Mars Lander Snaps the Most Detailed Pics Yet

An anonymous reader writes "The Mars Lander has taken its very first microscopic image of a piece of Martian dust (image). The particle, according to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, is shown at a higher magnification than anything ever seen from another planet. The piece of dust is a rounded particle about a millionth of a meter across. This particle is one of the countless specks of dust that continually swirl around the Red Planet, coloring the Martian sky pink. 'Taking the images required the highest resolution microscope operated off of Earth and a specially designed substrate to hold the Martian dust,' said Tom Pike, a Phoenix science team member. 'We always knew it was going to be technically very challenging to image particles this small.'"

Comments

"Millionth of a meter"

[blind biker]

It's called micrometer. I know, that sounds too sciency, sorry.

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[Muad'Dave]

In the US at least, we use that term for a device that measures very small things, a micro [=very small] meter [=that which measures]. It's pronounced 'my kromiter', not 'micro meter'. I think using it to mean a millionth of a meter would be confusing, regardless of it being technically correct.

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[Eudial]

It's called micrometer. I know, that sounds too sciency, sorry.

Meter sounds too European. A five thousand thousandth of a rod is colloquial enough for those imperialists to understand.

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[Anonymous Coward]

I can just imagine a specification calling for a gap of 100 micrometers and a NASA contractor supplying 100 instruments...

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[dotancohen]

In the US at least, we use that term for a device that measures very small things, a micro [=very small] meter [=that which measures]. It's pronounced 'my kromiter', not 'micro meter'. I think using it to mean a millionth of a meter would be confusing, regardless of it being technically correct.

That said by someone who measures distance by the FOOT?

(
As in: How many feet in a yard?
Depends upon what's on the grill!
)

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want to get technical, the correct way to spell the standard SI unit of length is "metre", not "meter", in most countries except the U.S. This leads to the convenient distinction that a "meter" is a device used for measurement (such as the micrometer you mention), whereas a "metre" is a unit of measurement. Therefore, a micrometre is what you are looking for, usually abbreviated with the Greek letter mu, which I can't seem to get to display properly here, followed by an m. It is also commonly called a "micron", although that usage is informal.

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[ceoyoyo]

Meter is uniquely American. Everybody else spells it properly: metre.

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[Smivs]

The Cow as a unit of measurement? What a load of bullocks!

Re:"Millionth of a meter"

[TriggerFin]

p>A centimetre, nanometre, micrometre, kilometre is a specific distance.

"Metre" is mispronounced by any English-speaking person using it. If the "e" is after the "r" then say it that way.

Kilometry: the science of measuring things greater than about six tenths of a mile long.

wrong approach

[larry bagina]

When we wanted to analyze moon rocks, we didn't send a microscope to the moon, we brought the moon rocks to the microscope (on Earth). I think it would save a lot of time and money to just send up some astronauts to colelcts some dust and rocks and bring them back. I guess NASA needs to waste money to justify a bigger budget.

Re:wrong approach

[Takichi]

Seems to me like they should start with robots that go to Mars and bring some rocks back. I'm assuming that we'll probably want to bring the people that eventually go there back, so this would probably be a good start. Unless all manned missions to mars are suicide/colonisation missions.

Re:wrong approach

[eln]

Have you seen the ticket prices on a round-trip to Mars lately? No to mention if you don't upgrade to first class you get to spend the next 6 months with some guy drooling on you in his sleep from the seat next to you and some brat kicking the back of your chair the entire time. Not to mention, the hotel accommodations on Mars are poor at best, and ridiculously overpriced.

Seriously man, maybe if the spacelines and the hotels could get their shit together and make it a worthwhile experience, you might see more astronauts willing to go up there to collect some rocks (did I mention the cargo fees on getting that stuff back? If it doesn't fit in your carry-on, you might as well just forget it!). As it is, it takes some doing just to convince lifeless robots to go up there, and even then they bitch the whole time.

Confucius say

[Profane MuthaFucka]

Confucius say "Sending giant rocket to see little piece of dust like bringing mountain to Mohammad."

Re:Confucius say

[Anonymous Coward]

Seeing as Confucius died almost a thousand years before Muhammed was born, that seems an unreliable quote.

