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The Planetary Science Institute |
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The Planetary Science Institute |
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This Cryo-SEM image is of a hot-spring microbial mat from Orakei Korako, New Zealand. It shows a microbe in the initial stages of silicification surrounded by sugars, exopolymeric substances, and opal-A silica spheres. PSI research scientist Randall Perry works on extreme environments such as hot-spring deposits, desert rock coatings, and deep-sea vents, looking for clues to the chemical origins of life. He also works with an Oxford University research group investigating Earth's oldest evidence of life in the Warrawoona, Australia. The image was taken by Bridget Lynne of University of Auckland, NZ, who together with Randall Perry investigates worldwide hot-spring deposits.
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An artist's rendition of the Hayabusa spacecraft as it nears touchdown with asteroid 25143 Itokawa. (Image courtesy of JAXA/ISAS.)
Hayabusa, "Falcon" in Japanese, is a Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) sample-return spacecraft supported by NASA, and is scheduled to rendezvous with Itokawa this September. The spacecraft will return the first-ever sample from an asteroid to Earth in June 2007. PSI researcher Paul Abell will be part of a team working on data obtained from the spacecraft's Near-Infrared Spectrometer (NIRS) instrument, which will help investigators determine the composition of the asteroid and select possible landing sites for sample collection.
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The rolling plains of Meridiani Planum are seen here as photographed by the Opportunity Rover. On the horizon is the rim of Endurance crater, which Opportunity later reached and explored. PSI researchers have worked on various aspects of this unusual region. Melissa Lane (PSI, Tempe) helped discover the unusual deposits of hematite in the sands. Bill Hartmann (PSI, Tucson) used crater counts to indicate that the area preserves very old features, but the surface has been only recently exposed. Opportunity discovered sulfate-rich sedimentary rocks, affirming that the area is probably an ancient lakebed.
(NASA image; processing by W. K. Hartmann)
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Hellas Basin is the largest preserved impact structure on Mars. Over 2000 km in diameter and 8 km deep, the Hellas basin and its surroundings exhibit landforms shaped by a diversity of geologic processes. Ongoing Hellas region research at PSI includes numerous geologic mapping projects, investigations into the development of circum-Hellas canyon systems, degradation of highland terrains, emplacement of lava flows, evolution of lobate debris aprons, and the morphologies and populations of impact craters.
This perspective rendering of the northeast rim of Hellas basin and Hesperia
Planum is one of many new products being produced at PSI by Varun
Bhartia, an Arizona Space Grant intern from the University of Arizona. Working
with PSI researchers Les Bleamaster and David Crown, Varun is helping to
build a comprehensive collection of Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey image
products for our Geographic Information Systems layered database.
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Almost everyone has seen a rainbow, but few people are aware of the other ways in which clouds can produce colors. Most clouds consist of water droplets with a wide range of diameters, but under some circumstances, clouds can form whose water drops are all small (around 1 micron). It is these clouds which produce a colorful phenomenon known as iridescence, an example of which is shown here. PSI's Dr. David Lien has carried out a theoretical investigation of the colors and intensities of reflected sunlight produced by cloud droplets in a range of sizes. His calculations show the theoretical basis of iridescent clouds and many other cloud colors. For more about iridescent clouds, click on image.
Photo by David Lien
The surface temperature of the southern California desert can reach
120F during summer days. The top image shows temperatures of a playa at
the Zyzxx Research Station near Baker, Ca., obtained with PSI's
FLIR Systems thermal infrared camera. Relatively "cold"
objects appear dark: vegetation, the sky. Warmer objects appear bright:
the playa and gravel road. The lower image shows the visible appearance
for comparison. Dr. Karl Hibbitts, a PSI research scientist,
is using FLIR infrared imaging on playas to determine the extent that
temperature and thermal inertia indicate a wet (and therefore treacherous)
subsurface.
Measuring Hot Plains
Our Solar System is teeming with small bodies trapped in resonances with
planets. Prime examples of these resonant small bodies are the thousands of
Trojan companions of Jupiter. Trojan asteroids are locked in a 1:1 resonance
with Jupiter -- orbiting the sun with the same 12 year period as the giant
planet. A more exotic class of 1:1 resonance is the quasi-satellites. PSI's
Dr. Steve Kortenkamp has been investigating the behaviour of quasi-satellites
as shown in these animations of the orbital behaviour of a quasi-satellite
(yellow) and a planet (red). Currently only a single quasi-satellite is known
-- near-Earth object 2003 YN107 is a quasi-satellite of Earth.
For more details on these animations and a description of how quasi-satellites
might be captured as true satellites, follow
this link.
