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SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2017
ASTRONAUTICS
Northwest is at both ends of this almost full-circle panorama; southeast is at the center, where a higher portion
of Mount Sharp dominates the horizon. Among the questions this Martian dune campaign is addressing is how
winds shape the dunes into different patterns. Others include whether Martian winds sort grains of sand in
ways that affect the distribution of mineral compositions, which also would have implications for studies of
Martian sandstones. The 115 individual images that were combined into this mosaic were acquired by the Mast-
cam's left-eye camera on March 24 and March 25, 2017, (PST) during the 1,647
th
sol of Curiosity's work on Mars.
This mosaic is white-balanced so that the colors of the colors of the rock and sand materials resemble how they
would appear under daytime lighting conditions on Earth. [NASA/JPL-CALTECH/MSSS]
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