Thursday, December 2, 2010

Secrets of Schröteri


Vallis Schröteri is a magnificent sinuous rille and of particular interest is its inner rille, which diverges from the primary rille near the arrow. This nested form indicates that multiple eruptive events occurred or there was a large change in the volume of a single eruption over time. LROC WAC mosaic, 100 m/pixel [NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University].


LROC NAC close-up of a bend in the inner rille of Vallis Schröteri; the rille walls are visible in the upper left and lower right corners of this image. The arrow in the LROC WAC mosaic denotes the location of this image; field of view is 600 meters [NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University].

Lillian Ostrach

LROC News System

Explore the largest rille on the Moon in the LROC WAC mosaic and the LROC NAC full image! Compare the sinuous nature of these rilles to yesterday's Featured Image of Rimae Posidonius - what features are similar and what is different?


Backing off from the LROC Narrow Angle Camera close-up slicing through Vallis Schröteri, geologically fascinating because not only is it the largest lunar sinuous rille, it is also composed of a primary rille and a smaller, inner rille. Full LROC Image field of view is 1.5 km [NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University].




Three views of the Aristarchus Plateau "chevron," lording over the vast Oceanus Procellarum. At bottom, from 2008, a 200 kilometer-wide (at bottom) SELENE-1 (Kaguya) HDTV view of the Aristarchus Plateau that is close to it's true optical appearance from orbit, according to those who have actually been there. The subtleties of the variety of actual color variation here are difficult to detect at first glance, though they are definitely present [JAXA/NHK/SELENE].

No matter how often the Aristarchus Plateau is imaged, and we have presented a wide variety of such images here, as seen in different wavelengths and bands from Earth and from lunar orbit, every new opportunity seems to show a new face to this feature, unique in our star system. Above the Kaguya HDTV still shows two perspectives of the LROC Wide Angle Camera mosaic attached to the digital elevation model of the Moon available in Google Earth. Besides the valley, where details are obscured in these greatly reduced images, is the crater Herodotus, the far older sister of Aristarchus.


Related posts:
Aristarchus Plateau 1: Amazing Geologic Diversity
Rille within a rille!
The Great Wall of Aristarchus
The colorful Moon
LROC: Aristarchus - Up from the Depths
LOLA's Aristarchus Plateau