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NASA / JPL-Caltech / Ken Kremer / Marco Di Lorenzo
A photographic mosaic shows the Curiosity rover's surroundings at a Martian location known as Yellowknife Bay. This view has been assembled from black-and-white images captured by the rover's navigation camera on Sol 132 (Dec. 19). Gaps in imagery of the Martian sky have been filled in, and the whole scene has been colorized. Click here or on the image to see the complete 360-degree panorama.
The cameras on NASA's Curiosity rover have been clicking away over the holidays — gathering enough pictures for a 360-degree panorama of its rocky surroundings at Yellowknife Bay, plus a close-up view showing a "Martian flower" seemingly sprouting from the surface.
The panorama was assembled from pictures snapped by the rover's navigation camera system on the 132nd Martian day of Curiosity's mission on the Red Planet, also known as Sol 132 or Dec. 19.
In this case, the folks doing the assembling are Ken Kremer, a New Jersey-based journalist, research chemist and photographer; and Marco Di Lorenzo, a physicist who's a high-school educator and photographer in Italy. They stitched together the black-and-white images, filled in the gaps in the Martian sky and colorized the scene to reflect what an observer on Mars might see.
We've featured the efforts of Kremer and Di Lorenzo several times before: They're part of an active online community that makes use of the raw images provided by Curiosity and other Mars probes, and then shares them via websites such as UnmannedSpaceflight.com. Even now, the folks at UnmannedSpaceflight are posting plenty of amazing pictures from Yellowknife Bay, including a must-see, zoomable GigaPan version.
Another picture from Sol 132 has stirred up some buzz at the Above Top Secret discussion forum. The picture focuses in on a bright, crumpled object that's sitting on a Martian outcrop, as seen by the rover's Mars Hand Lens Imager, or MAHLI. The translucent shape is reminiscent of a flower's pistils, which led one of the forum's members to call it a "Martian flower."
NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS
An anomalous bit of bright material can be seen left of center in this view captured by Curiosity's Mars Hand Lens Imager on Sol 132 of the mission (Dec. 19).
Update for 8:30 p.m. ET: I initially suspected that the flower was a tiny shred of plastic from the rover itself. Such a shred popped up in October. At that time, experts at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory surmised that the plastic may have been a bit of wrapping that was knocked loose from the Mars Science Laboratory's descent stage during the spacecraft's August landing. The plastic was thought to have fallen on top of the rover, and then dropped to the ground weeks later.
That's what led me to go with the plastic-scrap hypothesis. However, some of the folks commenting on the pictures noted that the object seemed to be embedded in the rock — which would argue against my hypothesis. So I put in an inquiry with Guy Webster, who serves as JPL's main spokesman for NASA's Mars missions.
A couple of hours later, Webster emailed me the verdict: "That appears to be part of the rock, not debris from the spacecraft."
Mystery solved? It's certainly an intriguing bit of mineral that stands out prominently in the MAHLI picture. If I find out anything more, I'll be sure to pass it along. And if it turns out that flowers are really sprouting up on Mars, you'll know it's time to cue up the "X-Files" theme. Either way, the truth is out there.
The Curiosity rover has released more images of Mars, including a self-portrait created with more than 50 images. NBC's Kate Snow has more.
More pictures from Kremer and Di Lorenzo:
- Scenes from Mars' 'Promised Land'
- Rover checks out its belly on Mars
- Curiosity adds color to Martian peak
- Mars rover points to its destination
- Still more from KenKremer.com
More about Martian anomalies:
- Opportunity's rover rotini
- Spirit's 'Mermaid on Mars'
- Opportunity's bunny ears
- Phoenix's Martian spring
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. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Trace the Curiosity rover's journey to Mars and see the pictures that the six-wheeled robot has sent back from the Red Planet.
Leave a Comment:
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The surface of Mars looks like a mixed bag of aggregate and mineral ?
The Martians are not going to take kindly to some alien machine trampling through their flower beds!! I'm glad NASA in their infinite wisdom stamped "Made in Pakistan" on the frame of that rover!!
It's George Bush's fault that is on Mars!
and Obama has just anounced a 10 trillion dollar tax hike to for the environment on mars, to protect that flower.
