Tag: Argyre Basin

Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped to post here, was taken on November 30, 2022 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

The section cropped shows only a small portion of the endless ripple dunes seen in this area. The color strip provides us some interesting other details as well as mysteries. The orange indicates dust on the ridges as well as the higher terrain near the center of the picture. The green in the hollows as well as to the east and west suggests coarser materials that have settled in lower elevations. This supposition is reinforced by the orange area near the bottom of the picture where the ripples have mostly dissipated. This is a high spot, and we appear to be looking at a dusty surface. (This impression is clearer in the full image.)

The latitude is high, 48 degrees south, but as far as I know orbital images have not found a lot of ice evidence in this part of Mars.
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Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on January 1, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to fill a gap in its shooting schedule so that the scientists could maintain the camera at its proper temperature.

In other words, the picture was not taken as part of any particular research project. Its target was in a sense chosen almost at random, though the science team always tries to find something of interest in such situations. In this case I think they succeeded, as these soft terraced buttes illustrate well the alien nature of Mars. The ground is barren, with absolutely no evidence of any life, and it appears that the buttes have been softened and eroded by eons of wind action. You can see evidence of this by the handful of dust devil tracks that cross the buttes.

There is more.
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