The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, has returned more than 8,214 gigapixel-size images of the Martian surface since the start of the science phase of the mission in November 2006.
HiRISE scientists released 1,005 observations of Mars made between April 26 and July 21 to NASA’s mission data archive, called the Planetary Data System, and also to the public last week.
The new images, a total 3.4 terabytes of data, can be found on the HiRISE Web site.
The HiRISE team has so far released a total 26.9 terabytes of data in more than 7,100 observations with 718,000 different image products derived from those observations, said HiRISE operations manager Eric Eliason of The University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory.
That amounts to more data than has been released by all previous deep space missions combined. The image products include color images and stereo pairs, as well as monochrome images.
“If I showed each HiRISE image for 10 seconds, it would take me about 4 years to show them all,” said UA’s Alfred McEwen, HiRISE principal investigator.
Despite this massive data volume, HiRISE images cover less than four-fifths of one percent of the area of the planet.