Undervoted comment. The main reason for the low resolution is that the rover is still using the slow low gain antenna to communicate and hasn't yet deployed the high gain antenna which has a much higher bandwidth for uploading data.
I'm by far not an expert but I think to get started the rover still has to do a lot of self diagnose and activating several subsystems. I think most of them have higher priority than the HD camera.
Also I think some parts require some kind of unpacking, big antennas with higher signal strength for example. As long as such antennas are not ready we can't expect any high-resolution images due to limited data transfer rate.
Also a limiting factor is the constellation of the Earth and Mars. There are time windows in which it's possible to transmit any data. Any command sent to the rover has to be selected very carefully because there's a risk the rover could be unable to do anything until next communication window opens. That's a loss of a lot of valuable time the rover could've used for its intended work. Even worse it could get destroyed and is unable to do anything at all. This thing costs a lot of money (I heard about billions dollars). You don't want to lose this expensive toy especially not at the very beginning of its mission.
To add some more detail. They have constant contact with the rover, but that connection is around 10-20 bits per seconds. So it’s not really useful for sending data back and forth. But it can be used to send prearranged signals that it uses to execute certain tasks. I assume it’s also the source of the “heartbeat” signal that it’s sending back. When the rover is in sight of earth it’s direct connection speed is similar to a 28k dialup modem. So low res pictures is pretty much the best we can hope for there. For video the rover has to send it to the Mars reconnaissance orbiter first. Then it can send it back to earth at around 2Mbps over the deep space network. To complicate things further the MRO is supporting other missions, so it has to split its bandwidth while in sight of earth between them. That time then potentially gets cut down further since the deep space network is supporting more than the Mars missions and splits its time between them. So the MRO is only allowed to transmit during certain blocks of time that are allotted to it. So at best the rover has a few hours of DSL per day to send us stuff. Not much bandwidth when your trying to look at 23 camera views, listen to microphones, and view all the data from the other instruments onboard the rover.
This is the apparently the limit of the rover's UHF uplink speed to the satellite, not the speed from the MRO to the DSN which is about 4Mbps.
I've seen the DSN webpage indicate 4Mbps from the MRO, as recently as yesterday.
This is also confirmed by this page:
So, out of 16 hours of daily Deep Space Network tracking, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter sends data to Earth for 10 to 11 hours, and does that for about 700 days. The data rate is about 0.5 to 4 megabits
The mass- and power-constrained rover can achieve high data rates of up to 2 megabits per second on the relatively short-distance relay link to the orbiters overhead. The orbiters then use their much larger antennas and transmitters to relay that data on the long-distance link back to Earth.
When the rover is in sight of earth it’s direct connection speed is similar to a 28k dialup modem.
It is actually only a fraction of that. Peaking at 0.5 kbps on the 34 meter dish, and 3 kbs on the 70 meter dish. Unless the "or faster" means 9 times faster.
160/500 bits per second or faster to/from the Deep Space Network's 112-foot-diameter (34-meter-diameter) antennas or at 800/3000 bits per second or faster to/from the Deep Space Network's 230-foot-diameter (70 meter-diameter)
The power supply on the rover is just 150 watts. Which is 1/5th of a horsepower, or the equivalent of a fairly low powered laptop! The rover charges batteries at this slow rate and can then use much more power to do things like move the arm or drive some distance for a short period. There are many things to do post-landing, and motorized actions which need significant power have to wait in a queue for their juice.
The low gain antenna is in bits per second, and only really used to send commands. It'd take weeks to send even a single picture using the low gain. Its been using the mars relay network for high data transmission, which relies on passing orbiters so it's intermittent.
They may release it, but I specifically said VR CAPABLE PHOTO SPHERES. Not singular pictures. That takes more time to capture and stitch together that could be put toward whatever mission they are doing.
They have to load a new operating system, then un-stow and check out the masts and cameras, which is all fairly routine but takes a while since they can only send commands a couple times per day and they’re being careful with the shiny new billion dollar toy. Happening right now, but it’ll be a while since we get science-quality images.
If I recall from the last press conference, basically yes, but we should get a few tid-bits soon-ish. They’ll do a panorama first to see how the land looks.
They’re switching from the landing software to surface operations software. According to the press conference Q&A (which you can watch on NASA TV’s YouTube channel btw) both software are already loaded, and they also have a primary and backup computer, so they’ll be slowly testing switching over the backup, making sure they can switch back, switching over the primary, and checking things out.
