The Japanese will arrange a high-quality space photo session for Mars, Phobos and Deimos. Pictures will be made available to everyone
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has announced plans to take pictures of Mars and its mysterious moons with a high-end 8K camera in collaboration with Japan’s public-public central broadcaster NHK. If possible, then humanity will be able to see the Red Planet and its satellites for the first time at such an unprecedented level of detail.
To implement the project, the two sides agreed to develop and build a Super Hi-Vision camera, which is supposed to be installed on the orbiting robotic Martian Moons Exploration (MME) probe. It is planned to be sent to the Red Planet in 2024.
The new space mission was approved by the Japanese government in February this year. Its main task will be to find answers to scientific mysteries associated with two relatively small natural satellites of Mars – Deimos, and Phobos. For example, scientists are very interested in the fact that both moons orbit the Red Planet at a very close distance. Deimos’ orbit lies only 23,500 km from the surface of Mars, which is less than one-tenth of the distance from the Earth to the Moon. Phobos’ orbit is located even closer – about 6,000 km from the planet’s surface.
In addition to the high-definition camera, the apparatus of the Martian Moons Exploration mission of the Japan Space Agency will carry 11 scientific instruments. They will allow him to study various issues related to the Martian system. Moreover, one of the tasks of the probe will be an attempt to collect soil samples from the surface of Phobos. After that, they are going to be returned to Earth for further study.
JAXA announced that the images taken from the ultra-high resolution camera will be transmitted to Earth for everyone to see. Photo files in their original form and without any correction will be recorded and stored in a special drive of the MME probe. The drive together with them is also planned to be returned to Earth.
