• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

WildCat

NWO Master Conspirator
WildCat
Joined
Mar 23, 2003
Messages
59,856
This spacecraft has sent its first pic back today. This is the first Martian orbiter capable of high-res pics, the first (and so far only) pic is here. (56k warning - 19 MB!) If you want the uncompressed TIFF image, it's here but it's 190 MB!

Very interesting pic, what strikes me the most about it is what looks like a river channel 3/4 of the way down on the left side. It's obviously very ancient, because there's several meteor craters right in the middle of the "river" channel, so the channel must be older than the craters. Which means that there has been no flowing water on Mars for a long, long time. I don't think the rovers have found any evidence of existing water on Mars either.

I just thought this was interesting, I love the great Mars pics we've had lately!
 
Thanks for the link.

The picture is amazing. There is a large crater on the far right of the image. Sand dunes are clearly visible inside the crater. Very cool.
 
Looking closer, I think some of the 'river channels' are actually raised ridges.
 
I just had the most interesting visual illusion happen.

I was going to comment on scotth's assertion regarding channels versus ridges. I don't know what particular feature he was referring to, but I was going to make the general observation that one must always be careful in interpreting height data...depending on the illumination angle, depressions can appear to be raised and vice versa. The largest contributor has to do with where the illumination source in the photo is. We are so used to interpreting a photo like this as a bas relief with an illumination source from above that an illumination source from below can make the photo undergo a "Penrose shift"...and can either flip flop back and forth or remain determinedly persistant.

I had previously commented on this effect in
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=43804
and was going back to review the photo of the "Star City"...a filled in crater with some channels which, when the illumination source is moved to the lower left, is claimed by Mars-inhabitant-ologists to look like a collapsed dome. The Penrose effect is typically strong in this photo, which is why it's so often reprinted.

When I pulled up the photo, though, I saw the depth in the correct way. Perhaps it was because I knew what I was expecting to see beforehand (the riverlike channels), but for the life of me I couldn't get it to "flop" to give me the illusion. I tried imagining the light source in the wrong place, but to no avail.

I then clicked back on the window to bring up the new MRO photo, which I'd previously been studying in detail, and now *it* was Penrose flipped, with all the craters appearing as variously sized flat domes ... and now I couldn't get *this* photo to Penrose flip back to the right depth orientation. I had to walk away from the screen and get a cup of coffee before coming back and having all be right in the world and my perception.

- Timothy
 
It's a great pic, and I'm looking forward to more!

I do so wish, though, that astronomers felt the need to include a scale line like you'd find on a map, to give you some means to judge the size of particular features, on every picture they release.

I check the Astronomy Picture of the Day daily, and am often frustrated by the lack of any frame of reference.
 
The accompanying text released with the photo

http://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/mro/gallery/calibration/pia08014-AEB1-full-reduced1.html

gives the dimensions of the image 49.8km x 23.6km, or approximately 2.5 meters per pixel for this non-operational altitude.

In astronomical imagery, there's typically so much other information of equal importance the user would be interested in that all the supporting information is included in a separate data file. Since it's already there, unless there's a compelling reason to do so, images are released without any annotations.

Remember, resolution of these images will be almost 10 times better at operational orbit.

- Timothy
 
I think I'll wait until--what is it? June 18th?--the MRO gets into its final orbit around Mars before indulging my eyes.

That, and I couldn't get the picture to display. =P

And I already get newly-released data and images from the Cassini Imaging team. I'm sure onces the MRO is in its June-ish orbit around Mars that there will be something else I can subscribe to to clutter my inbox.
 
Science operations don't begin until November, after aerobraking is completed (late September) and then after solar conjunction (for communication purposes). It doesn't preclude the occasional photo at periapsis for calibration and diagnostics, but the flow of data won't start for another 7 1/2 months.

- Timothy
 
Timothy said:
Science operations don't begin until November, after aerobraking is completed (late September) and then after solar conjunction (for communication purposes). It doesn't preclude the occasional photo at periapsis for calibration and diagnostics, but the flow of data won't start for another 7 1/2 months.

- Timothy
Click to expand...


Oh thanks for explaining that. And I believe when I first heard about it I knew it was much later in the year. I don't know why I was thinking June. Perhaps I'm excited?
 
Something to look forward to later in the year . That image was great and later images should give us images of all that woo woo stuff like that face , or just show it's all silly .
Anyhow it does look as if there used to be a river years ago .
 
Timothy said:
The accompanying text released with the photo

http://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/mro/gallery/calibration/pia08014-AEB1-full-reduced1.html

gives the dimensions of the image 49.8km x 23.6km, or approximately 2.5 meters per pixel for this non-operational altitude.
Click to expand...


Ah, very cool, thanks. (FYI, on that page, it looks like they computed the height in miles wrong; it should be about 14.7 miles, not 11.7.)

I always try to put these pictures in some sort of perspective, by imagining some earth-based feature or activity occurring on them. So in this one, driving 60 mph (96.5 kph), it would take you about 30 minutes to drive across this distance. The big old crater in the middle would take about two minutes to drive across, and would fit a good sized airport.

If you superimposed Manhattan over it, it would run almost all the way from top to bottom, and would be as wide as that center crater.
 
Has anyone seen the pictures from the Cassini spacecraft orbiting the moons of Saturn? WOW! They can all be at ciclops.org( sorry I cannot provide the link, I haven't posted enough:( ) Simply amazing! This is the first time I have seen news agencies make a big deal out of such pictures. Good for them.
 
:D That's the one! Aren't they amazing? That presentation was probably my favorite at TAM4.
 
Angus McPresley said:
I always try to put these pictures in some sort of perspective, by imagining some earth-based feature or activity occurring on them. So in this one, driving 60 mph (96.5 kph), it would take you about 30 minutes to drive across this distance. The big old crater in the middle would take about two minutes to drive across, and would fit a good sized airport.
Click to expand...


Ah, see, I should leave it to the pros --

Our very own (can we officially claim him?) Phil Plait of badastronomy.com himself decided to give some sense of scale to the new pictures on his blog. Great stuff.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom