Apparently there's a higher-resolution image of that panorama somewhere because this tweet has a couple sub-images showing descent hardware that are better than we can see in any of the panoramas that I've seen so far.

Wow, is that the actual speed in the backing away footage? The vibration of the radar booms makes it seem so! It's just so smooth!
I'm so glad to be proven wrong and that there is a hose (perhaps not a firehouse) instead of a trickle of data, after all!

I think CNSA's site have the pictures and videos in full resolution: Link

Click to view attachment
Yes, the wireless camera must have two different camera lenses.

This person was able to track the heat shield falling in several landing image frames, showing its descent when the frames are aligned to background surface features.

I was completely unable to get the CNSA site to load for me, with multiple attempts to download the full-resolution panorama failing. But a full version is posted to the NASA SpaceFlight forum here.

I put the long-distance image of the Lander thru a deconvolve routine (C++ modified Lucy-Richardson)
I tried to ID the PSF of the lens
GIF
Click to view attachment

I completed the sky in post-processing on the 360° panorama taken by Zhurong rover on June 16.



Panorama explorable in virtual reality.

A lot more clean sky on the second panorama than the one we got on the first batch of images. Showing difference beetween equalized Red and Blue Channels.

On the new panorama i needed to force the contrast to see some dust.

The Insight Mars lander has unexpectedly high dust levels on its solar panels due a lack of cleaning winds. Insight may therefore not have enough electrical power to continue functioning after a few more months. I have read that a lack of dust devils in orbital photos of the Insight landing site indicated that this problem would likely occur.

What I wondered is whether there is evidence of dust devils in orbital pictures of the Zurong landing site that would indicate that the regular needed cleaning events would take place?

It's a good question so I had a look. Here is an example not far from the landing site:

Click to view attachment

There are not many and they are small and faint but they do exist. Pretty much the same was true at Meridiani where cleaning events occurred often enough.

However, DD tracks are visible at InSight's location - see here:

Click to view attachment

- from this paper:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/34...tmospheric_Data

We had a post on here not long ago from Ralph Lorenz saying that they are not energetic enough to help. Not sure I understood why not but I trust him on this and we have the evidence in the lack of cleaning events.

Phil

There are two statistics one can develop from orbital images - the dust devil track formation rate (DD / km2 / Sol), and the track area generation rate (km2 / km2 / Sol). On both of those metrics, Elysium (InSight) was rather weaker than Gusev (Spirit).

If one adopts the imperfect hypothesis that removal of dust from regolith to form a visible trail is a good analog for the removal of dust from a solar panel a meter or so off the ground, then the reciprocal of the area generation rate is basically the interval between cleaning events. That interval appeared to be a few hundred Sols for Gusev, consistent with the cleaning events observed. The reciprocal of the track area generation rate at Elysium, published by Dennis Reiss and myself before the mission, was of the order of ten years, consistent with the non-observation of cleaning events so far.

Why these sites should be so different is not clear. My suspicion is that stronger background winds at Elysium suppress the formation of the largest (most intense) vortices which are needed for dust lifting. There was a bit of a clue about that in the dust devil tracks before landing - Dennis and I noted (a) that most of the Elysium tracks were much narrower than those at Gusev, and (b ) were straighter.

(a) narrow tracks suggests small diameter vortices
(b ) dust devil tracks are often cycloidal, a quasi-random rotating velocity component of a couple of meters adds vectorially to the background wind. If the background wind is stronger, you get tracks with lower sinuosity.

There may well be other factors at work (thermal inertia, regional flows suppressing the growth of the planetary boundary layer, etc.) but this is my best guess as to the reasons. If the story above holds, then at least one might be able to estimate sites of low and high dust removal potential from orbital data. And perhaps the meteorological factors can be satisfactorily predicted with global and regional circulation models.

