Artist Concepts
Selected Images and Artists' Conceptions of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mission
MRO is the largest U.S. spacecraft to reach Mars since Viking 1 and Viking 2 in 1976. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (284 kB JPG) |
MRO lifts off from Cape Canaveral on August 12, 2005. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (172 kB JPG) |
MRO follows an elliptical trajectory to Mars from August 12, 2005 to March 10, 2006. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (168 kB JPG) |
MRO's main engine fires to insert the spacecraft into an elliptical orbit on March 10, 2006. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (64 kB JPG) (560 kB JPG) |
MRO aerobrakes, repeatedly dipping into the upper atmosphere to lose velocity and circularize the orbit, from March through August 2006. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (276 kB JPG) |
MRO uses the visible, infrared, and radio ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum to measure water in the atmosphere, on the surface, and below the surface. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (244 kB JPG) |
Several of MRO's instruments have 5 to 20 times the resolution on preceding missions, providing unprecedented detail on Mars' geology and evolution. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (200 kB JPG) |
MRO studies water occurring as polar ice, as clouds and vapor in the atmosphere, locked in minerals, and as ice or groundwater below the surface. (Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.) (400 kB JPG) (4.6 MB JPG) |