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PIA05213: Now You See Them, Now You Don't
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows soil at Meridiani Planum, Mars. The sandy soil is loosely packed.
 Target Name:  Mars
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Mars Exploration Rover (MER) 
 Spacecraft:  Opportunity
 Instrument:  Microscopic Imager 
 Product Size:  1024 x 1024 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  JPL 

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Original Caption Released with Image:

This animation flips back and forth between microscopic images taken of the soil at Meridiani Planum, Mars, before and after the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity's Moessbauer spectrometer was pressed down to take measurements. The disappearing rocks indicate that the sandy soil is loosely packed.

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/Cornell/USGS

Image Addition Date:
2004-02-06