day that the Spirit rover has been on the
red planet.
APOD: 2004 June 28 - Spirit Rover Reaches the Columbia Hills on Mars
Explanation:
The Spirit robotic rover on
Mars
has now reached the
Columbia Hills on Mars.
Two of the hills are shown on approach near the beginning of June.
The above true-color picture shows very nearly what a
human would see from Spirit's vantage point.
The red color of the
rocks,
hills, and even the
sky
is caused by pervasive rusting sand.
Spirit has now
traveled over 3 kilometers since it
bounced down onto the red planet in January.
The robotic explorer,
controlled and programmed remotely from Earth,
is now investigating a rock called
Pot of Gold.
On the other side of Mars, Spirit's twin
Opportunity
is now inspecting unusual rocks inside a pit dubbed
Endurance crater.
APOD: 2004 May 10 - Endurance Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Scroll right to see the inside of Endurance Crater, the large
impact feature
now being investigated by the
Opportunity rover rolling across
Mars.
The crater's walls show areas of light rock that
might hold clues about the ancient
watery past of
this Martian region.
Inspection of this true-color image shows,
however, that much of this interesting
rock type is confined to crater walls that
might be hard for even
this wily robot to access.
Both of the Mars rovers have now
successfully completed their original mission
and are now exploring topical opportunities.
APOD: 2004 May 4 - Missoula Crater on Mars
Explanation:
Scroll right to see the
rocks,
craters, and
hills that were in view for the
Spirit rover
last week as it continued its trek across
Mars.
Missoula
crater, taking up much of the
above frame, appeared from orbit to have ejecta from
Bonneville crater inside it.
Upon closer inspection, however, Spirit finds only evidence for
wind-blown drifts.
The rocks show numerous
blisters and small
cavities that may have occurred as
ancient water vapor
evaporated from hot cooling
lava.
Columbia Hills in the distance is now planned as the ultimate destination for the Spirit rover.
Both of the Mars rovers have now
successfully completed their original mission
and are now exploring topical opportunities.
APOD: 2004 April 5 - A Berry Bowl of Martian Spherules
Explanation:
How were these unusual Martian spherules created?
Thousands of
unusual gray spherules, made of
iron and rock but dubbed
blueberries, were found embedded in and
surrounding rocks near the
landing site of the robot
Opportunity rover on
Mars.
To help investigate their origin, Opportunity found a
surface dubbed the Berry Bowl with an indentation that was
rich in the Martian orbs.
The Berry Bowl is
pictured above, imaged during rover's
48th Sol on Mars.
The average diameter of a blueberry is only about 4 millimeters.
By analyzing a circular patch in the rock surface to the
left of the densest patch of spherules,
Opportunity obtained
data showing that the underlying rock has a much different
composition than the
hematite rich blueberries.
This information contributes to the growing
consensus is that these small, strange,
gray orbs were slowly deposited from a bath of
dirty water.
APOD: 2004 April 1 - April Fools Day More Intense On Mars
Explanation:
Today, April 1st, astrophysicists have announced a surprising
discovery -
April
Fools Day is more
intense on Mars!
Though the discovery is contrary to accepted theories of April
Fools Day, researchers note that there are several likely
causes for the severe martian
April Fools phenomenon.
For starters, gravity, the force that opposes comedy
throughout the universe,
is only about 3/8ths as strong on Mars' surface as it
is on planet Earth.
Also, a
martian day, called a sol, lasts nearly 40 minutes longer than
an earth day.
And furthermore ... well, as soon as they think of some
more reasons, they've promised to tell us.
Happy April Fools day from the editors at APOD!
Editors note:
Mars rover Spirit
recorded this image looking out
toward the eastern horizon and the Columbia Hills over 2 kilometers
in the distance.
Its
journey across this
rocky martian terrain could take from 60 to 90 sols.
APOD: 2004 March 24 - Intriguing Dimples Near Eagle Crater on Mars
Explanation:
What are those unusual looking dimples?
Looking back toward Eagle crater, its landing place on
Mars, the
robot rover Opportunity
has spotted some unusual depressions in the Martian soil.
The dimples, visible above on the image left,
each measure about one meter across and appear to have
light colored rock in their interior.
The nearest dimple has been dubbed
"Homeplate",
while the next furthest one out is called "First Base."
