16-01-2004 10:40									#31
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Sprayber . . . that avatar of yours . . . it makes me feel kinda funny.

	16-01-2004 12:25									#32
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Did you put on your clown nose?

	16-01-2004 12:31									#33
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I had to edit it somewhat. I had to dress her up cause the orginal has no bottom or top. I have a full size version of her somewhere on my computer. With more color.

	16-01-2004 12:50									#34
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quote: Originally posted by asleepathewheel Like:

Those black dots are just transmission noise/errors that weren't corrected in the original picture.

That picture was taken with one of the Viking orbiters in 1976. Mars Global Surveryor (which is currently orbiting Mars) has taken relatively recent pictures of it with its higher resolution camera. The following are some examples of the "Viking Face" taken by MGS:


Overall view, comparing the "face" to other features in the immediate vicinity.


Close up

quote: Originally posted by Ned Are they going to look for evidence of life?

Nope, Spirit and Opportunity are not designed to look for life. They are robotic geologists and their only purpose on these missions is to determine if/when water was last present on the surface of Mars. Some pictures seem to conclude that Mars has features that appear to have been sculpted by water.

Both rovers have spectrometers though, so depending on what chemicals are present, they could indirectly determine there is life. However these spectrometers are specifically looking for carbonate materials, which is indicative of either lacustrine or marine environments.

The other way that the rovers could detect if there was life on Mars is by taking picture of a rock that contains stromatolites. That sure would be an amazing find. I think MrWhereItsAt would find that almost as exciting as I would.

Though he doesn't care for sedimentary petrology as much as I do. :P

Edit: Don't post when tired, besides they weren't around in 1776... :P

	16-01-2004 12:56									#35
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Stromatolites are cooool.

I picked some up in Herkimer, NY.

	16-01-2004 12:58									#36
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quote: Originally posted by WhiteBandit That picture was taken with one of the Viking orbiters in 1776.

Now THAT is a technological achievement.

	16-01-2004 13:02									#37
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LOL!

1976 is what I meant.

This is what I get for surfing the net and trying to strut my so called knowledge on 4 hours of sleep in 48 hours!

Also to clarify, the rovers could possibly find past life by taking a picture and seeing any sort of fossil embedded in the rock. I was just using stromatolites as an example, since they are such simple lifeforms. Huge colonies of single celled algae.

Example of stromatolites: