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curiosity

NASA'due south Marvel rover has been an unqualified success from the moment information technology arrived on Mars aboard a rocket sled in 2012. It has driven more than 10 kilometers, helped confirm the existence of aboriginal lakes on Mars, and collected data on Martian geology that could be invaluable for time to come missions. Still, Curiosity isn't too busy to stop for a quick selfie, the quaternary such paradigm released past NASA/JPL.

This new Marvel selfie was taken on Sol 1228 on Mars; the Martian mean solar day is slightly longer than World's. It'due south in a region chosen the Bagnold Dune Field, and in the background you tin come across a structure chosen Namib Dune. When it wasn't taking selfies, Curiosity used its bike to loosen sand from Namib Dune, which it and then scoped upwards for analysis.

Every bit with by images of the rover, you tin can't run across the arm that was used to position the camera, because this prototype is actually a mosaic of more than 50 private photos. They were all taken with the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI). This is a true color camera with a maximum resolution of 1600×1200 — roughly 2 megapixels. That's non a very loftier resolution, and wasn't fifty-fifty dorsum when Curiosity was built. All the same, the sensor is hardened to withstand the harsh Martian environment. Your fancy 16MP smartphone camera wouldn't terminal a day.

MAHLI

Combining all the smaller images taken with MAHLI allowed NASA to crop the arm out of the last image and obtain a resolution of 5623×6000. JPL has the full resolution JPEG and uncompressed TIFF bachelor for download, as well as cropped versions suitable for wallpapers. The full paradigm has a ton of detail; you tin can even see the rut where Curiosity used its cycle to loosen up the sand.

You might also discover Curiosity is looking a bit haggard these days. The bike closest to the camera has an easily identified hole, and the formerly white chassis of the rover is now caked with red Martian fines. If you look dorsum at some of the earlier selfies, Marvel looked so shiny and new. Nevertheless, it still works perfectly after three and a one-half years on Mars — twice equally long as the original pattern spec. JPL really congenital this robot to terminal.

Marvel's design will serve every bit the template for NASA'southward still-unnamed 2020 rover mission. That rover will examine Mars in an effort to determine if it ever supported life, or maybe still does. Possibly Marvel volition still be trundling around the planet when the 2020 rover lands, much in the aforementioned way Opportunity is still going 12 years later. NASA extended Curiosity'south mission indefinitely, so as long every bit it's functional, it'll proceed doing science.