Planet Four Talk

Really Puzzling

  • BlueMoon58 by BlueMoon58

    This surely is a strange feature, I have looked at it from every angle zoomed in and it really has me puzzled. I'd just love to see what it looks like over the entire area. Is there any chance you guys can map all these images into one frame and post it on the blog so we can get a sense of it's size. I am sure everyone that has looked at this image is curious to know what lies beyond it bounderies how it all fit's together like one giant jigsaw puzzle. Over 3 Million images have so far been classified. What have we learned thus far. Most of the images are upside down, a spider is no longer a spider its a valley.

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  • SEJones by SEJones

    Anya, a member of the science team, has explained this appearance in an earlier post:

    'These bright freckles are real. They are specular reflections from the parts of the ice-covered surface that has just the right angular position towards the sun and our camera. Something like that shimmer you see on the snow-covered field at sunny day. But instead of snowflakes here we have larger surface patches.'

    Meg Schwamb another project scientist also added: 'The dashed black lines are cracks in the carbon dioxide ice sheet. Those are blotches and fans which are deposits of dust and dirt. They are produced by carbon dioxide geysers on the South pole of Mars which lifts the dust on to the top of the carbon dioxide ice sheet in the summer and fall in the Southern hemisphere.'

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  • brian_peaston by brian_peaston

    With these linear vents we keep seeing, isn't it curious how the branches so often appear at 45 degree angles?

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  • JellyMonster by JellyMonster in response to BlueMoon58's comment.

    The surface is generally flat (see the post 'Orange Corrugations').

    It might be possible to map the images by collecting others that are similar in appearance. To do this, first click on the image above left, then change the last one or two alphanumerics in the search bar at the top (someone else gave me this info). So for example, if the last three characters are 'hd6', try changing it to 'hd7' or 'hd5' or even he6'. You'd have to experiment with this. Some images may overlap or appear differently when they are displayed. You'll find someone has lots of these in their collection... good luck.

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