A sea of dark dunes, formed by the wind in long lines, surrounds the northern polar cap that covers an area as large as Texas. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / ASU
A sea of dark dunes, formed by the wind in long lines, surrounded March‘northern cape and covers an area as large as Texas. In this false-colored image, areas with cooler temperatures are recorded in bluish hues, while warmer properties are depicted in yellow and oranges. Thus the dark, sun-warmed dunes glow with a golden color. This image covers an area of 30 kilometers wide.
This scene combines images taken during the period from December 2002 to November 2004 by the instrument of the Thermal Emission Imaging System on the Mars Odyssey orbit. It is part of a special series of images that commemorate the 20th anniversary of Odyssey, the longest-running Mars spacecraft in history. The location shown on Mars is 80.3 degrees north latitude, 172.1 degrees east longitude.