Archaeology News Online

In July 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft sent home the first close-up pictures of Pluto and its moons – amazing imagery that inspired many to wonder what a flight over the distant worlds’ icy terrain might be like. Wonder no more. Using actual New Horizons data and digital elevation models of Pluto and its largest moon Charon, mission scientists have created flyover movies that offer spectacular new perspectives of the many unusual features that were discovered and which have reshaped our views of the Pluto system – from a vantage point even closer than the spacecraft itself. Pluto flyover [Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI/Paul Schenk and John Blackwell, Lunar and Planetary Institute] This dramatic Pluto flyover begins over the highlands to the southwest of the great expanse of nitrogen ice plain informally named Sputnik Planitia. The viewer first passes over the western margin of Sputnik, where it borders the dark, cratered terrain of Cthulhu Macula, with the blocky mountain ranges locate...

A dried-out river valley with numerous tributaries is seen in this recent view of the Red Planet captured by ESA’s Mars Express. Libya Montes colour view [Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin] This section of the Libya Montes region, which sits on the equator at the boundary of the southern highlands and northern lowlands, was imaged on 21 February 2017 by the spacecraft’s high-resolution stereo camera. The Libya Montes highlands mountains, one of the oldest regions on Mars, were uplifted during the formation of the 1200 km-wide Isidis impact basin some 3.9 billion years ago, seen at the north of the context map. Libya Montes in context [Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin] The features seen across the broader region indicate both flowing rivers and standing bodies of water such as lakes or even seas that were present in the early history of Mars. The prominent river channel that runs from south to north (left to right in the main colour image) is thought to have cut through the region around 3.6 billion y...

Images of Jupiter's Great Red Spot reveal a tangle of dark, veinous clouds weaving their way through a massive crimson oval. The JunoCam imager aboard NASA's Juno mission snapped pics of the most iconic feature of the solar system's largest planetary inhabitant during its Monday (July 10) flyby. The images of the Great Red Spot were downlinked from the spacecraft's memory on Tuesday and placed on the mission's JunoCam website Wednesday morning. This enhanced-color image of Jupiter's Great Red Spot was created by citizen scientist Jason Major using data  from the JunoCam imager on NASA's Juno spacecraft. The image was taken on July 10, 2017 at 07:10 p.m. PDT  (10:10 p.m. EDT), as the Juno spacecraft performed its 7th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time the image was taken,  the spacecraft was about 8,648 miles (13,917 kilometers) from the tops of the clouds of the planet  [Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Jason Major] "For hundreds of years scien...

In July 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft sent home the first close-up pictures of Pluto and its moons – amazing imagery that inspired many to wonder what a flight over the distant worlds’ icy terrain might be like. Wonder no more. Using actual New Horizons data and digital elevation models of Pluto and its largest moon Charon, mission scientists have created flyover movies that offer spectacular new perspectives of the many unusual features that were discovered and which have reshaped our views of the Pluto system – from a vantage point even closer than the spacecraft itself. Pluto flyover [Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI/Paul Schenk and John Blackwell, Lunar and Planetary Institute] This dramatic Pluto flyover begins over the highlands to the southwest of the great expanse of nitrogen ice plain informally named Sputnik Planitia. The viewer first passes over the western margin of Sputnik, where it borders the dark, cratered terrain of Cthulhu Macula, with the blocky mountain ranges locate...

A dried-out river valley with numerous tributaries is seen in this recent view of the Red Planet captured by ESA’s Mars Express. Libya Montes colour view [Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin] This section of the Libya Montes region, which sits on the equator at the boundary of the southern highlands and northern lowlands, was imaged on 21 February 2017 by the spacecraft’s high-resolution stereo camera. The Libya Montes highlands mountains, one of the oldest regions on Mars, were uplifted during the formation of the 1200 km-wide Isidis impact basin some 3.9 billion years ago, seen at the north of the context map. Libya Montes in context [Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin] The features seen across the broader region indicate both flowing rivers and standing bodies of water such as lakes or even seas that were present in the early history of Mars. The prominent river channel that runs from south to north (left to right in the main colour image) is thought to have cut through the region around 3.6 billion y...

Images of Jupiter's Great Red Spot reveal a tangle of dark, veinous clouds weaving their way through a massive crimson oval. The JunoCam imager aboard NASA's Juno mission snapped pics of the most iconic feature of the solar system's largest planetary inhabitant during its Monday (July 10) flyby. The images of the Great Red Spot were downlinked from the spacecraft's memory on Tuesday and placed on the mission's JunoCam website Wednesday morning. This enhanced-color image of Jupiter's Great Red Spot was created by citizen scientist Jason Major using data  from the JunoCam imager on NASA's Juno spacecraft. The image was taken on July 10, 2017 at 07:10 p.m. PDT  (10:10 p.m. EDT), as the Juno spacecraft performed its 7th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time the image was taken,  the spacecraft was about 8,648 miles (13,917 kilometers) from the tops of the clouds of the planet  [Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Jason Major] "For hundreds of years scien...