The "First Frame" from MRO (detail mgnf)

The scene covers an area 49,8 Km (about 30,9 mi) wide and 23,6 Km (about 11,7 mi) high, of landscape typical of Mars' mid-latitude Southern Highlands. The location is 34° South Latitude, 305° East Longitude. An old, muted crater lies at the middle of the scene, with sets of channels to the left and right. Superimposed on parts of this terrain is a much younger, layered mantle of debris. The debris mantle is smooth in places but rough in other areas where it may have partially sublimated. This suggests that the debris mantle is (or was) rich in volatiles such as ices of water, CO2 or both. Also superimposed on the landscape are many small sharp-rimmed impact craters and wind-blown dunes. This image illustrates processes that may have involved water both on ancient Mars (channels and eroded craters) and much more recently in Mars' history (volatile-rich debris mantle). The radiometric and geometric processing of this image is very preliminary. In particular there are mismatches visible at full resolution along the seams between the 10 side-by-side images from separate CCDs (charge-coupled devices, which are electronic optical sensors).