Arsia Mons by Visible Light

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Caption:

Last week we looked at Arsia Mons lava flows in the nighttime IR. Today's image looks at the same flows at visible wavelengths. This image illustrates the very rough surface texture of young flows, the overlapping nature of lava flows, and how the margins of overlapping flows trap windblown sand and dust. Note the subdued texture of the flow at the top of the image; not only does this flow contain more dust than the younger flow, but it also contains more impact craters.

Image information: VIS instrument. Latitude -2.4°, Longitude 221.8° East (138.2%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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