Can the Zhurong rover reach a possible Martian mud volcano? video on YouTube

Mars Guy Episode 13 (Mars Guy is Arizona State University associate research professor Dr. Steve Ruff)

I'd be interested in the field of putative mud volcanoes to the SSW, just beyond the landing ellipse.

--Bill

New images released.

* The Dune equalized by the close-up images for reference, red channel decrease in 33%, blue channel increase by 33%, overal constrast and intensity increase by 50%.
* Impressive how the dusty over the soil is different in color from the terrain just behind it, that's why the zhurong path is so visible by Hirise.
* This contrast of colors from red to green/blue due to dust is very nice.
* Showing here side by side rock image.
* It apears to me that the botton rock at the close up zhurong path image has a very similar pattern of earth sea rock erosion holes.

Again we have dust plume at the horizon.

Panoramic images from here:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/art...tter_mailonline
and here:
https://twitter.com/ChinaEmbSL/status/1413543477275660292

Two images were taken on July 4th and were probably part of a full panorama. By aligning them with features on the distant horizon and then reprojecting them I get this view of the location on that sol.

Phil

Click to view attachment

This tweet has the newest set of images in full resolution. Attached is a sub-image of the aeroshell. Looks like we can see cables/ropes now?

Closing in, carefully. Much as we did with Oppy's heatshield.

* Nice images.

* The diferences beetween the dust, tracks, and the diferent lighter colors on the dune and the colors behind the dust on the rocks are interesting features, nice explanation above. I particularly like the effect on this rock after the zhurong pass, it would be nice to have a close-up of the rock before and after the passing.

* Added one interesting rock that Zhurong passed-by.

* In time: added the image taken by hirise from the parachute on june 06, 1 month ago. The parachute fall moved most of the red dust nearby exposing the soil. Soon we will see how the dust acted on one month period.

From that distance the aeroshell looks none the worse for wear.

Indeed. Aeolian processes are a major force on Mars. Erosion, transportation, and deposition as well as sorting. I'm looking forward to determining the composition of the light-toned material in these barchan dunes, as well as figuring a source for this material.

The Rover has given us important clues about the nature of the surface at this site. The blue color of the wheel tracks suggests that the composition of the regolith is basaltic, and the reddish color of the undisturbed ground is coated with the ubiquitous Martian iron oxide dust. I would like to see a close up.image of the wheel track.

--Bill

Would like to get a closer look at the intriguing structure and texture in this rock:

Click to view attachment

Is it a rock or a piece of fossilized mud ?

To me it resembles the weathered rocks around Hank's Hollow at the foot of West Spur in Spirit's early days. Relatively soft and looking eaten away by erosion. If you started out with soft sediments and let them weather for a billion years you might get this.

Phil

Thats a shame we don't have close-ups of the landing hole. It apears to have nice features there too. I'm pointing three, with a particular interest on the upper one... It apears to be a duplicated pattern, mabe a glitch at the camera or due to the rocket engine exaustion, but it is interesting...

That is almost certainly an artifact of the mosaic stitching.

Right! You can see the duplication continues above the rock in the area of small loose pebbles.

Phil

I thought this shot was a single frame,.. but it is indeed stitched or a selection from a panoramic that wasn't released... it apears they didn't paid atention to the shadows...

It didn't bother to stop by at the parachute...
http://www.chinanews.com/gn/2021/07-15/9520667.shtml
"As of July 15th, the rover has been working for 60 Mars days, has traveled 450 meters in total, and the orbiter has been in orbit for 357 days. The working conditions are normal. (CCTV reporter Li Xia Tao Jiashu National Space Administration Geng Yan Chen Gang)"

Extended life expected?
http://www.chinanews.com/gn/2021/07-14/9519372.shtml
"If the sun is located between the earth and the probe, it will also cause a long-term communication interruption. The operation of the probe cannot be seen on the ground, and the probe cannot receive ground instructions. In fact, these seemingly difficult issues were fully considered by scientists before the launch of the Tianwen-1 probe. Niu Junpo said that the detector has already added autonomous functions as early as the design stage. In the case of communication delays and communication interruptions, the detector can complete on-orbit operation independently without relying on ground operation and control."

