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Rotating Mars Globe

This globe of the planet Mars was assembled from three separate images of the red planet taken by Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 on August 24th, 26th, and 27th. The color composite images were mapped onto a globe, geometrically to create a representative sphere of how the planet would look from space. Artifacts of the mosaic are three seams seen at 120-degree intervals with some missing data in the North Polar Region. These images were taken when Mars' southern pole was tilted toward Earth. The exquisite sharpness is possible because Mars was very close to Earth when the pictures were taken. Surface details include numerous impact basins and craters, dusty plains, and a volcanic plateau.
  • Release Date
    August 27, 2003
  • Science Release
    Mars: Closest Encounter
    Read the release
  • Credits
    NASA, J. Bell (Cornell U.) and M. Wolff (SSI); Additional image processing and analysis support from: K. Noll and A. Lubenow (STScI); M. Hubbard (Cornell U.); R. Morris (NASA/JSC); P. James (U. Toledo); S. Lee (U. Colorado); and T. Clancy, B. Whitney and G. Videen (SSI); and Y. Shkuratov (Kharkov U.); Animation: B. Preston and E. Weibe (STScI)

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Last Updated
Mar 14, 2025
Contact
Media

Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov

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