APL instrument images twin Martian moons
These so called "d-type" materials are still thought to contain water ice and elemental carbon left over from the earliest days of the solar system's formation.
This finding led the APL team to conclude that the moons are not a product of a collision that caused parts of Mars to be ejected into orbit, but rather that Phobos and Deimos are most likely two primitive asteroids that passed by Mars at some point in the distant past and were lucky enough to be embraced by Mars's greater gravity.
Furthermore, with better spectral analyses, the APL has concluded that, as opposed to the previously held idea of a pair of grey moons, Phobos and Deimos are actually reddish in color, though Phobos does exhibit a large grey streak of ejected materials extending over a portion of its surface.
As far as moons go, Phobos and Deimos aren't much to brag about. They are tiny; from the surface of Mars, Phobos would appear to be a third of the size our moon appears from Earth. Deimos lags far behind even that, appearing as nothing more than a bright star.
The moons behave strangely, too. Phobos has an orbital period so short (approximately seven and a half hours) compared to Mars's rotational period (about 24 and a half hours) that it appears to set backwards, from west to east!
These findings are just the latest data from the CRISM satellite, which has the mission of investigating Mars and its system, from its chemical composition to its climate patterns to its terrestrial surface features.
CRISM and the rest of the instruments on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter continue to challenge and expand our knowledge of our nearest planetary neighbor.
This finding led the APL team to conclude that the moons are not a product of a collision that caused parts of Mars to be ejected into orbit, but rather that Phobos and Deimos are most likely two primitive asteroids that passed by Mars at some point in the distant past and were lucky enough to be embraced by Mars's greater gravity.
Furthermore, with better spectral analyses, the APL has concluded that, as opposed to the previously held idea of a pair of grey moons, Phobos and Deimos are actually reddish in color, though Phobos does exhibit a large grey streak of ejected materials extending over a portion of its surface.
As far as moons go, Phobos and Deimos aren't much to brag about. They are tiny; from the surface of Mars, Phobos would appear to be a third of the size our moon appears from Earth. Deimos lags far behind even that, appearing as nothing more than a bright star.
The moons behave strangely, too. Phobos has an orbital period so short (approximately seven and a half hours) compared to Mars's rotational period (about 24 and a half hours) that it appears to set backwards, from west to east!
These findings are just the latest data from the CRISM satellite, which has the mission of investigating Mars and its system, from its chemical composition to its climate patterns to its terrestrial surface features.
CRISM and the rest of the instruments on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter continue to challenge and expand our knowledge of our nearest planetary neighbor.
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