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Space Science

Making Tracks on Mars 179

An anonymous reader writes "In a remarkable series of orbital pictures, the Mars Global Surveyor's cameras have imaged the tracks of the Spirit rover on the surface. Individual debris pieces including the backshell and lander are visible with remarkable clarity using an innovative roll of the satellite."
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Making Tracks on Mars

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  • by EQ ( 28372 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:30AM (#10372320) Homepage Journal
    [insert D&D reference here]

    I wonder what the Satellite has for initiative roll bonuses?
    • by spectrokid ( 660550 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:43AM (#10372413) Homepage
      Over the past year and a half, the camera and spacecraft teams for Mars Global Surveyor have worked together to develop a technique that allows us to roll the entire spacecraft so that the camera can be scanned in a way that sees details at three times higher resolution than we normally get," said Dr. Ken Edgett, staff scientist for Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, Calif., which built and operates the Mars Orbiter Camera. The technique adjusts the rotation rate of the spacecraft to match the ground speed under the camera.

      It is a line camera, X resolution is set by number of pixels, Y resolution by mars rotation speed and number of scans per second. If the satelite rolls opposite to mars rotation, it is as if mars rotates more slowly, therefore higher Y resolution. Price to pay is you end up rotating out of view, so smaller pictures, but more detailed ones.

    • Keep in mind that it's got a +12000 lens of seeing.
  • Crap. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Skye16 ( 685048 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:32AM (#10372329)
    Can't we go to just ONE other planet without scattering our garbage about willy-nilly?!?!
    • Re:Crap. (Score:2, Funny)

      by Moby Cock ( 771358 )
      NASA ought to launch a Roomba to Mars to take care of all the mess. Its small, robust and autonomous. A perfect solution!
    • Because, of course, we all know that nature itself is perfectly neat and tidy.
    • Re:Crap. (Score:3, Informative)

      by Dun Malg ( 230075 )
      Can't we go to just ONE other planet without scattering our garbage about willy-nilly?!?!

      Why should we? What possible reason is there to keep every damn thing in the universe in pristine, untouched condition? Besides, it's not like we're going to Mars and throwing a McDonald's bag out the window, scattering burger wrappers and half-eaten McNuggets all over the Martian surface. These are spacecraft components that, first chance we get, will probably be brought back to Earth and examined.

    • Re:Crap. (Score:3, Funny)

      by nizo ( 81281 )
      I look forward to the day the first human comes along and picks up all this stuff to put in the new "Mars Museum". I just hope it happens in my lifetime.
    • Re:Crap. (Score:3, Insightful)

      by maxpublic ( 450413 )
      Fifty years from now, if we're *really* lucky, there'll be hundreds of human beings on Mars producing garbage left and right. I certainly hope so.

      Max

    • Why not? Nature left the entire planet covered in dirt. Why can't we leave a few stamped impressions of tire tracks.

      Don't make it sound like the planet was a pristine horticulture mecca. It's dirt. It can't get any dirtier.
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:32AM (#10372335)
    Now all they need to do is locate the massive impact crater left by Beagle 2.
    • Re:What else... (Score:3, Informative)

      I don't think it would be more massive than the one left on Earth by the Genesis probe...
    • They cant do that, at least easily - the roll-while-imaging method only works if you know the area you want to look at exactly - it would take way to long to search the possible area for beagle impact. Maybe they should have timed beagle eta better so that MGS could image impact..
  • by argStyopa ( 232550 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:39AM (#10372384) Journal
    Any chance that they can use this process to search for Beagle?

