PIA05216: Shiny and New
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit shows a cleaned off portion of the rock dubbed Adirondack. In preparation for grinding into the rock, Spirit wiped off a fine coat of dust with a stainless steel brush located on its rock abrasion tool.
 Target Name:  Mars
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Mars Exploration Rover (MER) 
 Spacecraft:  Spirit
 Instrument:  Microscopic Imager 
 Product Size:  1024 x 1024 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  JPL 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA05216.tif (1.05 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA05216.jpg (225.7 kB)  

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:
This microscopic image shows a cleaned off portion of the rock dubbed Adirondack. In preparation for grinding into the rock, Spirit wiped off a fine coat of dust with a stainless steel brush located on its rock abrasion tool. Some of this dust coating can be seen to the left of the image. Scientists plan to analyze the newly-exposed patch of rock with the rover's suite of science instruments, both before and after the top layer is removed. The image was taken by the rover's microscopic imager. The observed area is 3 centimeters (1.2 inches) across.
Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/Cornell/USGS

Image Addition Date:
2004-02-06