Photo Agency - Astronomy - Space - Nature

> Part of the dark side of the moon.

Part of the dark side of the moon.

author: Nasa/Novapix

reference: a-lun05-00100

Image Size 300 DPI: 9 * 9 cm

This color image of the Moon was taken by the Galileo spacecraft at 9:35 a.m. PST Dec. 9, 1990, at a range of about 350,000 miles. The color composite uses monochrome images taken through violet, red, and near-infrared filters. The concentric, circular Orientale basin, 600 miles across, is near the center; the near side is to the right, the far side to the left. At the upper right is the large, dark Oceanus Procellarum; below it is the smaller Mare Humorum. These, like the small dark Mare Orientale in the center of the basin, formed over 3 billion years ago as basaltic lava flows. At the lower left, among the southern cratered highlands of the far side, is the South-Pole-Aitken basin, similar to Orientale but twice as great in diameter and much older and more degraded by cratering and weathering.

Keywords for this photo:

1990 - ASTRONOMY - FAR SIDE - GALILEO - MARE ORIENTALE - MOON - OCEANUS PROCELLARUM - SATELLITE - SEA -