Opportunity Sees Cobbles Between The Ripples

MARSDAILY

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell

by Staff Writers
Pasadena CA (SPX) May 21, 2006
As Opportunity continues to traverse from Erebus Crater toward Victoria Crater, NASA's rover is navigating along exposures of bedrock between large, wind-blown ripples.

Along the way, mission scientists at Jet Propulsion Laboratory have been studying fields of cobbles that sometimes appear on trough floors between ripples.

The scientists also have been studying banding patterns in large ripples. This image, obtained by Opportunity's panoramic camera on April 27, on the rover's 802nd Martian day, or sol, shows a field of cobbles nestled among wind-driven ripples that are about 20 centimeters (eight inches) high.

The origin of cobble fields like this one is unknown. The cobbles may be a lag of coarser material left behind from one or more soil deposits whose finer particles have blown away.

The cobbles may be eroded fragments of meteoritic material, secondary ejecta of Mars rock thrown here from craters elsewhere on the surface, weathering remnants of locally-derived bedrock, or a mixture of these. Scientists will use the panoramic camera's multiple filters to study the rock types, variability and origins of the cobbles.

The image is a false-color rendering that combines separate components taken through the panoramic camera's 753-nanometer, 535-nanometer and 432-nanometer filters. The false color is used to enhance differences between types of materials in the rocks and soil.

MARSDAILY

Opportunity Presses On Toward Victoria

Pasadena CA (SPX) May 18, 2006
NASA's Opportunity rover has driven about 200 more meters (656 feet) to put itself within about 1,100 meters (two-thirds of a mile) of Victoria Crater, its next destination on the Meridiani Planum. As of Martian sol 822, or 732 sols past its expected operational lifetime, the rover still has shown no major mechanical or technical difficulties.

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