    You know the Surveyor guys are like "oh, sure, NOW you can look around and tell us what's interesting to investigate!"
  • This is old news (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sat1308 ( 784251 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:39AM (#10372385)
    I worked on the Mars Exploration Rovers (Spirit) this February at JPL and we had images like the posted one available almost as soon as the rover landed, of course you couldn't see the tracks back then...I don't have a link handy to any of the pictures from then I remember that we had a wall-sized poster where scientists used to guess where the rover would land. Some days later, once the rover landed, there was another poster with various points of interest (lander, parachute etc.) marked on it. So we have had images (also from the Mars Global Surveyor) like these for a long time only they weren't available to the public. If anything, these images bear testimony to the quality of the camera on-board MGS.
  • by dpilot ( 134227 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:39AM (#10372387) Homepage Journal
    On the one hand, Mars does have a much thinner atmosphere, and I have no idea how low the Mars Global Surveyer orbit is.
    On the other hand, *anything* we ship to Mars is a design compromise in terms of weight and size. So I'm sure the camera is sophisticated, but isn't this one of those times when size matters, especially on the objective lens?

    I've found my house on Terraserver, and I couldn't see features as small as this picture gives us. Makes me wonder what spy satellites can do, what commercial imaging satellites can do, and what DHS wants to let us have.
    • by jstave ( 734089 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @08:10AM (#10372615)
      Makes me wonder what spy satellites can do, what commercial imaging satellites can do, and what DHS wants to let us have.
      The government spy satelites can actually image individual crinkles on our tin-foil hats.
    • by MtViewGuy ( 197597 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @09:52AM (#10373566)
      If you think the images from Mars Global Surveyor look awesome, the images from the upcoming Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter should be nothing short of AWESOME.

      Given that MRO will likely use a modified version of the same camera system used on the Ikonos imaging satellite (Ikonos can resolve down to 100 cm resolution from a 300 km orbit through Earth's thick atmosphere), the combination of the lower orbit and the very thin atmosphere on Mars means there are estimates that the MRO cameras could resolve objects as small as 150 millimeters across in the visual light spectrum! At that resolution, MRO could finally put to bed the controversy about the anomalous features on the Cydonia plain of Mars that some people claim are not natural features of that plain.
      • Damn! (Score:4, Funny)

        by Civil_Disobedient ( 261825 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @10:03AM (#10373692)
        the combination of the lower orbit and the very thin atmosphere on Mars means there are estimates that the MRO cameras could resolve objects as small as 150 millimeters across in the visual light spectrum

        I think I just shat myself.
      • by mopomi ( 696055 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @10:35AM (#10374118)
        HiRISE on MRO will be able to resolve about 30 cm/pixel, not 150 mm, with a swath width of > 6 km for the greyscale images. It is not a remake of the Ikonos, though it is similar. A slice through the CCD array (I don't remember the number of CCDs in the array off the top of my head--must be 20) of the camera is something like (lameness/HTML filter screws this up--ignore the dots):

        ........BBBB
        PPPPPPPPRRRRPPPPPPPP
        ........GGGG

        Where the middle layer three CCDs deep are the "Blue", "Red", and "Green" (approx.) CCDs, while the others are the panchromatic (really the same as the "Red" in the color portion of the array). Each of the CCDs is something like 1024 pixels across, with a 6 pixel overlap on each side.

        Check out:

        http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu [arizona.edu] http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/hirise [nasa.gov]

        • That's about 300 mm/pixel, or just a hair under one feet in resolution, based on the estimates from the HiRISE team. But given Mars' very thin atmosphere and the fact Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter could orbit Mars from lower orbit compared to what Ikonos does now orbiting the Earth, we could in theory see resolutions far better than 300 mm/pixel once MRO has optimized its orbit over Mars.
    • The CIA will have better pictures than those available on Terraserver but there are limits to the resolution. Due to the fact that light has a finite wavelength, there are certain limits in resolution you can get depending on the size of your telescope [cornell.edu]. This phenomenon is known as the diffraction limit. A very rough calculation would say that Resolution=wavelength*Distance/Telescope_diameter. This gives 5 cm with a 2 meter telescope from 200 km at visible wavelengths. So take of your tinfoil hats

