Mars photos available on the Internet

Tucson -- U.S. astronomers have released more than 1,200 high resolution images of Mars, making them available on the Internet.

The University of Arizona-based team said anyone connected by Internet can see Mars better than at any time in history through the High Resolution Imaging Experiment, or HiRISE -- the most powerful camera to orbit another planet.

The scientists operating the HiRISE camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance orbiter not only released 1.7 Terabytes of HiRISE data -- the largest single dataset delivered to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's space mission data library -- but also a user-friendly way for the public to easily see HiRISE images.

The HiRISE camera takes images of 3.5-mile-wide swaths as the orbiter flies at about 7,800 mph between 155 and 196 miles above Mars' surface. For at least the next 18 months, HiRISE will collect thousands of color, black-and-white and stereo images of the Martian surface, resolving features as small as 40 inches across while covering about one percent of the planet.

The images are available at http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu.

Copyright 2007 by United Press International.