MRO-HiRISE

Western based research team — The Western-based teams planning the science component of MRO-HiRISE “cycles 339 and 340” (the 338th and 339th two-week imaging campaigns since the start of the primary mission): Livio Tornabene (Lead and HiRISE Science Team member, Vidhya Ganesh Rangarajan (PhD candidate), Chimira Anders (MSc. student), Leah Sacks (MSc. student), Will Yingling (PhD candidate), and Eric Pilles (PDF, and Co-Lead on HiRISE planning/training) (left to right). HiRISE is a high-resolution camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter – MRO, which has been in orbit and imaging Mars since 2006

Two WesternU- and Institute for Earth and Space Exploration (Western Space)-based teams are currently helping plan two back-to-back 2-week sets of HiRISE images of Mars this month. The two teams are led by Earth Sciences Adjunct Research Professor Dr. Livio Tornabene (@RocDocMars) – a veteran HiRISE Science team member – and by Post-Doctoral Fellow Dr. Eric Pilles, who will be responsible for planning the second 2-week set of images. The two teams are additional comprised of Western Space mission trainees, including two PhD candidates – Vidhya Ganesh Ranganjaran and Will Yingling, and two MSc students – Leah Sacks and Chimira Anders. These two teams continue to interface with the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory’s HiRISE Operations Team, including HiRISE targeting specialists (HiTS) Kristin Block, Nicole Baugh, and Singleton Thibodeaux-Yost.

These next two back-to-back imaging cycles mark the 10th time the science-planning of HiRISE images has been led out of a Canadian institution since 2014. Planning and training continue in the Institute for Earth and Space Exploration’s mission control facility, housed in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, throughout the rest of the month and into early November.

For the latest updates, and a sneak peek of some of their images of Mars follow them on the Western Space’s Facebook page, and Twitter at: @RocDocMars and @WesternUSpace