Visit NASA's Home Page Jet Propulsion Laboratory California Institute of Technology View the NASA Portal Click to search JPL Visit JPL Home Page Proceed to JPL's Earth Page Proceed to JPL's Solar System Page Proceed to JPL's Stars & Galaxies Page Proceed to JPL's Technology Page Proceed to JPL's People and Facilities Photojournal Home Page View the Photojournal Image Gallery
Top navigation bar

PIA11078: Mercury—in 3D!
Target Name: Mercury
Is a satellite of: Sol (our sun)
Mission: MESSENGER
Spacecraft: MESSENGER
Instrument: Mercury Dual Imaging System - Narrow Angle
Mercury Dual Imaging System - Wide Angle
Product Size: 600 samples x 600 lines
Produced By: Johns Hopkins University/APL
Other Information: You will need 3D glasses
Full-Res TIFF: PIA11078.tif (1.081 MB)
Full-Res JPEG: PIA11078.jpg (60.73 kB)

Click on the image to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original).

Original Caption Released with Image:

This graphic shows a portion of the fault scarp Beagle Rupes (see PIA10939) cutting through the highly elliptical crater Sveinsdóttir in a three-dimensional (3D) representation. By combining information from multiple images of the same portion of Mercury's surface taken under different viewing angles, the topography of the surface was determined. A high-resolution image was then overlaid on the topography map, resulting in this 3D image. In total, over 80 MESSENGER images were used to create this 3D view of Mercury's surface. As the MESSENGER mission continues, many more images will be acquired, and these additional images will provide views of Mercury's surface from a variety of illumination conditions and viewing geometries. These myriad views, anchored by topographic profiles to be acquired by MESSENGER's laser altimeter, will enable large portions of the surface of Mercury to be studied in 3D.

Date Acquired: January 14, 2008
Image Mission Elapsed Time (MET) : NAC image from 108830230 resampled on a topographic map made from more than 80 NAC and WAC images.
Instrument: Narrow Angle Camera (NAC) and Wide Angle Camera (WAC) of the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
Scale: Sveinsdóttir crater is about 120 kilometers by 220 kilometers (75 miles by 140 miles).

These images are from MESSENGER, a NASA Discovery mission to conduct the first orbital study of the innermost planet, Mercury. For information regarding the use of images, see the MESSENGER image use policy.

Image Credit:
NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington/Planetary Science Institute


Latest Images Search Methods Animations Spacecraft & Telescopes Related Links Privacy/Copyright Image Use Policy Feedback Frequently Asked Questions Photojournal Home Page First Gov Freedom of Information Act NASA Home Page Webmaster
Bottom navigation bar