

First Picture from Mars Odyssey 8
Insitus writes: "NASA releases the first images from the Mars Odyssey." Not very exciting, but I guess with the dust storm this is as good as they get.
If you want to put yourself on the map, publish your own map.
Mars Odyssey (Score:1, Informative)
2001 Mars Odyssey home page: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/odyssey/
Direct link to the first image and explanation:
http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/odyssey/gallery/latest
Explanation of the Mars Odyssey on HowStuffWorks:
http://www.howstuffworks.com/mars-odyssey.htm
Mission Overview:
http://www.marsnews.com/missions/2001/
Enjoy!
-NeoTomba
Uh, no. (Score:2, Informative)
Second, that image was taken during aerobraking from an altitude of 22,000 kilometers, as opposed to MGS's 400km orbit.
Third, it's a thermal infra-red image, showing surface temperature. Half of the image is being taken on the night-time side of the planet, in the dark. It doesn't show bright and dark regions like most images because it is measuring surface temperature, not brightness.
The interesting parts are how much thermal variation there is in the polar cap, considering it's a solid sheet of CO2 ice, and the temperature variations between the bottoms and tops of some of the craters.
The original image is here. [asu.edu] The space.com copy has been shrunk and doesn't show any detail.
Whoops. (Score:2, Informative)
Lets try again.
No significant dust storms. [asu.edu]
sigh.. (Score:1)
Yawn (Score:1)
Can someone explain to me if this photograph shows anything truly interesting, or is it just a test as the article says?
Re:Yawn (Score:2)
That said, I think that the picture is pretty cool. Just by looking at it, you can see the differences in temp between the dark side of the planet and the light side. Also, you can see how cold the CO2 polar ice caps are.
The two things that I found most interesting were:
1. At the top of the photo, you can see a little streak of blue. I belive that is the atmosphere. It's pretty cold!
2. The polar region of Mars is habitiable during the day! If you look at the temp scale, red corresponds to 0 degrees celcius. That's the freezing point (on earth) of water. People are able to survive in those conditions!