{"id":484653,"date":"2026-01-01T11:55:20","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T11:55:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/484653\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T11:55:20","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T11:55:20","slug":"nasa-probe-captures-postcard-of-mars-that-blends-day-and-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/484653\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA Probe Captures &#8216;Postcard&#8217; of Mars That Blends Day and Night"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>      <img data-perfmatters-preload=\"\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/pia26680orig-800x450.webp.webp\" alt=\"A panoramic view from the surface of Mars shows rocky, barren terrain under a gradient sky, transitioning from orange to blue, with part of a rover and its equipment visible in the foreground.\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-large wp-image-832881\"  \/>Team members working with NASA\u2019s Curiosity Mars rover created this \u201cpostcard\u201d by commanding the rover to take images at two times of day. | NASA\/JPL-Caltech <\/p>\n<p>NASA\u2019s Curiosity Mars rover used its black-and-white navigation cameras to capture a panorama made up of photos taken at two different times of day on November 18, 2025. Although on the Red Planet, that time period spanned both the 4,722nd and 4,723rd Martian days, or sols.<\/p>\n<p>The panoramas were captured at 4:15 P.M. on Sol 4,722 and 8:20 A.M. on Sol 4,723, local Mars time. After the panoramas were merged together, color was later added for an artistic interpretation of the scene \u2014 with blue representing the morning panorama and yellow representing the afternoon one.<\/p>\n<p>The resulting \u201cpostcard\u201d is similar to ones <a href=\"https:\/\/petapixel.com\/2023\/06\/16\/the-inside-story-behind-curiositys-time-blended-mars-panorama\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the rover took in June 2023<\/a>. Back then, PetaPixel spoke with Doug Ellison from NASA\u2019s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in southern California, who explained the picture was years in the making. <\/p>\n<p> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/PIA25912-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"NASA Curiosity Postcard\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-large wp-image-688694\"  \/>This postcard by Curiosity was captured on April 8, 2023. It also blends two panoramas taken across two different sols. | Credit: NASA\/JPL-Caltech <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasa.gov\/image-article\/curiosity-sends-holiday-postcard-from-mars\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"follow external noopener\">NASA explains<\/a> that the scene captured on November 18 shows Curiosity at the top of a ridge referred to as a boxwork formation. These formations crisscross a region in the lower foothills of Mount Sharp, a three-mile-tall (five-kilometer-tall) mountain which Curiosity has been climbing since 2014.<\/p>\n<p>Curiosity used the drill on the end of its robotic arm to collect a rock sample from the top of this ridge at a spot nicknamed \u201cNevado Sajama.\u201d This view looks north across the boxwork formations and downslope of Mount Sharp toward the floor of Gale Crater, a vast impact crater the mountain is located within. <\/p>\n<p> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Mars-Curiosity-Rover-800x420.jpg\" alt=\"Mars rover sits on rocky terrain under a gradient sky, from orange on the left to blue on the right, with Martian hills and a dusty landscape stretching into the distance.\" width=\"800\" height=\"420\" class=\"size-large wp-image-832880\"  \/>The crater\u2019s rim can be seen far in the distant horizon, approximately 25 miles (40 kilometers) away. Wheel tracks are visible in the hollow behind Curiosity, where a sample was also drilled at a spot nicknamed \u201cValle de la Luna.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The boxwork formations are believed to have been created billions of years ago when water on ancient Mars dripped through rock cracks, carrying minerals with them. The minerals hardened after the water dried up; eons later, wind sandblasted the softer rock around these hardened minerals, exposing the ridges Curiosity is exploring today. These ridges may reveal more about the planet\u2019s watery past.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year, Curiosity captured <a href=\"https:\/\/petapixel.com\/2025\/08\/08\/nasa-curiosity-rover-captures-photos-of-coral-like-rocks-on-mars\/\" data-wpel-link=\"internal\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fascinating photographs of a rock on Mars<\/a> that closely resembles coral found on Earth. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Team members working with NASA\u2019s Curiosity Mars rover created this \u201cpostcard\u201d by commanding the rover to take images&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":484654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[219187,3091,219188,916,70636,53628,159,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-484653","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-curiosityrover","9":"tag-mars","10":"tag-marscuriosityrover","11":"tag-nasa","12":"tag-panorama","13":"tag-probe","14":"tag-science","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115819716813000369","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/484654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}