Scrolling right will reveal a magnificent panorama including the rover in the foreground, the backshell and parachute that detached from Opportunity
before it landed near the horizon, Eagle crater in the center,
Opportunity's tracks as it rolled away from Eagle crater, and
wind blown ripples of
Martian soil in every direction.
Further analysis of
rocks photographed by Opportunity has
yielded evidence that Opportunity has landed on an
evaporated shoreline of an ancient salt-water ocean.
APOD: 2004 March 18 - Spirit Pan from Bonneville Crater's Edge
Explanation:
Scroll right and follow
this
breathtaking view of the martian
surface from the southern edge of a small crater dubbed Bonneville.
NASA's Spirit rover recorded the sharp 180-degree panorama
on sols 68 and 69 of its stay
on the Red Planet, following the completion of a
300+ meter journey from its
landing site
within Mars' expansive Gusev
Crater region.
Bonneville crater itself is about 200 meters across.
Rocks
scattered about the area are potentially "ejecta" from Bonneville,
debris blasted from below the martian surface by the impact
which created the crater.
Researchers are eager
to confirm this scenario since such material
could be a guide to the
geological history of the area.
So what's that shiny patch on the left, just beyond the
crater's far rim?
It's the Spirit lander's heat shield.
APOD: 2004 March 10 - Humphrey Rock Indicates Ancient Martian Water
Explanation:
How prevalent was water on Mars?
Results from the
Spirit rover now indicate that
Gusev crater likely had a wet past,
a result that comes shortly after Spirit's twin rover
Opportunity uncovered
clear evidence of past water at
Meridiani Planum on the other side of
Mars.
Evidence uncovered by Spirit and
released last week focussed on a large rock of unusual shape
nicknamed Humphrey, shown above near the image bottom.
Detailed inspection of the
rock revealed a bright material filling internal cracks.
Such material may have crystallized from water trickling through the
volcanic rock.
The amount of Mars once covered by ancient water remains unknown,
as both rovers landed in regions thought likely to once be underwater.
Spirit continues to roll across Mars,
recently passing the
300-meter mark on its way to
Bonneville crater.
APOD: 2004 March 3 - Opportunity Rover Indicates Ancient Mars Was Wet
Explanation:
Was Mars ever wet enough to support life?
To help answer this question,
NASA launched
two
rover missions to the
red planet
and landed them in regions that
satellite
images indicated
might have been covered with water.
Yesterday, mounting evidence was
released indicating that the
Mars Opportunity rover had indeed uncovered
indications that its landing site,
Meridiani Planum, was once quite wet.
Evidence that liquid water once flowed includes the
physical appearance of many rocks,
rocks with niches where crystals appear to have grown, and rocks with
sulfates.
Pictured above, Opportunity looks back on its now empty lander.
Visible is some of the
light rock outcropping
that yielded water indications, as well as the
rim of the small crater
where Opportunity landed.
The rover will continue to explore its surroundings and try to determine the
nature and
extent that water molded the region.
APOD: 2004 February 25 - White Boat Rock on Mars
Explanation:
What caused this rock to have an unusual shape?
Earlier this month the
robot Spirit rover on Mars stopped to examine
a rock dubbed "white boat", named for its unusually
light color and shape.
White boat, the large rock near the image center of the
above color-composite image, was examined by Spirit just after
Adirondack, a football-sized rock
determined to be composed of
volcanic basalt.
Spirit resumed scientific operations two weeks ago after
recovering from a
computer memory problem.
Spirit and its twin rover
Opportunity, on the other side of Mars, continue
to roam the red planet in search of clues to the ancient past of
Earth's most hospitable neighbor.
APOD: 2004 February 16 - A Patch of Spherules on Mars
Explanation:
Some patches of Mars are full of mysterious tiny
spherules.
The microscopic imager on board the Opportunity rover on Mars recorded,
last week, the
above
image showing over a dozen.
The image was taken near a rock outcrop called
Stone Mountain
and spans roughly 6 centimeters across.
A typical diameter for one of the
pictured spherules is only about 4 millimeters,
roughly the size of a small
blueberry.
The spherules
appear to be much grayer and harder than surrounding rock.
Debate rages on the origin of the
tiny spherules,
and whether their shape has to do with a
slow accumulation of sediments suspended in water, or
flash-frozen rock expelled during a
meteor impact or volcanic eruption.
