NASA's Hubble Space Telescope (HST) will make observations of the
planet Mars on Aug. 26-27, when Earth and Mars will be closer
together than they have been in the last 60,000 years. As soon as
Hubble's high-resolution images of the Red Planet are received at the
Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) and are digitally processed
by the Mars observing team, they will be released to the public and
news media via the Internet.
High-resolution files for downloading will available on HubbleSite
News Center at http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/2003/22, beginning
at 6 a.m. EDT Aug. 27.
The Hubble images will be the sharpest views of Mars ever taken from
Earth. They will reveal surface details as small as 17 miles (24 km)
across. Though NASA's Mars-orbiting spacecraft can photograph the
Red Planet in much finer detail, Hubble routinely serves as a
"weather satellite" for tracking atmospheric changes on Mars and for
probing its geology on a global scale.
Unlike "real-time" viewing through ground-based telescopes, Hubble
observations are carried out automatically by the orbiting
observatory. Free of clouds and atmospheric distortion, Hubble is
guaranteed a front- row seat to the celestial close encounter. To
study the planet's geology and weather, Hubble's Wide Field and
Planetary Camera 2 will take separate images of Mars through as
many as 10 different color filters. Hubble's unique ultraviolet-
light sensitivity will allow it to trace ozone and water vapor in
the Martian atmosphere.
The images will be stored in an onboard computer, transmitted to
the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., and then to the
Space Telescope Science Institute. Once received at STScI, the
images will be calibrated and combined to make a natural, full-color
view of Mars. A key image-processing step will be to combine and
register images taken through different filters. Because Mars rotates
a little between each Hubble exposure, each separate picture must be
precisely aligned to make a color image. This means several hours
will elapse from the time of a Hubble observation to the assembly of
a full-color image.
Two close-approach images will be posted on the Internet on Aug. 27.
The first view, taken the evening of Aug. 26, when Mars is
34,648,840 miles (55,760,220 km) from Earth, will be posted as a
full-resolution color image for downloading after approximately 6 a.m.
EDT. In the second image, taken within an hour of "closest approach,"
Mars will be merely 1,400 miles closer than the previous exposure. It
will be at its closest distance of 34,647,420 miles (55,757,930 km).
The resolution will effectively be the same as in the earlier image.
The image-processed color pictures will be posted on the Internet
after 4 p.m. EDT Aug. 27. Mars researchers Jim Bell of Cornell
University in Ithaca, N.Y., and Michael Wolff of the Space Science
Institute in Boulder, Colo., will be at STScI and available for
media interviews beginning at 5 a.m. EDT Aug. 27.
To arrange interviews with Bell and/or Wolff, please contact Ray
Villard at 410-338-4514, or Cheryl Gundy at 410-338-4707.
NASA-TV will broadcast a videotape of the Mars team's receipt of the
first Hubble image at 12 p.m. EDT Aug. 27.
The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is operated by the
Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. (AURA),
for NASA, under contract with the Goddard Space Flight Center,
Greenbelt, MD. The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of
international cooperation between NASA and the European Space
Agency (ESA).
