GOLDEN, Colorado — NASA's Opportunity Mars rover is getting an eyeful, wheeling itself ever closer
to a cliff wall that's part of the huge Victoria Crater. A camera campaign is
underway, with early imagery producing anticipation within the rover science team
back on Earth.
"When
this stuff is all done and put together it's going to be amazing," said
Steve Squyres, lead Mars Exploration Rover scientist from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
Opportunity
is about 20 to 23 feet (6 or 7 meters) back from the cliff face that's part of
"Cape Verde." From there, the rover will collect high-resolution,
panoramic images of rock layers in the promontory, taking a spectacular
panorama of the scene using the robot's PanCam camera system.
Looking
up at Mars
"Doing
this presents some interesting new challenges," Squyres explained.
"It's the first time we've ever looked 'up' at Mars like this."
And what is
exciting the rover science team?
"We've
identified some particularly interesting-looking targets in the cliff wall ...
things that show sedimentary structures and textures that might be particularly
revealing geologically. We're taking some 'super resolution' images of those
today," Squyres told SPACE.com in a June 27 e-mail.
Once all
that is done, the robot will be commanded to try and get even closer to the
cliff — both to improve the resolution of images taken and to get the
instruments on the rover's robotic arm onto bedrock.
Steep
terrain
"Whether
we'll be able to accomplish this or not, though, we don't know," Squyres
added. "The terrain here is very steep, and we obviously don't want to
venture so close to the cliff that we're in its shadow. So we'll see."
Both Opportunity and its twin, Spirit, have been on Mars since January 2004. "This is one
of the most challenging things we've ever tried with either rover,"
Squyres said.
Opportunity reached the rim of Victoria
Crater in Mars' Meridiani Planum region back in September 2007. It was a
lengthy drive to the impact crater from the rover's landing locale in January
2004, roughly 3 miles (5 kilometers) away.
The rim of
the crater is composed of alternating promontories, rocky points towering
approximately 230 feet (70 meters) above the crater floor, and recessed
alcoves.
The crater
itself is big, some 2,428 feet (740 meters) in diameter — about three-quarters
the size of Meteor Crater in Arizona.
History
written in stone
"We
continue to get tremendous results from Opportunity," noted William
Farrand, a research scientist at the Space Science Institute in neighboring Boulder, Colorado and a member of the Mars Exploration Rover science team.
"We
have seen some very interesting sedimentary structures. Hopefully, from this
closer position, we will be able to get some added detail on those
structures," Farrand told SPACE.com.
Farrand
said Opportunity's can read the writing on the cliff wall. That is, "a
rich geological record written in stone."
Meanwhile,
at another area on Mars within Gusev Crater, sister ship Spirit
is parked and hunkered down to conserve energy. The Martian winter solstice was
on June 25, a time when the Sun is as low in the sky as it ever gets.
"For
the time being, Spirit is basically just hanging out, charging the
batteries," noted a recent update on the rover's health from Jet
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
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