NASA: Five new photos of Mars from Curiosity rover

(CBS News) NASA released five new photos of Mars Tuesday, taken from the Curiosity rover.

Some of the stunning color photos show exactly where the Curiosity landed on Mars in the northern region of the planet.

NASA: Curiosity "brain transplant" successful
NASA's latest color image of Mars from Curiosity rover

The color-enhanced photos were taken with the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, showing new details of Mars' terrain like never before.

New photos of Mars were released following a press conference to report the status of the Curiosity, just over a week after landing on the red planet on Aug. 5.

The space agency reported that a four-day software update replaced software that was installed on the Curiosity before its flight from Earth to Mars. The original software gave the rover the navigational capabilities it needed for the journey to Mars, but not enough to carry out scientific work NASA has planned for Curiosity.

This color-enhanced photo shows the terrain of Mars in the Gale Crater, near where the Curiosity rover landed.

/ NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

Ashwin Vasavada, senior scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory said the Curiosity will also be taking its first full 24-hour weather readings this week. Mars enthusiast can also expect to see more panorama images of Mount Sharp in the coming days.

The Curiosity Mars rover shows up in this false-color photo taken by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter as a shiny blue dot on the floor of Gale Crater. The blast pattern of the rover's sky crane descent engines can be seen to either side.

/ NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

More photos of Mars from the Curiosity rover below.

63 Photos

Mars rover Curiosity: Images from the Red Planet

[mooring7]

It is reasonable to conclude that as a nation we will spend and create and do anything possible to find out where we came from but very little to improve the idea of where are we going.

[formerlyluvnut]

If we ever actually send anyone up there they need to take a HUGE dumpster with them & start picking up all our trash.

[takacrat]

When they find Elvis or JFK then I would agree about going to Mars. We tryed to find them on the Moon but that Misson went bust!

[formerlyluvnut]

Tried. It's spelled tried. Here on Earth anyway.

[karek40]

Anyone notice the abundance of life on mars, green grass, insects, microbes, etc. Didn't see em, anyone wonder why? Mars has been there for as long or longer than the earth. Evolution what happened, conditions not just right or no cambrian period where different life forms sprang forth in abundance. Hmmm

[unclebernies]

It's nice to explore new worlds but i'm a skeptic of how man in the past has had a record of destroying what they found. And i'm talking right here on earth.

[alpinequeen]

Curiosity should have landed in the Cydonia region near the "face" on Mars to see what's going on there. Never mind looking for signs of microbial life, look for signs of alien artifacts, if that is what they are.

[thEBuLSHiaR]

I fully agree! It's clearly something in that region lined up with the Pleiades system, which so many of our ancient earth monuments are lined up with!

[Phil__D]

Not to be pedantic, CBS, but these pics are not taken FROM the rover, they are OF the rover from orbit. The title and first line make it clear the writer of this article doesn't know the Orbiter and rover are different things.

[obicera1]

What do you expect? Our nation ranks 22nd in science, hardly the "greatest nation on earth". Actually, we are pretty pitiful.

[signseeker1717]

Headlines and stories are usually assigned to DIFFERENT writers.

This may explain why so many headlines don't seem to acurately reflect the content of the stories. It's also possible headlines may be machine-generated from content key words.

The issue is a lack of coordination between the headline and story writers, not necessarily a lack of subject matter knowledge. That lack of continuity is ultimately the reponsibility of copy editors.

In the haste to post timely stories, sloppy journalism may be the true culprit here.

[rwsmith29456]

I'm glad to see some scientific study going on, considering that otherwise we are becoming a nation of sitting on our duffs and let other people do it.

[obicera1]

Seems that the DOD has two better than Hubble telescopes lying around. If only NASA had DOD's money.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/12/06/hey-brother-can-you-spare-a-hubble-dod-sure-have-two/258061

[cozzicon]

Not all Americans are ignoring this. I'm not. I'm so proud.

[jaimieandlis]

I think this is a complete waste of time and money. Who cares about Mars? Do you think it's a wise investment to build something that once used can't ever be brought back?

[jaykay3141]

Never took a science class in your life, right, Jamie? No curiosity (pun intended)? No desire to learn anything about this incredible universe we live in?

And what do you mean "used once"? It didn't just take a single snapshot and go cold. It'll be returning information for YEARS.

Please go back to watching American "Idle" and Survivor - MegaMall.