      • Because the limits on resolution can be compensated for with image processing. For example, take a large number of photographs of the same thing, then use the differences to interpolate the real image.
        • No, there are certain hard limits imposed by physics that you can't break with some fancy image processing. Sure, you might reduce some of the noise, and you might gain a factor of 2, but that's it. Why do you think they build 10 meter diameter telescopes (100 meter in the works: OWL) if they could achieve the same with a 1 meter diameter and some processing.
  • What about the Moon? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by trash eighty ( 457611 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:41AM (#10372408) Homepage
    have they ever tried doing this to look for the remains of the Apollo missions and other luna missions?
  • Erosion? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dan East ( 318230 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:41AM (#10372409) Journal
    Any estimate on how long it will take the tracks to erode until they are no longer visible, given the average winds in that area? Unlike the tracks on the moon, these shouldn't last too long (relatively speaking).

    Dan East
  • by spidergoat2 ( 715962 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:42AM (#10372410) Journal
    Quit messing up my lawn!!!
  • Unearthly (Score:4, Funny)

    by NoInfo ( 247461 ) * on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:43AM (#10372412) Homepage Journal
    Yes, it's soooo interesting to look at our own devices on other planets.

    Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.
    • Re:Unearthly (Score:4, Insightful)

      by saider ( 177166 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @08:37AM (#10372852)
      Yeah, but you didn't design and build your car from scratch to get to your "exotic location". I'd be taking pictures of my car if it landed on another planet.
    • Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

      If I took my Enzo Ferrarri to the utah salt flats and had a choice of pictures of salt, or pictures of my car tearing it up on the flats, I'd have to go with pictures of the car.

    • If I took my car to another country, you can bet your sweet ass that I'd be taking pictures of it there. Then again, I have a car that's worth taking pictures of - well it would be if I had finished painting it. Maybe this semester :P
    • Maybe it's just me, but when I'm on an exotic vacation, I don't go out and start taking pictures of my car.

      Picture one us Americans on vacation in Europe. We park next to a topless beach and take a picture of our rental car. "Honest honey, I was taking a picture of the car".

      Yeah, ok, well, I'm a programmer not a commedian. ;-)
  • On Beagle 2 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by tod_miller ( 792541 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @07:52AM (#10372489) Journal
    My first thoughts about this were about re-calculating and re-imaging possible crash zones.

    What would happen if hubble could image on mars? I suspect the optics are not designed to image something like mars, and wouldn't be effective?

    Otherwise surely we would have close to 1m resolution of mars?

    Am I missing something? Or is hubble too busy?

    are visible in this image from the Mars Orbiter Camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor orbiter. North is up in this image I think the images released are not the full resolution, or if they are then they at least with less compression (unless they transmit them compressed - which would be an insane idea) it should be clearer.

    I would guess that they transmit all data back in raw, with lots of error checking.
  • by tod_miller ( 792541 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @08:00AM (#10372547) Journal
    A little article with two boffins [astrobio.net] talking abour terraforming mars.

    They harp on about oxygen levels. I started to wonder - what gas other than nitrogen would be good to compose the other 80% (assuming we reach earth density - could we have a 1/5 less atomosphere than was 99% 02?

    So I think (although mars contains nitrogen - composition [uoregon.edu]) the matter is how to make nitrogen and oxygen and enough co2.

    Nitrogen in the air is vital for plant life also, so I think a valid nitrogen cycle, water cycle and healthy o2/co2 ratios would need to be established.

    Would they find thier own levels, or will it be *bloody* hard to establish a balanced eco system?

    Any other thoughts on mars ecosynthesis?
    • I started to wonder - what gas other than nitrogen would be good to compose the other 80% (assuming we reach earth density - could we have a 1/5 less atomosphere than was 99% 02?

      I don't think anything that has evolved on earth could survive in such an atmosphere for very long. And having things from earth there is the point of terraforming, right?

      Also, if you had played The Little Terraformer's Virtual Lab (aka Sim Earth) long enough, you would know that if the oxygen ratio is higher than 25%, trees st

    • by Anonymous Coward
      The problem with breathing is something called "partial pressure". Partial pressure is the pressure exerted by an individual gas in the atmosphere. You have to have a bare minimum oxygen partial pressure of around 2.4in Hg in order to push enough oxygen through the lining of your lungs and into the bloodstream. That's the pressure at about 2 miles up. 6" Hg is about normal partial pressure at sea level.

