While NASA's curiosity rover is currently busy with investigating a Martian rock called Windjana, the rover was able to take a few minutes off of its busy schedule to take a selfie. The Curiosity beamed back images of itself as it prepares to continue its investigation of the Gale Crater on Mars.
The spectacular images sent back by the Curiosity rover can help give lowly, earthbound humans a taste of what it feels like to be standing on the Red Planet. However, Estonian panoramacist Andrew Bodrov took things a step further by stitching the images sent back by the Curiosity together into one breathtaking interactive 360 degree panoramic shot of the Gale Crater. Along with showing the stark and eerily beautiful Martian landscape, the panoramic shot also included the Curiosity's selfie shot.
Due to the angle of the shot, a cursory inspection may lead to the conclusion that the shot was taken by an astronaut or another rover. The effect is further emphasized since the rover's robotic arm is not visible in the panoramic mosaic. The photos were taken using the Curiosity's MAHLI arm mounted camera. The camera is mounted onto the robotic arm and the rover is able to twist and rotate the camera to take photos of the rover's surroundings. The images taken by the onboard 34mm Mast mounted Camera were then stitched together to create the impressive 30,000 pixel wide panoramic mosaic.
The rover is now in the midst of investigating the Windjana Rock, a possible drilling target that scientists are eyeing for further investigation. Before commencing with the drilling however, the Curiosity will need to run a series of tests on the rock. Last April 26, the Curiosity has already deployed its Dust Removal Tool to clean an area of the rock. The Dust Removal Tool is a wire-bristle brush mounted on the rover's robotic arm.
"In the brushed spot, we can see that the rock is fine-grained, its true color is much grayer than the surface dust, and some portions of the rock are harder than others, creating the interesting bumpy textures," said Melissa Rice, a member of the Curiosity science team. "All of these traits reinforce our interest in drilling here in order understand the chemistry of the fluids that bound these grains together to form the rock."
Last Tuesday, the rover also performed a test drilling on the rock. The "mini drill" test involved drilling out a shallow hole to prepare for the actual drilling operation. To conduct the test, the rover drilled a small hole 0.63 inches wide and 0.8 inches in depth.
While the Curiosity's mini-drill test was considered successful, the team controlling the rover is still deciding whether or not to proceed with the full-depth drilling operation.
