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PIA08639: Radiant Bowl
 Target Name:  Mars
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Mars Global Surveyor (MGS)
 Spacecraft:  Mars Global Surveyor Orbiter
 Instrument:  Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC)
 Product Size:  572 x 1311 pixels (w x h)
 Produced By:  Malin Space Science Systems
 Producer ID:  MOC2-1544
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA08639.tif (750.9 kB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA08639.jpg (181.4 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:

4 August 2006
This This Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image shows a bowl-shaped crater on the martian northern plains with a mysterious radiant pattern of zones with and without boulders and rocks. The rocky areas are seen as dark dots, the rock-free areas lack these spots. Craters like this are fairly common on the northern plains; some also occur at a similar latitudes in the southern hemisphere. When the Mars Odyssey Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS) team first saw these, earlier this decade, they called them"pinwheel craters" (see PIA05611). The exact cause of the boulder and streak distribution is uncertain.

Location near: 61.3°N, 88.4°W
Image width: ~3 km (~1.9 mi)
Illumination from: lower left
Season: Northern Spring

Image Credit:
NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

Image Addition Date:
2006-08-04