      Here's the first hit off of Google for partial pressure:
      http://wine1.sb.fsu.edu/chm1045/notes/Gases/ [fsu.edu]
    • Without a stable magnetic field to deflect the solar wind, any attempt to increase the atmospheric density on Mars is never going to work. It would be like trying to inflate a balloon with a hole in it. Deatils here. [nasa.gov]
      • by radtea ( 464814 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @12:37PM (#10375448)
        Unfortunately for this hypothesis, Venus has no magnetosphere [ucla.edu], experiences much stronger solar wind than Mars, and has no shortage of atmosphere.

        So Mars' lack of atmosphere is likely due to a combination of factors, with the lack of magentosphere being perhaps necessary but hardly sufficient. The question for terraformers is whether or not it is possible to create and sustain an environment like the one we have on Earth via biological means.

        It is worth noting that in the absence of life, Earth would be a lot less habitable than it is. That is, life on Earth has created conditions that are suitable for life on Earth. Or more correctly, life on Earth has found relatively open evolutionary niches due to the actions of other life on Earth. The most obvious thing like this is oxygen, which would weather out of the atmosphere in a few million years were it not a waste product thrown away by plants.

        --Tom
    • I was actually thinking about shipping oil and gasoline out there. :) Use bottled oxygen and use IC engines for transportation. That's a sure way to fill up the atmosphere with CO2. Then in selected areas, inject nitrogen into the atmosphere and just grow plants. Do that for awhile and eventually you have an entire planet capable of supporting human life!

      (might take awhile, though)


    • Instead of looking to off-earth as a possible (waaay into the) future home for us meatbags, why not consider moving underground?

      Probably a stupid question.
  • by Chemisor ( 97276 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @09:18AM (#10373235)
    Now we know how those "canals" got there :)
  • by BobPaul ( 710574 ) * on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @10:08AM (#10373765) Journal
    If they keep driving all over the surface of Mars, how will they ever tell the difference between their tracks and those made by the little green men?

    We'll never prove the existance of life on Mars at this rate!
  • by Zerbey ( 15536 ) * on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @10:11AM (#10373790) Homepage Journal
    Couldn't they use the same techniques to find the other landers that have either crashed or soft landed successfully and died (Viking, one of the Russian Mars probes).

    I would be interested to see if the Viking landers are still visible, or if they're now covered in martian dust? Maybe it'll be a better job for the MRO when it gets there.
  • Time of image (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Mr2cents ( 323101 ) on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @11:55AM (#10375011)
    The image shows shows spirit on the crater rim, that's something like sol 90 iirc (spirit is now at sol 260). So why did it take so long to get the image? Were they stored on-board for months? Were they processed for months? This is not a flame, I'm genuinly curous :).

    Anyway, I hope that Mars Express will give it a try, too.
  • I think we've stumbled upon a way to finance bigger and better future missions to Mars! For a sizeable contribution, our rovers will draw in a company's logo on Mars.
  • So if us can resolve 1.5m, that means the European orbiter can resolve single cells. When are we going to see the European orbiter use roll/pitch compensation to image single cells?

  • by Stephen Samuel ( 106962 ) <samuel AT bcgreen DOT com> on Tuesday September 28, 2004 @01:43PM (#10376127) Homepage Journal
    After looking at one of the images [astrobio.net] It would appear that the rover is tantalizingly close to the impact site of it's heat shield. (OK: It's about another 4 months drive across the Bonniville crater).

    I'm thinking that the heatshield impact should have dug a pretty nice divot out of the ground, which might make a pretty good opportunity for examining deep layers of soil on the edge of a large impact crater.

    Possible to find all sorts if interesting things in there... almost as good as the crater itself. (presuming that the rover can get out on the other side, that is.)

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