Russian state Corporation “Roskosmos” has published on its official website a recent photograph of the Martian surface. On a panoramic image obtained by the spacecraft Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) Russian-European mission “ExoMars-2016” you can see very interesting geological features, indicating a fairly “raw” history of the red planet.
In particular, the picture shows the crater Eberswalde, located in the southern hemisphere of our planetary neighbor, and a very ancient Delta dried up Martian river.
“The layered rocks, are part of the Delta deposits, is marked white-yellow and purple-blue flowers. Yellow is a deposition of iron oxides, indicating chemical changes due to exposure to water, blue is less altered deposits”, — explained in the description of the image.
The overall situation around the crater Eberswalde describes gradual changes of the environment which occurred at a time when Delta was still filled with water. With full photo can be found at this link.
A joint project of the state Corporation Roskosmos and the European space Agency’s “ExoMars” is aimed at the exploration of Mars, its surface, atmosphere and climate, began in 2016 and is divided into two stages. In the first, in the spring of 2016 to Mars was sent a lander “Schiaparelli” and the Orbiter TGO. Apparatus arrived to the red planet in the autumn of the same year. Orbiter without problems TGO went into orbit and started to work, but the “Schiaparelli” at landing was not so lucky — he crashed.
The start of the second phase of the project “Eczemas” is scheduled for the summer of 2020. In its course to the Red planet are going to send a landing platform and the Rover. The latter will be used as a long-term Autonomous research laboratory for the study of the composition and properties of the surface and atmosphere of the planet. The spacecraft launched from the Baikonur cosmodrome carrier rocket “proton” with upper stage block “breeze-M”. The arrival to Mars is expected in March 2021. For landing will be used the parachute system, engines and shock absorbers.
Step 2020 involves broader participation of the Russian side. The Russian landing platform, final Assembly of which is conducted near Moscow NPO. Lavochkin, will include 11 Russian and two European scientific instruments. The Rover will also be equipped with two Russian scientific instruments – an infrared spectrometer for mineralogical ICEM assessment of objects on the planet’s surface and neutron spectrometer HADRON-Mr, which would search for traces of subsurface water and hydrated materials, and to identify the most appropriate locations for taking soil samples.
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