Featured Images

Complicated Lighting

Finally, we can see within the Shackleton permanently shadowed region (PSR)!  In this area, the floor is littered with boulders resting on a large hummocky deposit.  Brightness contrasts arise from the interplay of topography, secondary illumination, and albedo ...

Published 30 Jan, 2024

Spudis Crater PSR

Detail of the permanently shadowed region (PSR) within Spudis crater. The scalloped dark-to-light boundary shows the contact between a landslide and slump material at the bottom of the crater; the image is 2200 meters wide, ShadowCam M021022053S [NASA/KARI/Arizona State ...

Published 1 Jun, 2023

ShadowCam Captures the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter!

The Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) lunar orbiter, Danuri, flew 18 kilometers above the NASA Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter on 7 April 2023, enabling ShadowCam to capture this dramatic image of LRO. The relative velocity between the two spacecraft was 3180 meters ...

Published 10 May, 2023

Aristarchus Crater Under Earthshine

Aristarchus crater central peak (left) illuminated with earthshine; image width 4400 meters, north is up, ShadowCam image M017435200S [NASA/KARI/Arizona State University].  

Published 30 Mar, 2023

Marvin Crater

The rim of Marvin crater  (4.6-kilometer diameter) arcs across the image from left to right. The steep interior wall below the rim slopes down toward the bottom of the image. The crater interior is in permanent shadow; the exterior was in shadow when this image sequence ...

Published 13 Mar, 2023

Under Earthshine

Equatorial ShadowCam image under earthshine illumination reveals the interior of Bruce crater (6.1-kilometer diameter, 1.16°N, 0.37°E). The brighter streamers were formed as immature soil slid down the steep crater wall. These dramatic landslide deposits are common in ...

Published 20 Feb, 2023

Northern PSR

Peek into a northern hemisphere permanently shadowed region (PSR). Small deposits of dark granular material slid downslope (top) onto ledges on this steeply sloped crater wall; the relatively flat floor is seen at the bottom of the image. Four-meter pixel scale, image 4400 ...

Published 9 Feb, 2023

ShadowCam First Look

The first ShadowCam image from orbit reveals the permanently shadowed wall and floor of Shackleton crater in never before seen detail. Image 2040 meters wide, ShadowCam M012728826 [NASA/KARI/Arizona State University].  

Published 9 Jan, 2023