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Artist's concept of Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter near Mars.

Artist's concept of Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter near Mars.

July 14, 2009

Artist's concept of Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter near Mars.

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NASA/JPL-Caltech

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This scene shows dark sand dunes marching over the ridges created by an alluvial (water-deposited) fan in an impact crater.
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This scene shows dark sand dunes marching over the ridges created by an alluvial (water-deposited) fan in an impact crater.
Dunes on Ridges
This map shows the route driven by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity through the 43rd Martian day, or sol, of the rover's mission on Mars (Sept. 19, 2012).
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This map shows the route driven by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity through the 43rd Martian day, or sol, of the rover's mission on Mars (Sept. 19, 2012).
Curiosity Traverse Map Through Sol 43
The rock layers in this image were likely horizontal when the materials were first deposited, but are now tilted to high angles, approaching 90 degrees.
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The rock layers in this image were likely horizontal when the materials were first deposited, but are now tilted to high angles, approaching 90 degrees.
Faulted Layered Bedrock in Noctis Labyrinthus
This map of an area within the Arabia Terra region on Mars shows where hydrologic modeling predicts locations of depressions that would have been lakes (black), overlaid with a map of the preserved...
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This map of an area within the Arabia Terra region on Mars shows where hydrologic modeling predicts locations of depressions that would have been lakes (black), overlaid with a map of the preserved valleys (blue lines, with width exaggerated for recognition) that would have been streams.
Hydrologic Modeling of Relatively Recent Martian Streams and Lakes
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project Manager Jim Graf shakes the hand of Andrew Dantzler, Director of NASA's Solar System Division, after a successful orbit insertion on March 10, 2006. Fuk Li, Dire...
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Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mission Team Members Celebrate Orbit Insertion Success
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mission Team Members Celebrate Orbit Insertion Success
Impact cratering and erosion combine to reveal the composition of the Martian underground by exposing materials from the subsurface.
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Impact cratering and erosion combine to reveal the composition of the Martian underground by exposing materials from the subsurface.
Clay Minerals in Craters and Escarpments on Mars (Figure 1)
This field of dunes lies on the floor of an old crater in Noachis Terra, one of the oldest places on Mars.
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This field of dunes lies on the floor of an old crater in Noachis Terra, one of the oldest places on Mars.
Colorful Dunes
The new global mosaic, shown in a detail example at left, is stitched together from images taken by MRO’s Context Camera, which captures the Martian surface in long strips. The process is revealed ...
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The new global mosaic, shown in a detail example at left, is stitched together from images taken by MRO’s Context Camera, which captures the Martian surface in long strips.
How the Mosaic Combines CTX Images
This graphic depicts the relative shapes and distances from Mars for five active orbiter missions plus the planet's two natural satellites. It illustrates the potential for intersections of the spa...
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This graphic depicts the relative shapes and distances from Mars for five active orbiter missions plus the planet's two natural satellites. It illustrates the potential for intersections of the spacecraft orbits.
Diverse Orbits Around Mars
This image acquired on December 9, 2018 by NASAs Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows Athabasca Valles with lava flows originating from Elysium Mons to the northwest.
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This image acquired on December 9, 2018 by NASAs Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows Athabasca Valles with lava flows originating from Elysium Mons to the northwest.
Almost Like Water
This sequence of three HiRISE images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows the growth of a branching network of troughs carved by thawing carbon dioxide over the span of three Martian years...
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This sequence of three HiRISE images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows the growth of a branching network of troughs carved by thawing carbon dioxide over the span of three Martian years. This process may also form larger radially patterned channel features known as Martian "spiders."
'Baby Spider': Growth of a Martian Trough Network
Aram Chaos is a heavily eroded impact crater that contains jumbled blocks of material disrupted when large quantities of ice or water were catastrophically removed. The light toned sediments may ha...
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Aram Chaos is a heavily eroded impact crater that contains jumbled blocks of material disrupted when large quantities of ice or water were catastrophically removed.
Aram Chaos (3-D)
This HiRISE image covers the southwest portion of the terraces and floor of Holden Crater situated in southwest Margaritifer Terra.
