Curiosity rover shows what morning and afternoon look like on Mars in one photo

NASA's Curiosity rover captured an unusual moment of morning and afternoon on Mars, and its photos were published on the official NASA website.

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These images, captured by Curiosity's navigation cameras on 8 April 2023, at 9:20 and 15:40 local Martian time, are a combination of an artistic interpretation of the landscape and the addition of colour to the two original black and white panoramas.

The images were taken near Mount Aeolian, which rises to a height of 5 kilometres in Gale Crater on Mars. The rover has been studying this crater for almost 11 years. The photo shows the foreground, where you can see part of the rover itself with antennas and a nuclear power source. Also in the frame is a device for studying radiation on Mars, which scientists use to understand how to protect future astronauts from harmful radiation on the Red Planet.

"Anyone who has been to a national park knows that this scene looks different in the morning than in the afternoon. Shooting at two times of the day provides dark shadows because the light comes from the left and right, just like a stage, but instead of lighting the stage, we rely on the sun," said Curiosity engineer Doug Allison of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, who planned and processed the images.

Earlier, scientists answered which asteroids could destroy our planet and when it could happen.

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