NASA MARS RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER (2005-2015)
Ascraeus mons (18, 225m / 18, 1 kms- 50, 793 ft / 11, 1mi)
Planet Mars
1. In Ascraeus mons, HiRISE camera ,Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO); November 2010
2. In Colorized MOLA topography of Ascraeus Mons, 2006
The mountain
Ascraeus mons (18, 225m / 18kms- 50, 793 ft / 11, 1mi) is a large shield volcano located in the Tharsis region of the planet Mars. It is the northernmost and tallest of three shield volcanoes collectively known as the Tharsis Montes. The volcano's location corresponds to the classical albedo feature Ascraeus Lacus.
Ascraeus Mons was discovered by the Mariner 9 spacecraft in 1971. The volcano was originally called North Spot because it was the northernmost of only four spots visible on the surface due to a global dust storm that was then enshrouding the planet. As the dust cleared, the spots were revealed to be extremely tall volcanoes whose summits had projected above the dust-laden, lower atmosphere.
The volcano is located in the southeast-central portion of the Tharsis quadrangle at 11.8°N, 255.5°E in Mars' western hemisphere. Ascraeus Mons is roughly 480 km in diameter and is the second highest mountain on Mars, with a summit elevation of 18.1 km ! The volcano has a very low profile with an average flank slope of 7°. Slopes are steepest in the middle portion of the flanks, flattening out toward the base and near the top where a broad summit plateau and caldera (collapse crater) complex are located.
Volcanic vents, located on the northeastern and southwestern edges of the volcano, are sources for broad lava aprons, or fans, that bury nearby portions of the volcano and extend over 100 km out into the surrounding plains. The southwest-northeast orientation of the aprons matches the orientation of the Tharsis Montes, suggesting that a major fissure or rift in the Martian crust is responsible for the orientation of both the aprons and the Tharsis Montes chain. The presence of the lava aprons causes some disagreement in the actual dimensions of the volcano.
Like most of the Tharsis region, Ascraeus Mons has a high albedo (reflectivity) and low thermal inertia, indicating that the volcano and surrounding areas are covered with large amounts of fine dust. The dust forms a mantle over the surface that obscures or mutes much of the fine-scale topography and geology of the region. Tharsis is probably dusty because of its high elevations. The atmospheric density is too low to mobilize and remove dust once it is deposited.
Ascraeus Mons is surrounded by lava flow plains that are mid to late Amazonian in age. The elevation of the plains averages about 3 km above datum (Martian "sea" level), giving the volcano an average vertical relief of 15 km. However, the elevation of the plains varies considerably. The plains northwest of the volcano are less than 2 km in elevation. The plains are highest (>3 km) southeast of the volcano.
The lava plains northwest of Ascraeus Mons are notable for having two dark collapse pits photographed by the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) in November 2010 (image above) . The pits resemble those imaged around Arsia Mons by the Mars Odyssey spacecraft. The two pits measure about 180 and 310 m wide, and the larger pit is approximately 180 meters deep. The eastern walls of the pits consist of steep, overhanging ledges. The bottoms of both pits contain sediments and large boulders. These rimless pit craters are believed to form by collapse of surface material into a subsurface void created either by a dike or lava tube. They are analogous to volcanic pit craters on Earth, such as the Devil's Throat crater on the upper east rift zone of Kilauea Volcano, Hawaii. In some cases, they may mark skylights/entrances to subsurface lava caves.
The camera
The image above, has been captured by the HiRISE (High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment) camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The 65 kg (143 lb), $40 million USD instrument was built under the direction of the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. It consists of a 0.5 m (19.7 in) aperture reflecting telescope, the largest so far of any deep space mission, which allows it to take pictures of Mars with resolutions of 0.3 m/pixel (about 1 foot), resolving objects below a meter across.
HiRISE has imaged Mars landers on the surface, including the ongoing Curiosity and Opportunity rover missions.
HiRISE was designed to be a High Resolution camera from the beginning. It consists of a large mirror, as well as a large CCD camera. Because of this, it achieves a resolution of 1 microradian, or 0.3 meter at a height of 300 km. (For comparison purposes, satellite images on Google Mars are available to 1 meter). It can image in three color bands, 400–600 nm (blue-green or B-G), 550–850 nm (red) and 800–1,000 nm (near infrared or NIR).
HiRISE incorporates a 0.5-meter primary mirror, the largest optical telescope ever sent beyond Earth's orbit. The mass of the instrument is 64.2 kg.
Red color images are at 20,048 pixels wide (6 km in a 300 km orbit), and Green-Blue and NIR are at 4,048 pixels wide (1.2 km). These are gathered by 14 CCD sensors, 2048 x 128 pixels. HiRISE's onboard computer reads out these lines in time with the orbiter's ground speed, meaning the images are potentially unlimited in height. Practically this is limited by the onboard computer's 28 Gbit (3.5 GByte) memory capacity. The nominal maximum size of red images (compressed to 8 bits per pixel) is about 20,000 × 126,000 pixels, or 2520 megapixels and 4,000 × 126,000 pixels (504 megapixels) for the narrower images of the B-G and NIR bands. A single uncompressed image uses up to 28 Gbit. However, these images are transmitted compressed, with a typical max size of 11.2 Gigabits. These images are released to the general public on the HiRISE website via a new format called JPEG 2000.
To facilitate the mapping of potential landing sites, HiRISE can produce stereo pairs of images from which the topography can be measured to an accuracy of 0.25 meter.
The HiRISE camera is designed to view surface features of Mars in greater detail than has previously been possible. It has provided a closer look at fresh martian craters, revealing alluvial fans, viscous flow features and ponded regions of pitted materials containing breccia clast. This allows for the study of the age of Martian features, looking for landing sites for future Mars landers, and in general, seeing the Martian surface in far greater detail than has previously been done from orbit. By doing so, it is allowing better studies of Martian channels and valleys, volcanic landforms, possible former lakes and oceans, and other surface landforms as they exist on the Martian surface.
The general public is allowed to request sites for the HiRISE camera to capture (see HiWish). For this reason, and due to the unprecedented access of pictures to the general public, shortly after they have been received and processed, the camera has been termed "The People's Camera".
The pictures can be viewed online, downloaded, or with the free HiView software.