A layered spherule, if ever found, would favor a water-based origin.
Meanwhile, Opportunity is being programmed to
dig into the Martian surface of
Meridiani Planum to see what is there.
APOD: 2004 February 10 - Unusual Spherules on Mars
Explanation:
What are those unusual spherules on Mars?
The
Mars Opportunity rover
has now photographed several unusual nodules on Mars that
have a nearly spherical shape.
Many times these spherules are embedded in
larger rock outcroppings but appear grayer.
Pictured in the inset is one such spherule embedded in a rock dubbed Stone Mountain, visible to the
Opportunity rover now rolling
inside a small crater on
Meridiani Planum.
Opportunity was directed to go right up to
Stone Mountain to get a better look.
The inset picture spans only 3 centimeters across, revealing the rock to be named more for shape than actual size.
Scientists are currently debating the origin of the
spherules.
One leading hypothesis holds that the
beads were
once-molten rock that froze in mid-air after an
impact or a volcanic eruption.
Another hypothesis holds that the spherules are
concretions, hard rock that slowly accumulates around a central core.
Opportunity will work to solve this mystery and others over the next few days.
APOD: 2004 February 6 - Magnified Mars
Explanation:
At first glance,
this sharp, color close-up gives the
strong impression of pebbles strewn over a sandy beach.
But the picture is one of the first
microscopic images of
another planet, captured by the Opportunity rover on its tenth
sol
on the martian surface
at Meridiani Planum.
The patch of soil measures about 3 centimeters (1.2 inches)
across.
It is shown in shades approximating what the eye
might see, obtained by combining pictures of the soil with
and without the microscopic imager's
orange-tinted dust cover in place.
Searching
for evidence
of past water on Mars,
researchers note that both volcanic and
water-related accretion
processes could have produced the striking circular grain at
the lower left.
However,
other
investigations now indicate the soil near
the lander contains olivine, an iron-bearing mineral
common in volcanic rocks, while a signature of
the iron mineral hematite was found in soil around
a nearby rocky outcrop.
On planet Earth,
hematite
often forms in association with liquid water.
APOD: 2004 February 4 - Opportunity's Horizon
Explanation:
Remarkably, the Opportunity Mars rover lies in a
small martian
impact crater about 3 meters deep and 22 meters wide.
For 360 degrees,
Opportunity's horizon stretches to the right in this new
color mosaic image from the
rover's panoramic camera.
Notable in this view of the generally
dark, smooth terrain are
surface imprints left by the
lander's airbags and an
outcropping of light-colored, layered rock about 8 meters
away toward the northwest.
Though they look imposing, the rocks in
the tantalizing outcrop are only a few centimeters high and will
be dwarfed by the cart-sized rover
itself during future close-up investigations.
Opportunity has now rolled off its lander and, along with
the restored Spirit rover, is directly
exploring
the martian surface.
APOD: 2004 January 27 - Opportunity on Mars
Explanation:
You've just woken up in a small crater on Mars.
The surrounding landscape is barren, strange, and alien.
You've never been on this world before.
You transmit pictures that are instantly rebroadcast
all over your home world.
You are the eyes for
billions of
people.
You seek adventure.
Your mission is to explore this strange new world
and search for signs of pre-historic life.
You have six wheels, one
arm, and
X-ray eyes.
Surrounding you,
pictured above, is
iron sand and
light-colored protrusions that might be
bedrock.
You are the
Opportunity Rover that
landed on Mars just this past weekend.
APOD: 2004 January 26 - A Landing at Meridiani Planum
Explanation:
After an interplanetary journey of nearly 300 million miles,
Opportunity
bounced down on
the martian surface at about 9:05 pm PST Saturday, its
final plunge cushioned by airbags.
Now the second NASA rover on Mars,
Opportunity's landing site at Meridiani Planum is
on the opposite side of the
red planet from its twin rover Spirit.
Described as unlike any ever seen on Mars, the dark, undulating
terrain at Meridiani Planum
(aka Terra Meridiani) is
pictured above in the first
stunning color view from Opportunity.
This area is thought to be rich
in
gray hematite, an iron-bearing mineral which can form in
watery
environments.
