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火星探査車、カラー写真を初公開
米航空宇宙局(NASA)は6日、無人火星探査車スピリットが撮影した着陸地点周辺のカラー写真を公表。また、米シャトル空中分解事故の犠牲者を追悼し、着陸地点を「コロンビア記念地」と命名した。
NASA rover takes most detailed picture of Mars' surface so far
PASADENA, California (AP) - NASA's Spirit rover yielded the sharpest picture ever taken of the surface of Mars, revealing in breathtaking detail a completely rust-colored landscape strewn with rocks.
NASA scientists said Jan. 6 the "postcard," sent across 169 million kilometers of space to Earth, had three to four times the resolution of any other pictures ever taken of the Red Planet. Spirit used a camera with the robotic equivalent of 20/20 vision.
NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe announced that Spirit's landing site would be named Columbia Memorial Station, in memory of the six astronauts who died in February 2003 in the space shuttle disaster.
"Spirit carries the dream of exploration the brave astronauts of Columbia held in their hearts," O'Keefe said.
Spirit is half of an $820 million (¥87.17 billion) project. Its identical twin, Opportunity, should land on the opposite side of Mars on Jan. 24. The rovers, the size of golf carts, were designed to probe Mars for evidence it once might have been a warmer, wetter place conducive to life.
Scientists said the picture was just a taste of bigger and better things to come from Spirit.
The postcard shows a vast plain scattered with a wide variety of rocks, including one in the far distance thought to be the size of a Volkswagen.
Poking above the horizon, perhaps 25 kilometers to 30.5 kilometers away, a mesa could be seen standing against the reddish-pink of the Martian sky.
A zoom-in showed off the crisp detail. Thousands of rocks peppered the scene, each blasted smooth by iron-rich dust lofted by the stiff winds thought to scour the area.
The new image is actually a mosaic of 12 pictures shot by Spirit's high-resolution panoramic camera, or Pancam.
"The object of our affection is doing quite well on the surface of Mars," said Firouz Naderi, manager of the Mars exploration program. "This baby has skipped all the baby talk and gone right into full sentences."
Shukan ST: Jan. 16, 2004
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- rover
- 探査車
- yielded
- 写し出した
- breathtaking
- 驚くべき
- rust-colored landscape
- 赤茶色の地表
- strewn with 〜
- 〜が散らばった
- had three to four times the resolution of 〜
- 〜の3、4倍の解像度だった
- Red Planet
- 赤い惑星(火星のこと)
- robotic equivalent of 20/20 vision
- 1.0/1.0に相当するロボットの視力
- landing site
- 着陸場所
- astronauts
- 宇宙飛行士
- exploration
- 探究
- identical twin
- 一卵性双生児の片方( 同一の探査車)
- probe
- 探査する
- conducive to 〜
- 〜をもたらす
- vast plain
- 広大な平地
- scattered with 〜
- 〜が散らばった
- Poking above the horizon
- 地平線の上に突き出しているのは
- mesa
- メサ(岩石丘)
- Martian
- 火星の
- crisp
- くっきりした
- peppered
- 無数に散らばっていた
- blasted smooth by iron-rich dust lofted by the stiff winds
- 強風で吹き上げられた、鉄分を多く含む砂ぼこりで表面が滑らかに削られた
- scour
- 吹き過ぎる
- This baby has skipped all the baby talk and gone right into full sentences
- 「この赤ん坊(スピリットのこと)は赤ちゃん言葉を飛ばして完全な文章まで進んでいる」