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PASADENA, Calif., Jan. 6 -- The rock-strewn floor of Mars's Gusev Crater blossomed into sharp view Tuesday with the release of the most detailed image ever obtained from the planet, taken by the rover Spirit's panoramic camera in a tantalizing foretaste of things to come.
The composite image revealed a mysterious substance right at the rover's feet, which scientists described as a "strangely cohesive" clay-like material with alien textures. Spirit exposed the material when it dragged its collapsed air bags across the Martian surface to retract them after its Saturday night bounce-down.
"The way the surface has responded is bizarre," said lead rover scientist Steve Squyres of Cornell University, at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which is managing the mission. "I don't understand it. I don't know anybody on my team who understands it. . . . It looks like mud, but it can't be mud."
The material was mashed and clumped, like something moist and viscous, and was broken away in pieces at some spots. Squyres said one of the Viking landers of the 1970s might have seen something like it elsewhere on Mars. One explanation, he speculated, might be that moisture had percolated from below the surface, leaving a residue of salt that acted as cement.
A primary goal of the mission is to find out whether the dry, frigid and almost airless planet might once have had surface water and possibly supported life.
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