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posted by cmn32480 on Wednesday September 14 2016, @07:47PM   Printer-friendly
from the it's-probably-a-hoax-in-Arizona dept.

The layered geologic past of Mars is revealed in stunning detail in new color images returned by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover, which is currently exploring the "Murray Buttes" region of lower Mount Sharp. The new images arguably rival photos taken in U.S. National Parks.

Curiosity took the images with its Mast Camera (Mastcam) on Sept. 8. The rover team plans to assemble several large, color mosaics from the multitude of images taken at this location in the near future.

"Curiosity's science team has been just thrilled to go on this road trip through a bit of the American desert Southwest on Mars," said Curiosity Project Scientist Ashwin Vasavada, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.

The Martian buttes and mesas rising above the surface are eroded remnants of ancient sandstone that originated when winds deposited sand after lower Mount Sharp had formed.

"Studying these buttes up close has given us a better understanding of ancient sand dunes that formed and were buried, chemically changed by groundwater, exhumed and eroded to form the landscape that we see today," Vasavada said.

The pictures are amazingly detailed. The formations resemble structures that abound in the American Southwest.


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by jmorris on Wednesday September 14 2016, @08:33PM

    by jmorris (4844) on Wednesday September 14 2016, @08:33PM (#401999)

    Yea, that was my first though too. NASA has done that too many times, posting pictures of little rocks that look big because of lack of reference points. They also never seem to tell you which photos are in natural light vs false color. Infrared/UV/etc do provide additional information, but they should always note that fact. It is reasonable to want to see an actual representational photo, one that reflects what we would actually see if we ever manage to go to Mars. That means a photo shot from an approximation of a standing human showing a field of view similar to that of a human eye, taken in wavelengths a human eye sees and exposures achievable with a normal healthy human eye.

    I suspect that most photos shot beyond the orbit of Mars are boosted beyond what most humans will be able to naturally see due to lack of sufficient light for color vision.

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