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NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS / Ken Kremer / Marco Di Lorenzo
A mosaic of photos taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager on NASA's Curiosity rover shows the underside of the rover and its six wheels, with Martian terrain stretching back to the horizon. The four circular features on the front edge of the rover are the lenses for the left and right sets of Curiosity's hazard avoidance cameras, or Hazcams. Because of the different perspectives used for different images, some of the borders of the photos don't line up precisely.
More than a month after landing, NASA's Curiosity rover is finally ready for its close-ups, and they're coming in bunches: After taking its own profile picture, the six-wheeled robot has snapped a series of images that show its flat-as-a-board belly.
Today's flood of photographs comes courtesy of the Mars Hand Lens Imager, or MAHLI, one of Curiosity's 17 cameras. The self-focusing, 1.5-inch-wide (4-centimeter-wide) camera is mounted on the end of Curiosity's robotic arm, and is designed to take up-close pictures of rocks and soil on Mars. It serves a purpose similar to that of a geologist's hand lens — hence its name.
MAHLI is undergoing a series of checkouts now that the 7-foot-long (2.1-meter-long) robotic arm has been limbered up. The rover is making its way to its first major destination: a geologically intriguing spot called Glenelg, which is about a quarter-mile (400 meters) from the spot in Gale Crater where Curiosity landed on Aug. 5.
The rover's $2.5 billion primary mission is aimed at determining whether Mars ever had the chemical constituents to support life. Glenelg will serve as a good warmup for the centerpiece of Curiosity's two-year trek: a climb up the slopes of a 3-mile-high mountain called Aeolis Mons or Mount Sharp.
So far, all of Curiosity's instruments appear to be in great shape — with the exception of a wind-speed sensor that was apparently taken out of commission by a hail of pebbles kicked up during the rover's descent. Curiosity's handlers had worried that the pebbles might have damaged the MAHLI camera as well. Fortunately, the pictures taken over the past few days prove that MAHLI (pronounced like "Molly") is in great shape.
This mosaic of Curiosity's trim underside was put together by Ken Kremer, a New Jersey-based journalist, research chemist and photographer; and Marco Di Lorenzo, a physicist who is a high school educator and photographer in Italy. Kremer and Di Lorenzo are among the habitues of UnmannedSpaceflight.com, where image-processing gurus are having a field day with the MAHLI pictures. NASA's website for the Curiosity mission is also mad about MAHLI today. Check out these MAHLI masterpieces, plus a bonus panorama from Ken Kremer and a video from NBC Nightly News:
NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS
This picture shows just how much detail the MAHLI camera can pick up. It shows a one-cent coin and a few of the symbols printed on a calibration target mounted on Curiosity. The image was acquired from a distance of 2 inches (5 centimeters). The coin is a 1909 penny provided by MAHLI principal investigator Ken Edgett. "Everyone in the United States can recognize the penny and immediately know how big it is, and can compare that with the rover hardware and Mars materials in the same image," Edgett explained. "The public can watch for changes in the penny over the long term on Mars. Will it change color? Will it corrode? Will it get pitted by windblown sand?" Flecks of reddish Martian sand can already be seen on and around the penny. One of the images printed above the penny is a cartoon character called "Joe the Martian."
NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS
This image, captured by Curiosity's MAHLI camera over the weekend, shows a patch of ground measuring about 34 inches (86 centimeters) across. The size of the largest pebble, near the bottom of the image, is about 3 inches (8 centimeters).
NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS
A combination of images from the MAHLI camera provides a close look at the Curiosity rover's wheels, right down to the dirt stuck in the treads.
NASA / JPL-Caltech / Ken Kremer / Marco Di Lorenzo
Ken Kremer and Marco Di Lorenzo produced this "colorized" version of a panorama looking back at the Curiosity rover's tracks on Sol 24 of its mission (Aug. 30). The panorama is based on black-and-white imagery from Curiosity's Navcam system. Missing patches of the Martian sky have been filled in. The lower reaches of Mount Sharp can be seen at the picture's left edge, and the rise of Gale Crater's rim stretches across the rest of the horizon.
NASA's Curiosity rover took a self-portrait on Mars, using a camera mounted on its robotic arm. NBC's Brian Williams reports.
Update for 9:05 p.m. ET: Kremer points out that the pictures of Curiosity's underbelly are far sharper than similar underbelly images that were captured by the Spirit rover in 2009, when mission managers worried that it was hung up on a rock. He said the difference illustrates the "quantum leap" in capability between the Spirit and Opportunity rovers, which were launched in 2003, and the Curiosity rover, which was sent toward Mars last year.
More vistas from Mars:
- Curiosity snaps its own profile picture
- Mars rover's tracks traced from orbit
- Curiosity looks back at its first tracks
- Rover's first moves at Bradbury Landing
- Martian peak picks up some extra color
- Curiosity rover points to its target peak
- Cosmic Log archive for the Mars mission
Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space, sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
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Tune in next week when they will show some more pics of more rocks and gravel (like there's anything else )
R2D2 and 3CPO in the background if you look really close.
