NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE Images – January 30, 2013

– Textured Crater Floor in the Arabia Region http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_024870_2080

Surrounding the uplifted bedrock in the center of this large crater is mottled terrain. What possibly caused this?

– East Coprates Chasma Dune Fields and Wall Rock http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_025164_1655

One of the suggested goals for this observation was to investigate the relation of dune material with wall rock as a suspected sand source.

– A Crater Exposing Diverse Compositions http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_030079_1550

The blue-green (infrared-shifted) colors indicate minerals like olivine and pyroxene, common in lava or subsurface intrusions of magma.

– MSL Curiosity on Sol 157 in Color http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_030313_1755

This HiRISE observation was performed in conjunction with a CRISM observation so that they could get good spectral data on the scour zone created by the MSL descent rockets.

All of the HiRISE images are archived here: http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/

Information about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is online at http://www.nasa.gov/mro. The mission is managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, of Denver, is the prime contractor and built the spacecraft. HiRISE is operated by the University of Arizona. Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp., of Boulder, Colo., built the HiRISE instrument.