I would hope the "flower" could be sampled and its nature revealed using the on board lab.
I am also glad to be able to make comments on your site other than with "Facebook". Don't like it, probably never will.
Yeah great call a shiny rock a flower on Mars, NBC. So now half the idiots who only read the headline - read that 75% of all people who visit NBC.com will run around telling the world there are flowers on Mars. Why do you think test scores are so low. Education remember?
75% who get their news from nbc and not a respected media outlet can barely read anyway.
Just another anomaly amongst hundreds identified in past rover photos. Dozens of obvious artificial artifacts along with forests of vegetation and lakes filled with water are among the pics taken but have we heard any NASA comments? They're slowly breaking it to us that Mars is FILLED with life so as not to throw our global society into chaos.
Hey, we can handle it!
Yeah you can see in that photo in the upper right hand corner just a piece of the FTD Florist sign..
"Curiosity rover studies rocks and a 'flower' on Mars"
Really Alan.......What are you, desperate for attention?
Just trying to have a little fun with it ... and besides, "'flower' on Mars" takes up less space in a headline than "strange little white bit on Mars."
Looks too me like polished tops on these rocks. Many others that surround the subject show that look, but just barely.
Possibly polished by high velocity wind and fine dust perhaps caused by an asteroid or meteor impact.
Making something out of nothing. Oh yeah, Thats the fundamentals of science!
no bucks, no buck rogers
Say, that might be corn growing.
If you look to the left there is another one curled towards it as if they are ribs of something that died in the desert......Left overs from a Martian rib roast?
Or are you guys just ribbing us?
it looks like a cry for media attention and funding. lol
NASA could pay for all new exploration by usng drone planes or a ballon system to fly over the Valles Marineris.
Would anyone not pay a bonus to see what manner of goodies may be sitting on the bottom of that "Grand Canyon"? There we may find the liquid water we seek and perhaps even life itself.
if liquid water existed at 300 below zero, and the lack of an atmosphere made it impossible to not imediately, dehydrate youd be correct.
They are located at 4 o clock on the right and 11 o clock on the left about two inches apart on my screen
and i have trouble growing flowers in ideal conditions. those martians can grow them at 300 below zero with no water. lol
The author should send something like that to his wife on Valentine Day. Tell her it's a flower. See how that works out for him.
maybe he'd be delighted....
I would love to have a little pearl-colored piece of Mars for Valentine's Day, and I think my wife would, too. But she'd probably want something bigger than the tiny bit in this picture.
could be the bracelet worn by Ming's daughter
Simply amazing the variety of comments one finds here! Mars is a dead rock, period! Not much more than a large asteroid caught between Earth and Jupitor. sort of like a moon with a pathetic atmosphere. But it does present a target for your kind to practice on until they stumble across gravity drive and stop burning everything in sight to release energy. How many of you can conceive the idea that the speed of light can be exceeded? Do any of you really appreciate the beautiful planet you have the great fortune to inhabit? Or the fact that others would lke very much to occupy the space you immature and barbaric peoples infest like so many ants?How many of you realize how living on a "spaceship" for uncountable generations would affect your body? Breathing scarcified air, low light conditions, crowded spaces, drinking the same water over and over, and eating a very simple variety of food nourishment while seeing and hearing the garbage you spew out into space as well as the wonderful bounty you have somehow survived to enjoy? And yet you dwell on your childish squabbles and cannot seem to mature! What you call"mankind" certainly has a long way to go! It simply amazes me that you have achieved such as you have.
*yawns*
Were you exiled from your planet for being too preachy?
some sanity please
best post ever, lmao
Martian Booger!!!
I wonder if Phil Platt will give me my money now for future projecting him to the discovery of alien life....I already future projected us to capping the oil leak in the gulf, and getting Bin Laden ....I'm 3 for 3 and he still doesn't believe.......at 66 I don't want to keep future projecting just to prove my point....I might future project beyond my statute of limitations.....
It's a plastic "action figure" of Marvin the Martian.
Made in China, of course.
Remember the scene in the movie "there's something about mary" when he blows his wad?
And there it is....
Plastic man's ribs