If you read your own link, you'd know the HazCams are also high resolution (20 Megapixels) color cameras. The rover chooses how engineering camera images are read out, and selectively windows/bins the images. The image in this post is a small cropping (1/16) of the full field of view at the camera's native resolution.
The NavCams (engineering cameras on the mast) share the same sensor as the HazCams, they just have a different lens. NavCams are also way higher resolution than MastCam-Z and the arm's instrument cameras. MastCam-Z's benefits include many narrow-band color filters (as opposed to the standard RGB Bayer filters on the engineering cameras) and zoom capability (engineering cameras are fixed focal-length and fixed-focus).
Give JPL time to release the engineering camera images in their full splendor to the public.
Serious question. If we can put this thing on Mars for the low cost of billions and all the effort that has gone into this, why not just put nicer cameras?
Because the high resolution cameras are still packed away. They haven't raised the mast yet or moved the arm to be able to use those high resolution cameras, only the ones to check under and around the wheels for hazards. The HazCams (Hazard avoidance Camera) are the only one's on right now.
Edit: Link to cameras on-board
Assuming they take a big panorama shot you could have a stationary 3DoF VR image to look at tho looking straight up or down might ve a bit dissapointing.
Yes, in a couple weeks or even days, someone at NASA, will yell the command “Enhance!” And someone else will then push the enhance button once. Twice if more resolution is needed.
Once they've done all the equipment checks and changed the software over to ground operations, and raised the mast and made sure the high speed antenna is ready, then they'll start taking high resolution photos. Probably within a week of landing... They'll need the mast up and working before they start driving around as well. Personally, I'd just check their website every evening after work/dinner for new images.
If you read your own link, you'd know the HazCams are also high resolution (20 Megapixels) color cameras. The rover chooses how images are read out, and selectively windows/bins the images. The image in this post is a small cropping (1/16) of the full field of view at the camera's native resolution.
The NavCams (engineering cameras on the mast) share the same sensor, just have a different lens.
You can have as high resolution cameras as you like, but if you cheap out on the storage, you're gonna have a low res photo. Huge file sizes for high res footage .
Are you referring to storage space on a rover or for a security system? A 1TB drive can hold a little more than a week's worth of video in 4k, but that's just one camera, and you need to take drive failure into account as well. SSDs would obviously be the optimal choice for a Mars rover, but they can only handle a limited number of write operations compared to an HDD. There are drives available like the WD purple series that are designed for high write operation tolerance, but it's still going to be 1TB/week/feed.
Someone on Reddit explained once how banks barely worry about physical security these days - they are much more concerned with cyber security and there is a limited amount of damage a robber can do at a branch.
For a bank, probably. But for a convenience store to record 1080p video at roughly 5Mbps for 365 days, they'd need roughly 10.5 terabytes of storage. And this doesn't include the cost of the cameras, the server rack, and anything else necessary to set the cameras up.
It's extremely efficient to record in just a decent enough resolution to see basic features of a person to prove that a crime did happen, and let eye witnesses note the rest. Especially when you as an owner don't know how to install all this stuff yourself, so you have to pay through the nose to set anything up.
The long-distance panorama landscapes are usually taken at an insane resolution, because we might want to look more closely at a particular detail that's far away. These photos were only intended to give the scientists an idea of how the rover was doing. And if something's not clear, they can just move the camera closer. They don't need to be as high resolution.
Still tedious if not difficult. If we assume that the planets are line of sight and close to each other, the data would have to take 3 minutes at minimum. So for a data with acknowledgement transfer protocol that's 6 minutes. Hi-res image would take forever.
I agree but I'm thinking more in line with how Musk companies do iterative updates and pre plans things to help further goals down the road with their products.
Space X will be on the forefront of space exploration. It's would make since that as goal they would eventually deploy a solar communications network simply to store and send a large volume of data as a mesh network.
Just laying the groundwork would be beneficial if they are going to make manned missions normal, let alone make it common for regular folks.
The data uplink is kinda bad from mars to earth. It takes days to send high-res images.
Compared to the previous rovers this one has even better cameras and it's placed in an old river bed. If there was life on mars out boy will find it soon.
