NASA Mars Odyssey THEMIS Image: Crater Dust Avalanches

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Context image credit: NASA/Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) Team
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Dust avalanches, also called slope streaks, occur on many

Martian terrains. The deposition of airborne dust on surfaces

causes a bright tone in the THEMIS VIS images. Any movement

of the dust downhill, a dust avalanche, will leave behind

a streak where the darker, dust-free surface is exposed.

This region of dust avalanches is located in and

around a crater to the west of yesterday’s image.

[Source: ASU THEMIS Science Team]

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory manages the 2001 Mars Odyssey mission for NASA’s Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) was developed by Arizona State University, Tempe, in collaboration with Raytheon Santa Barbara Remote Sensing. The THEMIS investigation is led by Dr. Philip Christensen at Arizona State University. Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, is the prime contractor for the Odyssey project, and developed and built the orbiter. Mission operations are conducted jointly from Lockheed Martin and from JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Arizona State University