by Ryan Morrison
NASA‘s Perseverance rover has captured a stunning high resolution 360-degree panorama of Mars, showing the dusty landscape in incredible detail.
The panorama shows the rim of the Jezero Crater where the rover touched down last week and the cliff face of an ancient river delta in the distance.
Captured in stunning HD, it was taken by the rover’s Mastcam-Z, a dual-camera system equipped with a zoom function to help it focus on distant objects.
The newly released panorama was stitched together by NASA from 142 individual images taken by the rover on February 20.
Captured in stunning HD, it was taken by the rover’s Mastcam-Z, a dual-camera system equipped with a zoom function to help it focus on distant objects
NASA says the Mastcam-Z is equipped to take high-definition video, panoramic colour images and 3D images of the Martian surface in incredible detail.
The Perseverance team tweeted along with the new image: ‘I’m taking it all in. This is the first 360º view of my home using Mastcam-Z. This dual, high-definition camera system sits atop my mast and has zoom capability.’
It is located on the mast of the rover, so can also show parts of the vehicle itself, set against the deep rust coloured Martian soil and lighter orange sky.
‘We’re nestled right in a sweet spot, where you can see different features similar in many ways to features found by Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity at their landing sites,’ said Jim Bell from the NASA Perseverance team.
Opportunity, Spirit and Curiosity are earlier rover missions to Mars sent by NASA…
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