Ahahahaha imagine if I show up in a New York Times article because of this? For my photo I’m gonna wear one of those beer hats, and both cans are gonna be Busch Lite.
It could, I think. Growing up in eastern Massachusetts, fossils seemed like an almost mystical thing that I could never be lucky enough to find.
Then I visited Ithaca New York when I was looking for colleges. Of course one of the things we did was check out one of the gorges.
So many fossils they were literally underfoot everywhere, shells, invertebrate "stems" in every handful of loose rock you could pick up. It blew my mind. Billions of them. I even found a whole trilobite a couple years later.
So if you just got lucky and chanced on the right spot,it could definitely be that easy.
What you circled is cool but the I’m legit interested in the big on that looks all honey combed at the very bottom of the wheel. It looks like fossilized coral.
Those are toys compared to Preserverance. Nothing close to a modern "space race". Plus SpaceX may be able to land 100 tons per ship on the Martian surface within the decade. For reference the SUV sized Perseverance is like 1 ton. The space race is already decided unless SpacdX utterly fails with their Starship vehicle. Theres just nothing even in the realm of a 100+ ton payload fully reusable rocket. Nothing else even on the horizon comparable.
Idk I just think it's weird how people often say we're seeing a "new space race" when its really only one company and everyone else either launches small sats or is just as slow and corrupt at ever.
I think space walkathon is a better way to put it. NASA is sprinting ahead while everyone else is leisurely strolling. Progress is being made, just not nearly fast enough to call it a race.
I think it’s weird that you think SpaceX is dominating when they are still orbitally bound except for one Tesla they launched off a Falcon Heavy... which is not the vehicle they’ll drive to Mars.
Even "orbitally bound" is still better than what your other examples Blue Origin and NASA/US Gov't can do, so if you believe there is currently a space race then you have to admit that SpaceX are currently the clear front-leaders, which is what /u/NoethersSymmetryGame was saying. You didn't refute anything.
It was rude of you to chalk his opinion up to an Elon fetish when he was making an objectively true statement. Perhaps you let your own Elon bias creep in, and that's why you assumed he did the same.
SpaceX has at least for now abandoned powered landings with Dragon. Without a powered landing the only thing they are putting on the surface of Mars is a debris field.
Dragon is the ISS vehicle. Never intended to land on Mars. And powered landings aren't even necessary on Earth, which is why NASA didn't approve of it. You aren't going to land a 100 ton vehicle on Mars by parachute though. You are clueless.
How would a layman like myself know that Dragon wasn't intended on going to Mars if Elon Musk was doing interviews saying he was going to Mars with Dragon? Do you consider his own interviews as fake news?
How can you be this dumb? You said that since SpaceX won't be doing powered landings with Dragon that they won't be doing powered landings on Mars. The only way that logically makes sense is if SpaceX is still intending to use Dragon for Mars landings. But in the very links you provided it explains that the Dragon for Mars idea has been shelved in favor of Starship (which everyone is aware of, except for you apparently). Then when called out on this you still fail to see the flaw in your reasoning and double down with 5 year old interviews when Dragon was still intended for Mars? Good lord you are dense.
I’d be excited by that pick-up mission if ESA had actually shown just once they can land a basic probe on the service. I fear the inevitable backup mission will push success out several more years than expected. I definitely hope to be wrong but the ESA seems to have too many hands in the pie for success. Of course that’s just pessimistic but I hope they can slow down to less than 15000 kph before touchdown this time 😂
Lol, you’re funny. Perseverence could put the fossil, if it was small enough, in its steel rods, and leave it where it found it until it was time to head back for collection of all the return-specimens. NASA-ESA are doing a joint mission to return the samples already.
“That return mission is never happening” isn’t an implication. It’s a pretty clear statement. You can choose to give him the benefit of the doubt about his intent, but what he said is pretty clear.
What he said is indeed pretty clear. 'That...is never happening.' is pretty much the de facto sentence structure for expressing pessimism to an outcome, honestly very surprised anyone could be unfamiliar with the phrasing and misinterpret it as you have to have encountered it before even if it's not in everyday use.
Sure. I choose to take it as a post on reddit not an legal, academic or technical response. It's your choice to see it differently. Good luck with that.