Part of the rover's deck is in the foreground while
circular impressions and drag marks made
by the airbags
are visible just beyond it.
APOD: 2004 January 24 - Valles Marineris from Mars Express
Explanation:
Looking down from orbit on January 14, ESA's
Mars
Express spacecraft scanned a 1700 by 65 kilometer
swath across
Valles Marineris - the Grand Canyon of Mars -
with its remarkable High Resolution Stereo Camera.
This spectacular picture
reconstructs part of the scanned
region from the stereo colour image data recording the rugged
terrain with a resolution of 12 metres per pixel.
Joining Mars
Global Surveyor and
Mars Odyssey,
Mars Express
has been orbiting the red planet since December 25th,
returning scientific data, acting as a communications relay, and
even making coordinated
atmospheric observations with NASA's
Spirit
rover on the surface.
The Beagle 2
lander was released from Mars Express making
a landing attempt also on December 25th,
but no signal has been received so far.
APOD: 2004 January 22 - Columbia Memorial Station
Explanation:
After leaving its nest, the Spirit rover turned to capture
this
spectacular view over the
Columbia Memorial Station
and the floor of Gusev crater
on the 16th sol of its visit to Mars.
The sharp picture looks toward
the northeast.
Over 2 meters wide,
the lander platform surrounded by
deflated airbags, and the egress ramp used by the rover
to complete its journey to the
martian surface, are in the foreground.
In the background lie Spirit's likely
future waypoints and
destination - initially toward a ridge on the left bordering an
impact crater about 200 meters across and
finally toward
the hills visible
on the horizon at the right.
The crater is about 250 meters away while the hills are about
3 kilometers distant.
Searching for evidence of
ancient
watery environments,
Spirit's scientific instruments have begun to return data
on the
composition of the surface in the lander's
vicinity, suggesting that iron-bearing volcanic minerals are present.
APOD: 2004 January 21 - Adirondack Rock on Mars
Explanation:
Is this a great
pyramid on Mars?
Actually, the pictured rock dubbed
Adirondack
has an irregular shape, is only about the size of a
football,
and has formed by natural processes.
Still, its relatively large size and
dust-free surface
made it the first destination for the
robotic Spirit rover currently roving
Mars.
Spirit, itself the size of a
golf cart, will now attempt to determine the
rock's composition and history by prodding it with its
sophisticated mechanical arm.
Spirit's arm, programmed remotely from Earth, has the
capability to bend, grind, and photograph the rock in minute detail.
Spirit's twin rover Opportunity is
scheduled to land on the other side of Mars this coming weekend.
APOD: 2004 January 18 - A Close-Up of Martian Soil
Explanation:
Make your background the closest image of Mars yet.
The Spirit Rover currently rolling on
Mars
has taken the highest resolution image to date of another planet.
The above black and white image spans only about 1.5 centimeters across,
with details smaller than 1/10 of a millimeter visible.
A microscope attached to the Spirit rover's instrument arm took the image.
Up close, the Martian soil appears to planetary geologists to have clumping properties similar to cocoa powder.
As more images come in and as the Spirit Rover continues to explore Mars, more information about the unusual floor of
Gusev Crater are likely to emerge.
APOD: 2004 January 16 - Martian Surface in Perspective
Explanation:
Spirit moved
across Mars yesterday as the rover
successfully maneuvered down off its lander, driving
its six wheels onto the floor of Gusev crater.
As planned, the
robotic geologist will now
begin a close-up examination of the rocks and soil around the landing site
for clues to the processes that formed them.
A perspective projection
of Spirit's
local martian rocks
and soil is shown above, based on 3D color image data recorded when
rover was still perched on its landing platform.
Dark-colored airbag drag marks stretch across the soil in
this view of the surface.
For scale, the triangular-faced rock in the upper left corner is
about 20 centimeters (8 inches) high.
Scientists anticipate that the rover's investigation
will yield valuable evidence helping
to confirm or refute
the possibility that the floor of Gusev crater is
an ancient lake bed.
APOD: 2004 January 14 - A Mars Panorama from the Spirit Rover
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what would you see?
Scrolling right will reveal a
full color 360-degree panoramic view from
NASA's Spirit Rover that landed on Mars just 10 days ago.
The
image is a digital mosaic from the panoramic camera
that shows the view in every direction.
