Western University researchers have received their first images of Mars, taken with the largest telescope ever used for a deep space mission
They placed the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to capture these two images.
The Western team says receiving the pictures late Sunday night was, well, out of this world.
“It's mind-blowing to realize that when the team, myself included, first look at the images, we are likely the first people on Earth to lay eyes upon a portion of the Martian surface that may have not been imaged before at such high resolution," says LivioTornabene, an adjunct research professor at Western's Faculty of Science and a member of the Centre for Planetary Science and Exploration.
The researchers are likely the first to see a portion of the Martian surface, not imaged before at such a high resolution.
Launched in 2005, the orbiter has spent the last eight years circling Mars. The team is using the orbiter for two weeks to analyze ideal landing spots for three Mars Rovers set to arrive before the decade is out.
