Planetary exploration missions have returned a wealth of imagery data over the last 40 years. The problem is how to make best use of it all. Thoroughly analyzing such large datasets manually is…
The planet Venus is the second largest (after the Earth) body among the terrestrial-type planets. The surface of Venus is 460x106 km2, which is three times larger than the area of the dry land…
In its extended mission, the MGS spacecraft has been operated in so-called "R16" mode, in which a 16-degree pitch is introduced to minimize fuel usage by reducing torque on the spacecraft. This…
I introduce world maps with constant scale edges [cse], and show how cse encompasses both conventional projections and a new class of maps—world maps with constant scale natural boundaries [csnb].…
In the field of Earth observation and planetary exploration, a number of spacecrafts have been equipped in the last years with various multispectral and/or hyperspectral optical instruments spanning…
Viking Orbiter, MOC and MOLA data are being used to construct three dimensional landmark templates on Mars which can be aligned with a variety of data types for navigation on future missions and…
We present a toolkit of routines for IDL. This toolkit converts a set of coordinates and data sorted by acquisition time into a map. It was developed at first for low-resolution data that require…
The Mars Express mission, which is expected to be launched in May/June 2003, will bring the "High Resolution Stereo Camera" (HRSC) into an orbit around the planet Mars. This research program, which…
GIS-like tools have existed in the computer age since scientists have been displaying images or comparing digital datasets. Whether it was a program on a mainframe to draw a satellite image to…
We describe a series of programs and scripts under development for the USGS digital cartography and image processing software system ISIS that will make it possible for users to create digital…
The RAND-USGS control network of Mars is a combination of the RAND control network and the USGS network.
The International Mars Conference highlights the wealth of scientific data now and soon to be acquired from an international armada of Mars-bound robotic spacecraft. Underlying the planning and…
The MGS Orbiter is carrying the high-precision Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA) which, when combined with precision reconstructed orbital data and telemetered attitude data, provides a tie between…
We describe an interactive terrain visualization system which rapidly generates and interactively displays photorealistic three-dimensional (3-D) models produced from stereo images. This product,…
The NEAR mission produced shape models of asteroid 433 Eros by both the imaging team and the altimetry team. Preliminary models by both teams at the 2 degree x 2 degree resolution, equivalent to…
Recent geodetic observations of Mars by the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft, particularly the altimetry and gravity experiments, have provided a new framework in which Mars may be geodetically…
The utility (read: need) of topographic data in formulating and testing hypotheses for the formation of geologic features is undisputed. In the absence of laser altimeters, however, image-based…
The USGS is producing digital elevation models (DEM) and topographic maps of Mars at scales of 1:250,000 to 1:1,000,000. The initial source material will be Viking Orbiter images, with a later…
During the Clementine Mission both oblique and vertical multispectral images were collected. The oblique and vertical images from a single spectral band collected during the same orbit form a stereo…
A basic requirement for the planning of future, perhaps even manned Mars missions are precise and high resolution maps of our neighbour planet and, especially, of the landing area. Here we present a…