Annotated on the
image are the directions and distances to various hills along the
horizon.
These hills are valuable for orienting Spirit since they are also visible to the
Mars Global Surveyor and
Mars Odyssey spacecraft orbiting high overhead.
Visible in the foreground are several instruments and
airbags> around
Columbia Memorial Station.
Spirit will attempt to roll onto the red planet in the next few days and explore
interesting features.
APOD: 2004 January 10 - Two Worlds, One Sun
Explanation:
Two Worlds, One Sun,
is the legend emblazoned on the Spirit
rover's camera calibration target.
Resting on the rover's
rear deck,
it also doubles
as a sundial, allowing
students
to determine the solar time at Spirit's landing
site on Mars.
Examples of the
sundial
or Marsdial
are shown above where
the left image, captured near local noon, shows the effect of
the Sun high in the martian sky.
The right image from later in the afternoon with the
Sun lower in the sky, shows a long shadow cast by the Marsdial's
3.5 centimeter high central post.
Based on the computer generated grid overlay, students
determined the local time in the
central inset image to be
about 12:17 pm local solar time.
The face of the Marsdial was designed by astronomy artist
Jon Lomberg
in collaboration with other team members.
Did you know,
the Marsdial idea was a brainchild of
Bill
Nye, the Science Guy?
Now
you know ...
APOD: 2004 January 9 - Sol 5 Postcard from Mars
Explanation:
A martian
Sol - the average martian
solar day - is
about 39 minutes longer than Earth's familiar 24 hour day.
Operating on martian time, the Spirit rover recently
sent back this color postcard image,
recorded on Sol 5 of its stay on the martian surface.
This cropped version of the full, high-resolution mosaic looks
north across Gusev crater floor.
The smooth-looking, 9 meter wide circular feature dubbed
Sleepy Hollow
lies at the center of the scene.
Within it are round dark markings which may have been left by
the lander
swaddled in airbags as it
bounced across the martian
surface.
Other examples of disturbances, likely made by the lander's
retracting
airbags, can be seen in the foreground just beyond
Spirit's solar cell covered deck.
APOD: 2004 January 8 - The Hills of Mars
Explanation:
Distant hills rise above a rocky, windswept plain in
this sharp stereo scene
from the Spirit rover
on Mars.
When viewed with red/blue glasses, the picture combines
left and right images from Spirit's high resolution
panoramic camera
to yield a dramatic 3D perspective.
The hills were estimated to lie about 2 kilometers away
and be approximately 50 to 100 meters high.
Along with other features of the landscape, determining their
direction and distance will help
pinpoint
the exact location of the
Spirit landing site when compared with high resolution
images of the region taken
from Mars orbit.
Much stereo
image data, allowing important estimates
of three dimensional shapes, sizes, and distances, is anticipated
from the rover's cameras.
(Editor's note: Red/blue glasses for viewing stereo
pictures can be
purchased or simply
constructed using
red and blue plastic for filters. Try it!
To view this image, the red filter is used for the left eye.)
APOD: 2004 January 7 - Red Mars from Spirit
Explanation:
Rocks are strewn across the broad, flat Gusev crater floor in
this sharp color picture
from NASA's Spirit rover.
Recorded by the
rover's panoramic camera,
the picture is part of Spirit's
first color
image of Mars - the highest resolution picture yet taken on
the surface of another planet.
Already revealing alluring and
perplexing
details of an apparently
windswept
plain thought to be an ancient lake bed,
this stunning view represents only a small fraction
of the color image data mission scientists expect to be
transmitted in the coming days.
As the robotic Spirit
rover
is preparing to stand up, roll off the lander, and
explore
the geology of the crater floor,
NASA has announced plans to rename the landing site the
Columbia
Memorial Station in honor of
the astronauts lost
in the Columbia space shuttle accident.
APOD: 2004 January 6 - Spirit's 3D View Toward Sleep Hollow
Explanation:
Working late, tired mission members nicknamed the
smooth-looking depression to the
left of center in this image from the martian
surface, Sleepy Hollow.
The picture is a portion of
the 3D panorama of the
Spirit rover's
landing site released yesterday, constructed
with data from the Mars rover's navigation cameras.
Use red/blue glasses, red for the left eye,
to get the 3D effect.
