New ‘Rainbow Map’ Shows Mineralogical Make-up Of Mars

Science New ‘Rainbow Map’ Shows Mineralogical Make-up Of Mars David Bressan Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. I deal with the rocky road to our modern understanding of earth New! Follow this author to improve your content experience. Got it! Jul 5, 2022, 08:28am EDT | Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Seen are six views of the Nili Fossae region of Mars captured by the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging .

. . [+] Spectrometer for Mars, or CRISM, one of the instruments aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/JHU-APL Scientists are about to get a new look at Mars, thanks to a multicolored 5. 6-gigapixel map. Covering 86 percent of the Red Planet’s surface, the map reveals the distribution of dozens of key minerals.

By looking at mineral distribution, scientists can better understand Mars’ watery past and can prioritize which regions need to be studied in more depth. The first portions of this map were released by NASA’s Planetary Data System . Over the next six months, more will be released, completing one of the most detailed surveys of the Martian surface ever made.

NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter , or MRO, has been mapping minerals on the Red Planet for 16 years, with its Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars, or CRISM. CRISM map of Mars, colors indicate different mineral composition. The yellow square indicates the .

. . [+] Nili Fossae region of Mars, which is highlighted in six views in the previous image.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/JHU-APL Using detectors that see visible and infrared wavelengths, the CRISM team has previously produced high-resolution mineral maps that provide a record of the formation of the Martian crust and where and how it was altered by water. These maps have been crucial to helping scientists understand how lakes, streams, and groundwater shaped the planet billions of years ago. NASA has also used CRISM’s maps to select landing sites for other spacecraft, as with Jezero Crater, where NASA’s Perseverance rover is exploring an ancient river delta .

MORE FOR YOU New Research Finds A Connection Between Domestic Violence And These Two Personality Disorders This Scientist Helps Andean Forests And Ecuador’s Women In STEM Exceptional Fossil Preservation Suggests That Discovering Dinosaur DNA May Not Be Impossible The first piece of this new map includes 51,000 images , each of which represents a “strip” 540 kilometers long by 10 kilometers wide that was captured as MRO passed overhead. The different false-colors of the CRISM images show the presence of iron-oxides, iron-bearing minerals, important rock-forming minerals like pyroxene, water-altered minerals and carbonates on the planet’s surface. CRISM maps of the Nili Fossae region showing mineralogical composition.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/Johns Hopkins APL To acquire its data, CRISM used two spectrometers , one of which was designed with three cryocoolers to keep temperatures low so that it could more clearly detect the longest wavelengths of reflected solar infrared light. Used in succession, the last of these cryocoolers completed its lifecycle in 2017, limiting the instrument’s capabilities to view visible wavelengths. So this will be CRISM’s last map covering the instrument’s full wavelength range.

The instrument is now in a standby mode and may record data a few more times in the coming months before being decommissioned. One last map will be released within the year, covering visible wavelengths and focusing only on iron-bearing minerals; this will have twice the spatial resolution of the latest map. “The CRISM investigation has been one of the crown jewels of NASA’s MRO mission,” said Richard Zurek , the mission’s project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

“Analyses based on these final maps will provide new insights into the history of Mars for many years to come. ” Materials provided by NASA/JPL/Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory . David Bressan Editorial Standards Print Reprints & Permissions.