It has been the Festival of Colours or Holi in India this week and to celebrate, Isro has released some stunning color pictures of Mars. The mission has also recently carried out some important experiments, which may help in the search for life there.
The Indian Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) is the least costly of any mission to Mars made by any country, but it has proven to be a treasure chest of information gleaned from the red planet. The pictures below show magnificent shots of the huge Arsia Mons volcano, the Eos Chaos canyon, the Valles Mariner canyon and one of Mars’ moons, Phobos, silhouetted against the planet’s surface.
The Arsia Mons volcano is 270 miles (435 km) in diameter, almost 12 miles high (20 km) and its summit is 72 miles (110 km) wide. That makes it 30 times larger than the Earth’s largest volcano, Mauna Loa in Hawaii.
The following photo is a spectacular view of the Martian moon Phobos. The satellite is tiny. According to the MailOnline it is only about 14 miles (22km) across, and completes an orbit of Mars once every seven Earth hours.
The next picture is of the Eos Chaos canyon. The fracture patterns shown on the surface could help scientists better understand some of the geological processes taking place on the planet.
The Eos Chaos canyon is, in fact, part of the largest canyon on Mars, Valles Mariner, pictured below. It is a system of canyons near the equator. The canyon is 2,500 miles (4,000 km) long, 120 miles (200 km) wide and up to 4.5 miles (7 km) deep.
The Hindustan Times quotes Isro from its facebook page saying,
““These images of Eos Chaos region of Mars were taken by Mars color camera on February 5 at a spatial resolution of 220m from an altitude of 4403km. Eos Chaos is located at eastern part of Valles Marineris region. Grabens/Fracture patterns at the edges of Valles Marineris are clearly seen at this resolution. Images at this coarse resolution are useful for understanding geological processes at regional scale.”
However, Mangalyaan has not just been sending back super photos. SEN blog reports that it has made an extremely important step towards measuring methane on the planet – something NASA has struggled to do.
SEN says that its Methane Sensor For Mars “has recorded radiation on the surface of Mars which in turn reflected the Sun’s radiation back into space.” In doing so, it measures the reflectivity of the Martian surface, which could prove important in the search for methane.
Finding methane is one of the key objectives of the Indian MOM and is crucial in answering the question of whether there is life on Mars.
Isro says that more photos of Mars will be released soon.
