PIA08440: Spirit Beholds Bumpy Boulder
 Target Name:  Mars
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Mars Exploration Rover (MER)
 Spacecraft:  Spirit
 Instrument:  Panoramic Camera
 Product Size:  1022 x 1024 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  Cornell University 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA08440.tif (3.144 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA08440.jpg (188.7 kB)

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Original Caption Released with Image:

As NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit began collecting images for a 360-degree panorama of new terrain, the rover captured this view of a dark boulder with an interesting surface texture. The boulder sits about 40 centimeters (16 inches) tall on Martian sand about 5 meters (16 feet) away from Spirit. It is one of many dark, volcanic rock fragments -- many pocked with rounded holes called vesicles -- littering the slope of "Low Ridge." The rock surface facing the rover is similar in appearance to the surface texture on the outside of lava flows on Earth.

Spirit took this approximately true-color image with the panoramic camera on the rover's 810th sol, or Martian day, of exploring Mars (April 13, 2006), using the camera's 753-nanometer, 535-nanometer, and 432-nanometer filters.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/NMMNH

Image Addition Date:
2006-05-05