This is the first ever close up look we've ever had of a parachute and aeroshell. Is my imagination getting the better of me or has the wind pushed the parachute on top of it self. Note the apparent outline, and possible dragging on the surface.

And mabe it turned over first the most of it, and a second time, later, only a small portion of it. Part of the parachute apears to be painted with the red dust, mabe this part was in contact with the ground more time then the other, or was the part dragged at the floor.

If you look at HiRISE images of newly landed chutes…they all do some version of that over the first couple of months…fold up or roll around a bit and then settle down.

Has there been a nickname floated for the Zhurong Rover, as was done for Oppy?

--Bill

I think I have seen it abbreviated to 'Rong'.

Phil

That makes sense, but it doesn't have much of a ring to it.
Not complaining; just sayin'.

--Bill

Zhu Rong is mythological and is a game character, "Said to be the daughter of the God of Fire" on Dynasty Warriors... It is just a name that don't need a nickname... One fun fact, as Zhurong rover is tall, it is almost the same height as the character, less then 10cm of difference and the hair of the character is mostly white...

"It is just a name that don't need a nickname..."
That makes sense, too. Americans tend to shorten names, especially multisyllabic names, to nicknames.
Op-por-tun-ity became Oppy and Curi-os-it-y became Cury.

It's not just Americans. The Chinese have an even greater tendency to shorten phrases to a few characters. However, as Zhurong is already the short form of 祝融号火星车 (Zhurong Hao Huoxing Che), shortening it further doesn't make a lot of sense. On the other hand, if one wanted to convey the same sort of baby-babble as Oppy, one might call it Zhuzhu.

http://www.chinanews.com/gn/2021/07-17/9522472.shtml
Passed 500m... "the second dune is about to be reached, and detailed exploration of the dune and surrounding environment is planned" It apears they will release a better batch of scientific data (images by now) on the second dune then on the first one. Lots of interesting features here... If CNSA is receiving raw frames, would be interesting to see it. But i believe all the image processing are being made by zhurong and only stitched images are coming to control center... If im wrong i would love to see more raw frames... the 2 close-up images apears to be raw frames.

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/w4rLn3Hy47Ei9dLWknGXOQ

First Chinese map of Zhurong's travels and a new image of some dust drifts.

Phil

Zhurong is making 20 meters a day, and keeping this pace with almost none long stop. Im thinking if they are trying to use the most its ground penetration radar, or have a target on south or are pushing the equipment to just increase the mileage and know what it can do, or all of that...

Adding explanation: Red line traced manually following the acumulated rover path, trying to make a guess on where it is going. Very nice article on Phil reply.

Moving much faster than Yutu-2, for instance.

Much faster! Yutu 2 can only drive about 6 days each month - 3 in the morning, 3 in the afternoon with no driving for about 6 days around lunar noon and of course no driving in the lunar night. Zhurong can drive every day. Also the surface is much smoother and they do not have to do the tricky maneuvering to place the body-mounted VNIS on a target.

Phil

Here's a link to a full-resolution view of the new image.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E69n8QIVoAAu2ui...;name=4096x4096

Given the distortion at the bottom of the image, it appears to be a segment of a larger panorama.

I assume that the red line in the image in Post293 is just a bearing from the lander to the E. Rim of that large crater.
Zhurong is moving at a fairly good clip. Do we suppose autonomous Obstacle Avoidance, or are they doing planned short segments?

--Bill

just a line traced by the acumulated rover direction.
I have read but can't find now the source, they explaining that the best direction was south, in direction of ancient ocean border.

Here's an article previously linked to which describes possible targets.

Phil

https://news.have8.tv/2863778.html

That is reasonable. I don't recall seeing an explanation, and my Chinese is rusty enough that I can't go to a first-hand source.
As I said, the rover is making good progress.

--Bill