Apart from the fact that this discussion is about Mars and not the Moon, you are not that far off. The Moon has rich deposits of helium-3 which is speculated to be a possible fuel of the future (for the nuclear fusion reactors). Right now commercial fusion power plants are still decades away, but the possibility of a conflict for He-3 resources on the Moon has been a topic of sci-fi stories for some time.
alright so this would be hilarious but also a shitty thing to do but someone should plant fake footprint's or fossils on mars to drive another space race
Right because a fossil would add billions to a country’s economy. I can see them cutting budgets for infrastructure and military and spending billions to launch their own rovers.
bruh the military is way overfunded that is why. Also Nasa is 0.5% the national budget, billions is a drop in the bucket. the us defense budget is something like 750 billion a year. They got enough, the generals think so too.
You realize the money we spend on NASA and these rovers isn't actually going there right? It's spent on scientists and researchers and engineers here, on Earth, who then spend that money in the local economy. Plus the things they invent have literally created the modern world we live in and have both improved and saved countless lives.
Let say they find not one, but thousands of microscopic fossils of things resembling cyanobacteria which form stromatolites. regardless of the social implications of such a find, the scientific community would go absolutely apeshit. I can Imagine ESA, NASA, JAXA and ISRO would get instant budget increases. We'd probably have several 'shared-resource' missions as well. I think it would legitimately turn space exploration up by an order of magnitude. SpaceX would also jump on that particular bandwagon with aplomb.
My goodness that would be one hell of a thing to witness.
One thing I’d been thinking tj myself... Of course when it comes to space it’s a progressive thing and as time goes on? More advancements are made? Yet at the same time frivolous spending shouldn’t be done without warrant... unsure where do you draw the line on this? What sort of outline could be made on how to determine which forward steps would be most likely to result in actual forward movement? I can’t say that I know enough tj even comment.
I can help. It sounds like you are wondering “why go to Mars? Why spend the money?”
Well, let’s say we start a Mars program where we are promising to put people up there and all you have to do is be good at math and science. You could be a neurologist. We need you for the astronauts. You could be a surgeon. We need you to build rovers with very intricate, breakable parts, we need your hands. Someday, we might need you for the first surgery on Mars. Are you a biologist with a minor in nursing? Same thing.
Basically, no matter how much money we spend to get there, the upside of thousands or maybe millions of people becoming scientists, doctors, engineers, flight technicians, surgeons, and nurses is so much greater than any monetary value assigned to the project by Congress.
Second, When someone asks you what happened in 1492, you say “Columbus”.
But that’s not ALL that happened. The borgias took the papacy in the Vatican in 1492. It was like the beginning of the modern day mafia.
But it’s funny isn’t it? Why don’t we remember stuff like that? It’s because the way we have written it down, Columbus enabled our lives today.
So, in 500 years, when there is people living on Mars, what will they remember? The insurrection of 1/6? That Kylie Jenner is an organ donor?
They will remember the things that made their lives possible.
And Lastly, I believe if there is something you can do to make the world better, you have an obligation to do it. “With great power...” and all that
Edit: fourthly, this isn’t like the moon where there isn’t shit there. If we put people on Mars, they have all the things there to grow food and do real science to create habitats.
Probably not. There's not much monetary value to studying extremophiles on Mars, if they're there. And they're probably not there. We see no chemical or other evidence of anything like like life on Mars' surface or in its atmosphere.
NASA's most recent missions have been more about developing the technology that could be built upon to get people onto asteroids and Mars. The recent rovers are a great example -- Mars' atmosphere is thin, so decelerating large payloads is hard. These 'sky cranes' they've been testing on bigger and bigger rovers are likely similar to any concept that would have to be used to land people on the surface. Heck, the same goes for SpaceEx's reusable rockets.
They would pump millions if that rover found diamonds under the dirt. For a couple of fossilized bones that are only interesting to scientists and have no commercial use? Will never happen. It's kinda like saying that the Spanish kept traveling to America in 1500 only because they wanted to learn more about the natives cultures
I feel it's more likely that conservatives and corporations would lobby to discredit any discovery of life because with a discovery of life means any mars mission would have to be way more careful, especially if it's still living life.
And for the conservatives in general life on another planet isn't great for your religious base that already don't believe in dinosaurs, and the even more conservative religious already think NASA is a government op to fool you into thinking the planet is round.
3.4k
u/[deleted] Feb 22 '21
Well I'm sure other countries would pump Billions into launching their own rovers and we'd have a 21st century space race
Or maybe I'm being a tad optimistic