MSL - Astronomical Observations, Phobos/Deimos, planetary/celestial observations and more Options

[Deimos]

New Earth & Venus (& Mars) picture (release) from Curiosity on sol 2784. Also about 80 minutes after sunset, but lots more high-altitude dust.

[vikingmars]

Sol 3071 : the Curiosity rover saw Mars' biggest satellite, Phobos, in the Martian night sky.
The size of Phobos from Mars is about 1/3rd that of the Moon as seen from Earth.
Here is the image taken in natural color and well processed.
The big crater Stickney is seen at the bottom of the disk, and the south polar crater Hall is at right close to the terminator. Enjoy

[vikingmars]

On Sol 3215, Deimos, Mars' smallest satellite, was imaged by the MAHLI camera:
https://mars.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/0...210C00_DXXX.jpg
Also enlarged and processed. Enjoy

[neo56]

On Sol 3215, Deimos, Mars' smallest satellite, was imaged by the MAHLI camera:

That's not Deimos but Phobos, Olivier. See this post by Abigail Fraeman, Curiosity rover Deputy Scientist.

[vikingmars]

That's not Deimos but Phobos, Olivier. See this post by Abigail Fraeman, Curiosity rover Deputy Scientist.

Thank you very much Neo56 for pointing this info This moon looked so little with a surface very smooth

[vikingmars]

A nice meteor seen Sol 3868!


(link : https://mars.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/proj/m...NCAM00598M_.JPG )

[fredk]

Considering the low sensitivity of navcam I'm thinking it was more likely a glancing cosmic ray hit.

[vikingmars]

Considering the low sensitivity of navcam I'm thinking it was more likely a glancing cosmic ray hit.

Thank you for your nice explanation.
What hinted for me as being a meteor, is that when you transform the image, the incoming trail becomes more apparent (see here below)

[djellison]

A nice meteor seen Sol 3868!.....
(link : https://mars.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/proj/m...NCAM00598M_.JPG )

Your link isn't to the same image you posted - but both have CR hits. The aliasing of the streak strongly suggests a grazing CR hit rather than a real optical phenomenon. Your version where you have vertically compressed the image doesn't show a contiguous streak - one could draw many such lines based on hot pixels elsewhere in the image, many of which would go below the local horizon.

[tolis]

Thank you for your nice explanation.
What hinted for me as being a meteor, is that when you transform the image, the incoming trail becomes more apparent (see here below)

Most likely a CR, though one cannot dismiss the meteor hypothesis entirely.

If there were an object in the foreground like a boom or mast that could interrupt the trail, it would help distinguish
between a CR and a bona fide meteor.

[Deimos]

Based on the morphology, the image has a CR that entered the CCD on the anti-readout side of the detector near the image's horizon (thus the high diffusion) and was near the readout side by the time it exited the imaging part of the CCD (hence the low diffusion). The pointiness of the streak is pretty diagnostic of a CR, with the tip being sharper than the optical point-spread function (giving djellison's aliasing). Well, that and fredk's observation about sensitivity and (from a statistical point of view that may support the wrong conclusion once every many thousand times) the many 1000s of CRs vs. no meteors yet identified.

[vikingmars]

Sol 4106: the Curiosity rover took a series of pictures showing the Martian sky.
At the top of all the images it looks like the same stars.
Or maybe that they are bad pixels?
An opinion?



Link: https://mars.nasa.gov/raw_images/1301343/?site=msl

[fredk]

That sequence was shot at around 11:00 local time, so broad daylight. The bright pixels are hot pixels.

You can also tell by zooming into the image because these bright spots are basically just single pixels. Any real point source would always be imaged as at least a few pixels (the "point spread function").

You can see the local time (LMST) of those MSL pics here:

http://lcdm.ca/msl/4106/index.2.html

(And latest images here: http://lcdm.ca/msl/)

[vikingmars]

That sequence was shot at around 11:00 local time, so broad daylight. The bright pixels are hot pixels.
You can also tell by zooming into the image because these bright spots are basically just single pixels. Any real point source would always be imaged as at least a few pixels (the "point spread function").
You can see the local time (LMST) of those MSL pics here:
http://lcdm.ca/msl/4106/index.2.html
(And latest images here: http://lcdm.ca/msl/)

Thanks Fredk (and also for the links)