A Rotating False Color View of the Martian South Pole from MOLA

Visualizations by Tom Biddlecome Released on November 22, 1999

This is one of a series of visualizations showing false-colored renderings of the Martian topography measured by MOLA in the vicinity of the Mars Polar Lander landing site. Blue tones represent elevations of less than 2 kilometers, while reddish tones are greater than about 2.8 kilometers, relative to the mean equatorial height of Mars. The elevation of the landing site is about 2.4 km, midway into the polar layered terrain. The 400 meters (1/4 mile) resolution of the MOLA data gives a smoothed but vertically exaggerated view of the topography. At this scale it is impossible to ascertain the actual roughness at the lander's destination, forcing project directors to make their best guesses based on available data.

The visible Martian south polar cap appears outlined in black, but the accompanying false color data shows the topographically inferred extent of the polar layered terrain.

False color image of Mars from MOLA data. Here the color scale shows the darkest blues as roughly 8 km below the mean equatorial height, while reds indicate elevations up to 5 km above the mean equatorial height.

MOLA data of Martian topography highlighting the differences in elevation between the Hellas Impact Basin and surrounding terrain. The deepest point in Hellas is roughly 8200 meters below the equatorial mean.

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For More Information

http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/stories/MOLA_south_pole/index.html

Visualization Credits

Tom Biddlecome (Raytheon): Lead Animator
David Smith (NASA/GSFC): Scientist

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

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https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/770

Mission:
Mars Global Surveyor - MGS

Data Used:

MGS/MOLA/Topography

1997/09/15-1998/11

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Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of this series:
Mars Polar Lander

Goddard TV Tape:
G1999-097

Keywords:
SVS >> Mars
DLESE >> Space science
NASA Science >> Planets and Moons