PIA05490: Bird's Eye View of Mars


Bird’s Eye View of Mars

Caption:

This artist's concept shows NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission over the red planet.

NASA launched this multipurpose spacecraft to advance our understanding of Mars through detailed observation, to examine potential landing sites for future surface missions and to provide a high-data-rate communications relay for those missions.

The orbiter's shallow radar experiment, one of six science instruments on board, is designed to probe the internal structure of Mars' polar ice caps, as well as to gather information planet-wide about underground layers of ice, rock and, perhaps, liquid water, which might be accessible from the surface.

Cataloging Keywords:

Name Value Additional Values
Target Mars
System
Target Type Planet
Mission Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO)
Instrument Host Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
Host Type Orbiter
Instrument
Detector
Extra Keywords Artwork, Color, Radar, Water
Acquisition Date
Release Date 2004-03-03
Date in Caption
Image Credit NASA/JPL
Source photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05490
Identifier PIA05490