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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.

Mars in the New Year

Explanation: Many will long remember where they were and what they were doing when the calendar rolled over to the year 2000. On Mars , of course, that date was nothing special and the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft continued with business as usual - systematically recording images of the Red Planet from orbit . In fact, this striking high-resolution picture was taken less than 7 hours after the new year began for planet Earth's “Universal Time” zone. The area seen is about 3 kilometers across at a maximum resolution of 4.5 meters per pixel. It shows a wonderful variety of surface features and textures in the Martian northern hemisphere region Nilosyrtis Mensae .

Date January 6, 2000
Credit Credit: Malin Space Science Systems , MGS , JPL , NASA
Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation & Michigan Tech. U.