It would have been really funny if some wag over at Nasa put " truck balls" on the rover,lol
yeaaah...no
Those are amazing pictures. The resolution is stunning.
Interesting thing to me was the apparent assymetry of the wheels' tread surface of the rover. That is totally out of left field to me. Instead of relatively uniform shape of the wheels tread surface, part of it is completely different from the other part.
My guess is that it is a design that was created out of the efforts of digging out sand or other such hazards over short distances. But from the pictures it looks like that tread area could easily become clogged with rocks and debris and upset the wheel balance.
But that design for a wheel is something that is completely radical. Wheel treads for thousands of years have been designed with the idea that it is supposed to be symmetrical. So it should be interesting on how well they work.
I read somewhere that the tread pattern is suppose to spell out something on the marsian surface, which is also suppose to help them determine the slip rate as they drive.
Yes, you are right, I watched the video in the article and it's supposed to type out a message on the surface of Mars. Probably viewable by orbiting satellite that can prove the rover was there.
I just hope that wasn't the only motivation for that design. The most important thing is that it works. Very radical design and it took me by complete surprise.
Spotted two interesting rocks in the close up of the surface. One toward the top right of the 3" rock referenced in the caption, it appears to have a crystalline depression in its middle. The 2nd is near the center of the image, I zoom in on it and it appears to have a green growth on it with details projecting up from the surface of the rock it is on (the shadow shows it projects upward for about 1" but shows no supporting rock under it). It might be some kind of crystal or even a liken like lifeform. Might be worth NASAs time to look at them with the laser and other instruments.
Do you have a link to these higher res pictures? Or are you just blowing up the articles' version? I am not seeing this detail that you are.
But like you, I am also excited to really start looking around instead of staring at the rovers underside. Is that a "Crotch cam" or an "ass cam"? Anyway we all know how that looks, lets start looking at MARS! :)
I did a ctrl + a number of times which zooms in on the screen. But since seeing these photos I came across a JPL website that has untouched copies of the photos.
Holy COW !!! The level of detail on these and I'm sure other Mars Curiosity Photos. This just shows How the digital age really has transformed the way we SEE, HEAR, and GOD knows how many other developments!
It is truly SPECTACULAR!!!
Holy COW !!! The level of detail on these and I'm sure other Mars Curiosity Photos. This just shows How the digital age really has transformed the way we SEE, HEAR, and GOD knows how many other developments!
It is truly SPECTACULAR!!!
I agree, the resolution is amazing, but I'm still skeptical of the bandwidth. Anyway, just hit "reload page" or "refresh page" in between posts and you won't have repeat posts.
I Marvin The Martian am getting damn tired of you Earthlings roving around our planet. I will just do some checking myself on the Planet Earth then you'll see!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cwxc_zLH560
Every single Mars rover story on NBC News refers to it as a "2.5 billion dollar mission". Why don't they put the price-tag on every war report too?
damn staight on that, probably the editor doing it....
Sooooo it's taking pics of its privates on Mars for the name of science? That's what this ^^^ 2.5 Billion $ ^^^ mission is for?
In the first picture and the fourth picture, on the right side just over the wheels, is it just me or does that look like some sort of culvert with water? I'm not saying it is, I'm saying it looks like it. It appears to be a channel created by some sort of runoff. It could be just a dark rock strata that got exposed, but what exposed it.
Maybe Curiosity should take a hard left and go check it out. :-)
it's 2:58 pm on 9/11/12 and i want to know...why does the pronunciation for "MAHLI" come halfway through the article, after the term "MAHLI" was used a three previous times? It should come after the first use....
other than that, this is an exciting adventure for NASA and the human race to see what our closest neighbor on the way out of our solar system has to offer to our intriguing minds.
I recall from my coin-collecting days that a 1909 penny in that excellent a condition is worth a heck of a lot more than one cent. It's too late now, but he'd have done well to keep that penny right here on Earth and sent one to Mars that had an actual worth of a penny!
It's interesting that a lot of posters have fixated on the value of the penny or the year chosen.
To me, it's a trivial aspect of the mission and a choice of a rare penny with real value is more appropriate than one of the new pennies that are not even copper anymore and up for elimination from the economy all together.
But to me, this 1909 penny is a great choice and I think it was donated by one of the team members, so it's not like NASA was fleeced like they are with many other projects from 3rd party contractors.
We humans just have to humanize everything, don't we. Silly, maybe, but I'm loving watching this "little" guy roam around, doing his thing on Mars even if it's just him checking himself out. Absolutely amazing that we can do this! Since living near Vandenberg in the 60's till now I've not missed seeing whatever I could on tv and/or computer of every space adventure this country has been on. One of the things I hate most about getting old (I'm 70) is missing out on all that the future has to hold, that is if we dumb humans don't kill off each other and our planet.