Re:Confucius say

[Muad'Dave]

Nostradamus told Confucius about Muhammed.

Re:Very little science?

[jellomizer]

I think when I get home Ill Photoshop a dust mite on it and really shake the world.

What!

[Smivs]

Well, it's not what I expected. I kinda imagined a tiny rock.

In case of slashdotting . . .

[PeeAitchPee]

. . . here's another view of the piece of the Martian dust: .

Re:In case of slashdotting . . .

[street struttin']

And here's a close up: O

Source info and images

[sighted]

The original source for this story is here. Updates and raw daily images directly from the team running the mission are here.

Good Intentions

[flaming error]

Either both you, and your moderators, are a little too quick on the button today, or I don't know what "+5 informative" means anymore.

Picture

[iamlucky13]

I don't know why so often we get articles linked to sources completely unrelated to the topic at hand. I understand and appreciate PCMag having articles unrelated to PC's occassionally for the edification of their readers, but there's no reason not to get a topical source for sharing on Slashdot. Space.com and spaceref.com are great news sites for lay-persons, and one thing NASA is generally outstanding about is having detailed, up-to-date, and accurate mission websites.
 
/rant

Anyways, I think calling this a picture affects readers' expectations. The atomic force microscope is a coordinate mapping tool rather than a camera. It uses tiny probes to sense the surface profile of a target and create elevation maps based on that data. It's more of a three-dimensional graph than a picture and it doesn't use light, but it can reveal much finer details than an optical microscope can.

Here's a similar image to that linked in the summary overlayed with an optical microscope picture of the same area. Note that the optical microscope image is about 3 mm across, of a target of micromachined silicon that has a bunch of tiny pits, posts, and bumps intended to hold dust particles of different types. The atomic force microscope image is 100 times the resolution of the optical image.

Actually, even the optical microscope on Phoenix is far higher resolution than any camera previously flown to another world, but the AFM takes the capability two steps further. Between the two, the Phoenix team is learning a lot about the soil on Mars that should allow them to deduce not only its bulk properties, but even hints about how it formed.

By the way, the Mars Rovers have "microscopic imagers," but these are really more like close-focus cameras than true microscopes. Offhand I can't think of any other robotic space missions that carried microscopes.

Re:Picture

[moosesocks]

Kudos to NASA for doing this.

We've got an AFM in my lab, and it's easily the most troublesome piece of equipment that I have to work with on a regular basis.

It's slow, extremely sensitive to vibrations, and the tips have to be replaced frequently. What's worse is that it's not always all that clear when your tip's gone bad, unless you're calibrating between every image taken.

The fact that they got one to another planet, and had it work properly without human intervention is pretty darn impressive.

Phoenix seems full of some rather daring decisions by NASA. I'm still shocked that the suits approved their landing trajectory and location, which gave the craft about 50/50 odds of surviving the landing.

Re:Picture

[Panaflex]

Well, roughly 12 years ago I was in the data archiving business, and I remember that NASA generated 1.2TB of space data per day. This doesn't include engineering, life sciences, analyzers, contractors, etc... I can only imagine that this has risen astronomically (hahaha) in these last few years.

I've ready recently that NASA aims to keep about 40 petabytes of recent data online & nearline. If you put it all together, I'm fairly sure that "tons" is probably an apt measure - most certainly if we're talking drives, tapes, storage, and machines.

And if you don't believe me... then just google "ton of data" site:nasa.gov They confirm my suspicions!!

The image proves it!

[Eg0Death]

Mars is made of Legos!

Re:Microscope

[CraftyJack]

Spirit and Opportunity each have a microscopic imager, so that's two. Any more?

No stupid, its 1.05702341(10^-22) light years

[RudeIota]

rounded particle about a millionth of a meter across

Get it right.

While we're at it, maybe someone would care to share arbitrary comparisons to help us visualize... like if we could line these particles up from the Earth to the Moon, it would take nearly 3.84403(10^14) of them! Or, if we encircled the Earth with these particles, it would take nearly 4.0008(10^13)! Amazing!!! It's all so clear now.

I think it depends on the size of the rod,

[DigitalReverend]

although they keep saying it's not the size of the rod that matters, but how it's used.