What Will This Mission Accomplish Others Won't? Options

[pioneer]

I heard this mission has an extremely high-resolution camera, but don't MGS and Mars Express as well? I know it also has some kind of radar sounder to search for water beneath the surface, but doesn't Mars Express have something like that too? The only instrument I found that hasn't been flown before is one for measuring climate that I think was lost on the Mars Climate Orbiter.

[djellison]

Well - yes - MGS and MEX have high res cameras - 1.5 - 2m/pixel.

MRO has a resolution of 0.3m/pixel - i.e. for every pixel that Global Surveyor can image - MRO will have 25 pixels.

You can do a lot more science with that.

There's a great presentation you should watch on the whole mission that explains a lot of the instruments and how they compliment one another and the other orbiting assets, and landers - http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures/oct04.cfm

Doug

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

......still wondering what happened to the high resolution images from Mars Express. And the radar still hasn't been deployed because mission engineers are still trying to work out whether it's safe to do so.

[djellison]

......still wondering what happened to the high resolution images from Mars Express. And the radar still hasn't been deployed because mission engineers are still trying to work out whether it's safe to do so.

The MEX high res issue is due to calibration problems - or so Bruce tells me. I'm not sure I buy that - and I'm not sure he does either.

Doug

[lyford]

......still wondering what happened to the high resolution images from Mars Express.  And the radar still hasn't been deployed because mission engineers are still trying to work out whether it's safe to do so.

The MEX high res issue is due to calibration problems - or so Bruce tells me. I'm not sure I buy that - and I'm not sure he does either.

Doug

I am also hopeful that they get the imaging online, but the radar will be a tremendous loss if it can't be activated - so much for the underground water detection!

Maybe next time instead of "Mars Express" they should go for "Mars Patiently and Carefully Thought Out."

[djellison]

The Marsis deployment is scheduled for March iirc

Doug

[OWW]

The MEX high res issue is due to calibration problems - or so Bruce tells me.  I'm not sure I buy that - and I'm not sure he does either.

I have this book about the 2004 mars missions ( MER, MEX, beagle-2 ):
http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/ASIN/3440...2222784-3018130

And on page 70 is the HIGH RESOLUTION companion to this MEX Olympus Mons picture:
http://search.esa.int/queryIG.html?col=mmg...&nh=1&lk=3&rf=3

The caption says it has a resolution of 2.3 meters. If it really IS taken by MEX the calibration excuse is nonsense. The image looks fine.
The book was published back in april, so ESA had a lot of time to 'calibrate' I would say... It's funny, because the author of this book himself complains about ESA's enormous lack of PR compared to the MER mission.

[djellison]

Well - two obvious points.

-That image is colour - so it's not the b'n'w high res camera
- The Olympus Mons Calderra is 60km across - which at 2.3m/pixel is 26000 pixels across - and that image would be more like 31000

Give those factors - and the size of the image being 3100 across - it's a typo - there shouldnt be a . between the 2 and the 3

Doug

[OWW]

-That image is colour - so it's not the b'n'w high res camera
- The Olympus Mons Calderra is 60km across - which at 2.3m/pixel is 26000 pixels across - and that image would be more like 31000

Give those factors - and the size of the image being 3100 across - it's a typo - there shouldnt be a . between the 2 and the 3

Doug, you are absolutely right........about the low-res picture in the link. ( This picture is on page 71 in the book )
But the picture I am talking about ( on page 70 ) is, as I stated, the HIGHRES companion of that Olympus Mons link. So....No, the . between the 2 and 3 is no typo.

[djellison]

Do you have a scanner

Doug

[OWW]

No I don't have a scanner. But I can give you a comparison MOC image I found that covers almost the exact same area.
Look at this MOC strip: http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/e07_e12/im...0/E1003979.html
The full-res version has a 'scaled pixel width' of 6.25 meters, but shows a lot more detail than the MEX picture from the book. However, the tiled 'medium-res' version is comparable to the MEX picture: http://www.msss.com/moc_gallery/e07_e12/fu...10/E1003979.jpg
The picture in the book covers the bottom half of the second strip and the top of the third strip. So, judging from this image, a 2.3 meter MEX image looks something like a 12 meter MGS image.

[djellison]

Maybe it's just printed small

Doug

[OWW]

Maybe it's just printed small

I don't think so. If it is blown up it will only become blurry. But we won't know for sure until ESA finally releases some stuff like MSSS does, right?
When is that going to happen anyway? It has been more than a year since that camera began taking pictures... I thought I read somewhere that they would release all pictures after 1 year?

[djellison]

Well - maybe they are having calibration problems afterall- poor focusing by the sounds of it

Doug

[MizarKey]

Well - maybe they are having calibration problems afterall- poor focusing by the sounds of it

Doug

Not the dreaded Hubble disease???

Eric P / MizarKey