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This HiRISE image covers the southwest portion of the terraces and floor of Holden Crater situated in southwest Margaritifer Terra. The HiRISE sub-frame shows the most clearly-evident image of a megabreccia on Mars. Breccia is a rock typically consisting of rock fragments of various sizes and shapes that have been broken, tumbled and cemented together in sudden geologic event (e.g., a landslide, a flashflood or even an impact-cratering event). If it were not for the dark sandy dunes dispersed through out the sub-image, this image could easily fool an expert into thinking that this image is actually a photograph of a hand sample of an impact breccia. The prefix "mega" implies that the breccia in the sub-image consists of clasts, or rock fragments, that are typically larger than a large house or a building. The rectangular megaclast near the center of the image is a colossal 50 x 25 meters (~150 X 75 feet). As mentioned in the transition image caption for Holden crater (TRA_000861_1530), the crater likely experienced extensive modification by running water, which is supported by observations of drainage and deposition into the crater from a large channel (Uzboi Valles) breaching Holden's southwest rim. While it is possible that the megabreccia formed from a catastrophic release of water into the crater, a more likely possibility is that it formed from the impact that created the approx. 150 km-in-diameter Holden crater. Popigai Crater, a terrestrial crater of half the size of Holden, possesses a similar occurrence of megabreccia with a similar range in megaclast size to the Holden crater example. An impact-generated megabreccia deposit, as observed in terrestrial craters, typically lies beneath the crater floor, so the exhumation of the megabreccia may be the result of down-cutting and erosion of water that once flowed through Uzboi Valles.
Holden Crater Megabreccia: A Telltale Sign of a Sudden and Violent Event
HiRISE captured this image of an eroded mesa made famous by its similarity to a human face in a Viking Orbiter image with much lower spatial resolution and a different lighting geometry.
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HiRISE captured this image of an eroded mesa made famous by its similarity to a human face in a Viking Orbiter image with much lower spatial resolution and a different lighting geometry.
Popular Landform in Cydonia Region
The linearity of the volcanic vent shown in this HiRISE image, in conjunction with evidence of lava flow from the vent, suggests control by combined volcano-tectonic processes.
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The linearity of the volcanic vent shown in this HiRISE image, in conjunction with evidence of lava flow from the vent, suggests control by combined volcano-tectonic processes.
Fissure near Cerberus Fossae with Tectonic Morphologies
This inner slope of a Martian crater has several of the seasonal dark streaks called "recurrent slope lineae," or RSL, that a November 2017 report interprets as granular flows, rather than darkenin...
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Seasonal Dark Streaks in Tivat Crater, Mars
Seasonal Dark Streaks in Tivat Crater, Mars
Artist’s concept of Comet Siding Spring approaching Mars, shown with NASA’s orbiters preparing to make science observations of this unique encounter.
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Artist's concept of Comet Siding Spring approaching Mars, shown with NASA's orbiters preparing to make science observations of this unique encounter.
NASA's Mars Orbiters Maneuvers as Comet Siding Spring Approaching Mars
Mesas in Aureum Chaos
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Mesas in Aureum Chaos
Mesas in Aureum Chaos
Shown here is a stereo pair of a well-preserved impact crater about 6 or 7 kilometers wide from rim to rim.
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Shown here is a stereo pair (see the anaglyph) of a well-preserved impact crater
Another Well-Preserved Impact Crater (3-D)
Images of locations in Gale Crater taken from orbit around Mars reveal evidence of erosion in recent geological times and development of small scarps, or vertical surfaces.
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Images of locations in Gale Crater taken from orbit around Mars reveal evidence of erosion in recent geological times and development of small scarps, or vertical surfaces.
Erosion Patterns May Guide Mars Rover to Rocks Recently Exposed
A radar on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has detected widespread deposits of glacial ice in the mid-latitudes of Mars.
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Glacial Ice Deposits in Mid-Latitudes of Mars
Glacial Ice Deposits in Mid-Latitudes of Mars
A Martian dust devil roughly 12 miles (20 kilometers) high was captured winding its way along the Amazonis Planitia region of Northern Mars on March 14, 2012 by the High Resolution Imaging Science ...
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A Martian dust devil roughly 12 miles (20 kilometers) high was captured winding its way along the Amazonis Planitia region of Northern Mars on March 14, 2012 by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Mars' Whirling Dust Devil
A digital terrain model generated from a stereo pair of images provides this synthesized, oblique view of a portion of the wall terraces of Mojave Crater in the Xanthe Terra region of Mars.
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A digital terrain model generated from a stereo pair of images provides this synthesized, oblique view of a portion of the wall terraces of Mojave Crater in the Xanthe Terra region of Mars.
Terrain Model of Mars' Mojave Crater
Researchers have found deposits of impact glass preserved in Martian craters, including Alga Crater, shown here.
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Colorful image showing impact glass distribution on a Martian crater. These glass deposits are scattered with areas of green showing more glass versus other areas in blue.
Spectral Signals Indicating Impact Glass on Mars
This Mars map shows variations in thickness of the planet's crust, the relatively thin surface layer overlying the mantle of the planet. It shows unprecedented detail derived from new mapping of va...
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This Mars map shows variations in thickness of the planet's crust, the relatively thin surface layer overlying the mantle of the planet. It shows unprecedented detail derived from new mapping of variations in Mars' gravitational pull on orbiters.
Newly Detailed Map of Mars' Crustal Thickness

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