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Southern Spring on Kaiser Crater Dunes

This image acquired on November 27, 2021 by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, shows sand dunes in Kaiser Crater partially covered with seasonal carbon dioxide ice (dry ice).
PIA25181
Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
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The sand dunes in Kaiser Crater are partially covered with seasonal carbon dioxide ice (dry ice) in this image. The dunes are made of dark sand, showing through where the dry ice has sublimated (turned to gas) in the spring sun.

The fine scale structure of the ripples on the dunes shows up highlighted by the presence or absence of the ice, and the low angle of the sun on the slope.

The map is projected here at a scale of 50 centimeters (19.7 inches) per pixel. (The original image scale is 50.7 centimeters [20.0 inches] per pixel [with 2 x 2 binning]; objects on the order of 152 centimeters [59.8 inches] across are resolved.) North is up.

The University of Arizona, in Tucson, operates HiRISE, which was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., in Boulder, Colorado. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington.