Dunes on Ice

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Caption:

Released 14 October 2003

Dark dunes caught in a crater in the southern mid-latitudes slowly climb out. Winds push the sand to the NW (upper left), burying features on the crater wall that may be gullies. Gullies tend to be the youngest features in their environments, but this image may show an exception to the rule: the dark dunes override the gully-like features, so these features must have formed before the dark dunes encroached on them.

Image information: VIS instrument. Latitude -52.8°, Longitude 215.6° East (144.4%deg; West). 19 meter/pixel resolution.

Note: this THEMIS visual image has not been radiometrically nor geometrically calibrated for this preliminary release. An empirical correction has been performed to remove instrumental effects. A linear shift has been applied in the cross-track and down-track direction to approximate spacecraft and planetary motion. Fully calibrated and geometrically projected images will be released through the Planetary Data System in accordance with Project policies at a later time.

Background Info:

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory manages the 2001 Mars Odyssey mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C. The Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) was developed by Arizona State University, Tempe, in collaboration with Raytheon Santa Barbara Remote Sensing. The THEMIS investigation is led by Dr. Philip Christensen at Arizona State University. Lockheed Martin Astronautics, Denver, is the prime contractor for the Odyssey project, and developed and built the orbiter. Mission operations are conducted jointly from Lockheed Martin and from JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

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