Interior of a crater with a central depression
Interior of a crater with a central depression
Realistic perspective views of the surface of Mars can be generated from data acquired by the stereo and colour channels of the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA's Mars Express spacecraft, which are oriented at an oblique angle with respect to the planet's surface. This image shows a 50-kilometre crater in the Thaumasia Planum region. The image was generated from the HRSC data using digital terrain models. The image data was acquired on 4 January 2013 during orbit 11,467 and the image shows the central depression of this crater, which is thought to have been formed by a subsurface steam explosion as the thermal energy from the causative impact event rapidly vaporised water or ice lying below the surface.
Copyright note:
As a joint undertaking by DLR, ESA and FU Berlin, the Mars Express HRSC images are published under a Creative Commons licence since December 2014: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO. This licence will also apply to all HRSC images released to date.