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Asteroids, like the one pictured here, cruise through the Solar System incessantly. Several hundreds of thousands have been discovered, catalogued, and named; however, millions of unknown objects are still out there waiting to be found. Asteroid hunters use a form of time-lapse photography in their quest to discover these elusive space rocks. The animation shown here is a collection of three images of the same field of view, but at different times (called a triplet). Can you spot the moving object amongst the stationary star field? With a telescope, a camera, and patience, you too could discover an asteroid. The animation here represents the inaugural presentation of 'Asteroid of the Night,' a joint educational project of the Jarnac Observatory, the Planetary Science Institute, and the Flandrau Science Center. This pilot program is an attempt to take nightly astronomical observations of asteroids directly to the public through the World Wide Web. Observational data are being made available through the generous efforts of David Levy (Jarnac Observatory and member of the PSI Board of Trustees). PSI researchers, Les Bleamaster and Carol Neese, will be involved in preparing the images and ancillary information for distribution to the Flandrau Science Center, who will incorporate these exciting views into their existing asteroid exhibit. |
| Both Earth and Mars have atmospheres that can mobilize particles to form sand dunes. This image is from the caldera of an inactive Volcano (Nili Patera) on Mars. The steep avalanche face on the downwind side of the dunes indicates wind direction (see arrow). There are several types of sand dunes in this image, some of which have not been previously recognized on Mars.
(a) Lateral dune. Despite the presence of a 100 m deep double-trough, the sand transport pathway is not significantly interrupted. The march of the dunes across the trough may be aided by the tendency for wind speed to accelerate as it meets vertical obstacles. PSI's Mary Bourke and collaborators at John Hopkins University and University of Loughborough, UK, have modeled wind as it interacts with troughs on Mars and demonstrated that, under Martian conditions, wind speeds up by 30% at the downwind trough walls. (Bourke, M.C., J. Bullard, and O. Barnouin-Jha, in press.) The Mars Orbital Camera Image is from the Malin Space Science Systems site. Image number: M17-00435, (8.99°N, 293.29°W, 5.84 m/pixel). |
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This mosaic of two MOC images (E09-02399 and E10-04497) shows the northern wall and floor of a 16.7 km diameter crater near Newton Basin in the southern hemisphere of Mars, centered at -43.5 degrees S and 161.9 degrees W. PSI's Dan Berman has been investigating the role of water and ice flow in the degradation of craters on Mars, exemplified in this image. Typical martian gullies can be seen flowing down the wall of the crater, ending in sharp, tongue-shaped ridges. These ridges may be the result of the flow of ice-rich materials on the crater floor. The feature labeled "a" is the main tongue-shaped ridge. The ridge is about half as wide as it is long, is concave, has a smooth floor, and a sharp rim. Feature "b" is a less sinuous ridge extending beyond the primary ridge, possibly the remnant of an older ridge from a flow that has since receded. The feature labeled "c" looks like a viscous flow feature extending directly into the floor from a tongue ridge or a region of tongue ridges. Mosaic by Dan Berman. MOC images credit NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems. |
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PSI Tucson has a new home. After over ten years at our North 6th Avenue location, an historic two-story residential building near downtown Tucson, we finally outgrew our space and had to move. The new building, about three miles from the old location, has a more commercial feeling to it, without the charm and funkiness of the old place, but it's quickly taking on the lived-in atmosphere of a busy research institute. The additional space, including expanded meeting and conference space, has allowed the development of the new PSI Mars Lab, an expanded Seminar Series, and the addition of new research staff and programs. Photo by W.K. Hartmann |
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This false color, three-dimensional perspective view over the Turan Planum of Venus comes from the ongoing research of PSI's Les Bleamaster on the interaction of tectonic structures and volcanic processes along chasmata or "rifts." The image, made by draping a Magellan synthetic aperture radar (SAR) mosaic over Magellan altimetry data, shows relatively flat volcanic fields that lie centrally along an elongate topographic trough, the Vir-Ava Chasma. Many of the linear features running from the bottom to the top of the image are faults and fractures. Detailed geologic and structural mapping has determined that the structural development along the Vir-Ava Chasma and the volcanic activity in Turan Planum are intimately related and may be responsible for significant transport of material and heat to the surface of Venus. If Venus is still active today, chasmata most likely represent the hotbed of geologic activity. The Vir-Ava Chasma, interpreted as an intrusive complex similar to those observed in Hawaii, Iceland, and Africa, holds important keys to unraveling the elusive secrets of Venus' thermal and geologic histories. Foreground is approximately 400 km, with a vertical exaggeration of 8x. |
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Image © Gil Esquerdo and the RCT Consortium
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Click on the image to see the corresponding image depicting the different materials used in the model.
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Click on the map to view a larger version, along with a photomosaic of Viking Orbiter images (from USGS Mars Transverse Mercator quadrangles -20272 and -25272) of the same area shown in the map.
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Photo by NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems.
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