Sleepy Hollow is
estimated to be around 9 meters (30 feet) in diameter and
about 12 meters (40 feet) away.
Possibly an impact crater, the martian surface feature
is a tantalizing potential site for a future visit when the golf
cart-sized robotic rover ventures forth.
Covered with solar arrays, the rear deck
of the rover is
also visible in this view along with the top of an antenna at
the right.
An innovative camera
calibration target, a
martian
sundial, can be seen left of the antenna,
mounted near the edge of the rover's deck.
APOD: 2004 January 5 - Spirit Pan from Gusev Crater
Explanation:
After a seven month voyage of nearly 500 million kilometers
through interplanetary space, NASA's
Spirit
Rover has reached the surface of Mars.
Scroll right and see a mosaic panorama of Spirit's
first images returned
from its landing site in Gusev Crater!
Taken by Spirit's
navigation camera, the panorama covers 360 degrees,
with the spacecraft in the foreground and the floor of
Gusev Crater,
thought to be an ancient lake bed, extending to the horizon.
The entry,
descent, and landing phase of Spirit's mission -
referred to by mission planners as "Six Minutes of Terror" -
began Saturday night around 8:30pm PST as Spirit entered
the martian atmosphere at about 20,000 kilometers per hour.
Updates
on Spirit's status will be posted throughout the day.
APOD: 2004 January 4 - Spirit Rover Bounces Down on Mars
Explanation:
After a seven month voyage through interplanetary space,
NASA's Spirit Rover has reached the surface of the Red Planet and
returned
the first images from its landing site in Gusev crater!
The entry,
descent, and landing phase of its mission -
referred to by mission planners as "Six Minutes of Terror" -
began Saturday night around 8:30pm PST as Spirit entered
the martian atmosphere at about 12,000 miles per hour.
Depicted in the above artist's
illustration, the spacecraft is
in the final stages of its landing sequence,
swaddled in large, protective airbags and bouncing to a soft landing on
Mars.
The same type of airbags were used for the
Mars Pathfinder landing in 1997.
Updates
on Spirit's status will be posted throughout the day.
APOD: 2003 September 22 - Opportunity Rockets Toward Mars
Explanation:
Next stop:
Mars.
Two months ago, the second of
two missions to Mars
was launched from
Cape Canaveral,
Florida,
USA above a
Boeing
Delta II rocket.
The Mars Exploration Rover dubbed Opportunity is expected to arrive
at the red planet this coming January.
Pictured above, an attached
RocketCam (TM) captures Opportunity
separating from lower booster stages and rocketing off toward
Mars.
Upon arriving, parachutes will deploy to slow the spacecraft and surrounding
airbags will inflate.
The balloon-like package will then bounce around the
surface a dozen times or more before coming to a stop.
The airbags will then deflate, the spacecraft will right itself,
and the Opportunity rover will prepare to roll onto Mars.
A first rover named Spirit was
successfully launched
on June 10 and will arrive at Mars a few weeks earlier.
The robots Spirit and Opportunity are expected to cover as much as
40 metres per day, much more than Sojourner,
their 1997 predecessor.
Spirit and Opportunity will search for evidence of
ancient Martian water,
from which implications might be drawn about the possibility of
ancient Martian life.
APOD: 2003 July 28 - Launch of the Spirit Rover Toward Mars
Explanation:
Next stop:
Mars.
Last month the first of
two missions to Mars
was launched from
Cape Canaveral,
Florida,
USA above a
Boeing
Delta II rocket.
Pictured above, solid fuel boosters are seen falling
away as light from residual exhaust is reflected by the
soaring rocket.
The Mars Exploration Rover dubbed Spirit is expected to arrive
at the red planet this coming January.
Upon arriving, parachutes will deploy to slow the spacecraft and surrounding
airbags will inflate.
The balloon-like package will then bounce around the
surface a dozen times or more before coming to a stop.
The airbags will then deflate, the spacecraft will right itself,
and the Spirit rover will prepare to roll onto Mars.
The robotic Spirit is expected to cover as much as 40 meters per day,
much more than Sojourner,
its 1997 predecessor.
Spirit will search for evidence of
ancient Martian water,
from which implications might be drawn about the possibility of
ancient Martian life.
A second rover named Opportunity was
successfully launched
on July 7 and will arrive at Mars a few weeks later.