Months after dazzling the world with the deepest view of the cosmos ever captured, NASA's James Webb Telescope has turned its gaze to something much closer to home — Mars.
NASA has published the first round of images of Mars captured by the $13 billion telescope, a collaboration with ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency), with more research to come.
Featuring the Huygens Crater, Hellas Basin and the Syrtis Major, the batch of images was taken on September 5.
The James Webb Telescope is orbiting around the Sun at a distance of about 1.5 million kilometres from Earth.
This unique position means the telescope can study short-term phenomena like dust storms and weather patterns, NASA said in a blog post.
However, there were some challenges.
Mars' blinding 'detector saturation'
Webb was designed to gaze into the furthest reaches of the universe to detect quite faint light.
Mars, which is relatively close to the telescope, is very bright.
"Webb's instruments are so sensitive that without special observing techniques, the bright infrared light from Mars is blinding, causing a phenomenon known as detector saturation," NASA's blog post said.
"Astronomers adjusted for Mars' extreme brightness by using very short exposures, measuring only some of the light that hit the detectors, and applying special data analysis techniques."
The images, taken by the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCaM) at two different wavelengths, are of a portion of Mars' eastern hemisphere shown here in a simulated image map from NASA and the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA):
The first image is a shorter-wavelength shot which covers about one quarter of Mars' eastern hemisphere.
It shows surface details you can see in the simulated images because it's dominated by reflected sunlight, NASA said.
"The rings of the Huygens Crater, the dark volcanic rock of Syrtis Major, and brightening in the Hellas Basin are all apparent in this image."
The darker brown patches are the least reflective bits.
The second one is a longer-wavelength image which shows thermal emission.
It shows light given off the by planet as it loses heat with the brightness related to the temperature of the surface and the atmosphere, NASA said.
The orange patch you can see in that yellow portion of planet is the Hellas Basin, which is on of the largest impact craters in the solar system at more than 2,000 kilometres wide.
The darkening of the basin was caused by atmospheric effects, NASA's blog post said.
Researchers are also going to use data collected by the telescope to learn more about Mars' surface and atmosphere.
"Preliminary analysis of the spectrum shows a rich set of spectral features that contain information about dust, icy clouds, what kind of rocks are on the planet's surface, and the composition of the atmosphere," the post said.
"The spectral signatures – including deep valleys known as absorption features – of water, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide are easily detected with Webb.
"The researchers have been analysing the spectral data from these observations and are preparing a paper they will submit to a scientific journal for peer review and publication."
