February 23, 2012 I Heart Mars

[SIZE="2"][FONT="Georgia"]An image taken by the Context Camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows a heart-shaped feature that the camera's team at Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, wants to share with other Mars fans.

The feature is about 1 kilometer (0.6 mile) long, in the Arabia Terra region of Mars' northern hemisphere. It appears in an image taken on May 23, 2010. A small impact crater near the tip of the heart is responsible for the formation of the bright, heart-shaped feature. When the impact occurred, darker material on the surface was blown away, and brighter material beneath it was revealed. Some of this brighter material appears to have flowed further downslope to form the heart shape, as the small impact occurred on the blanket of material ejected from a much larger impact crater.

The Context Camera was provided by and is operated by Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, Calif. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the spacecraft and operates it in partnership with JPL. For more information about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission, click here.

2011-052

Guy Webster (818) 354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
[email]guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov[/email][/FONT][/SIZE]

[FONT="Georgia"]Courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
California Institute of Technology[/FONT]

Its a valentine from Mars!

I think it looks like a fly.

How so ? I don't see any zipper

Bwaaahahahahahaaa!

You're wily today!

I saw Mars really clearly the other night.
And it was so obviously the Red Planet. It hung low in the sky, was ruddy and was identifiably a planet - much smaller than the moon but far larger than any star.

I began to realise why so many sci-fi novels feature Mars - it's so close, spacially.

Then I woke up :(
Mars is visible to the naked eye of course, and I have seen it.
But it was nowhere near as spectacular as in my dream.

Brianna;797304 wrote:

Its a valentine from Mars!

That's because:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060672/

No, wait. Hearts represent an aroused vagina.

Turns out women are from Mars. So where the heck are men from, then?

And Sheldon is from .... (too easy).

ZenGum wrote:

No, wait. Hearts represent an aroused vagina.

Is there some sort of historical justification for this? I'd never heard it, but it makes so much more sense than that organ beating in our chest that looks not a damn thing like that shape.

The theory is widely reported, but there are a number of other theories as well. I'd guess that several reasons for this shape have converged. But the vulva theory is most fun.

Especially when the heart is drawn with an arrow going into it. :doit:

Kind of disproves the whole 'Men are from Mars' theory.

richlevy;797454 wrote:

Kind of disproves the whole 'Men are from Mars' theory.

We're **all** from Mars. It's just that the guys are more homesick.