Distinguished Exoplanet Lecture March 7

The Lunar Surface

• highlands
  Descartes highlands as seen by Apollo 16
• maria
  Mare Imbrium, Mare Orientale
• craters
  Copernicus, more, more, and more craters
• regolith: first-hand description

NASA Apollo: 50th Anniversaries

• Apollo 8: Dec 1968
  • first global images of Earth
  • Earthrise
  • Christmas on the Moon
• Apollo 11: July 1969
  • crew: Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins
  • Command & Service Module Columbia here and here
  • Lunar Module (LM="lem") Eagle here, here, here, here, and here
  • landing on the Moon: video here (start at 13:30), and here; transcripts
  • iconic images here and here
  • walking on the Moon: video (start at 2:45), transcripts
  • landing site imaged by LRO

Origin of the Moon

• giant impact
• impacts create maria basins

Intermission

• Compare/contrast: this vs this

Mercury: MESSENGER Mission

• Mercury visualized, exaggerated colors
• portrait, gravity anomalies, enhanced closeup
• scarps suggest tectonic activity
• image galleries here and here

Venus

• terrestrial planet comparison
• atmosphere here, here, and here (colorized); IR night
• surface: radar views here and here
• craters here and here, lava flows
• surface closeup (from Soviet landers): Venera 9 & 10, 1975; Venera 13; Venera 14
• Runaway greenhouse effect

Mars

• Moons: Phobos here and here; Deimos; flyby
• Polar caps S. pole
• Mariner valley canyon
• surface today: Endurance Crater, Engineering Flats, Columbia Hills, McMurdo panorama, clouds and sand
• The Face: Viking, 1976, Mars Globar Surveyor, 1998, Mars Express.
  another face, and a brain
• Craters
• Mount Olympus
• Water
  Past flows: channels, gullies, neutron Mars
  Present flows: landslides i.e., recurring slope lineae
  Phoenix lander blast cone and excavation
• Curiosity selfie and rearview
• a possible meteoritic fossil indication of life?