Mars Picture of the Day: Cycloidal Dust Devil Track
Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera
MGS MOC Release No. MOC2-382, 5 June 2003
![]() NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems |
The spiraling feature near the center of this
Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image
is known as a cycloidal marking. Patterns like this
can also occur on Earth. On Mars, the cycloidal pattern—and
all of the other dark streaks in this picture—are thought
to have been formed by passing dust devils. On Earth, cycloidal
markings have been observed to result from some tornadoes.
The pattern is created when more than one vortex (spinning
column of air) is travelling, and spinning, together.
This picture is
near 62.9°S, 234.7°W.
Sunlight illuminates the scene from the
upper left.
Malin Space Science Systems and the California Institute of Technology
built the MOC using spare hardware from the Mars Observer mission.
MSSS operates the camera from its facilities in San Diego, California.
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Mars Surveyor Operations Project
operates the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft with its industrial
partner, Lockheed Martin Astronautics, from facilities in Pasadena,
California and Denver, Colorado.