Exploring our Solar System

Horst Uwe Keller, Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research

The following examples illustrate the usage of IDL in a variaty of research projects at the Max-Planck-Institute for Solar System Research.

The Rosetta Science Imager OSIRIS was pointed towards the ORION nebula during commissioning of the instrument after launch. The image has been created in IDL by first transforming from digital numbers (DN) to calibrated radience units and then composited into a color image by merging gray images acquired with three different optical filters of the narrow angle camera (NAC). The image has been logarithmically scaled to enhance the darker regions of the nebula.

This image shows a 3D reconstructed surface of a 4mm by 4mm section of a weathered basaltic rock on Mars, imaged by the Beagle2 microscope. The x,y resolution is 4um and the height resolution is 40um. The DTM of the surface was generated using IDL by making a polynomial fit of the image contrast for each image in a stack of images acquired at different focal positions. The 3D visualization has also been performed using IDL.

This image is constructed from data (images and spectra) taken by the DISR instrument onboard of the Huygens probe during descent towards Titan's surface. The images are stitched together and projected onto the surface to form the panorama. The spectral footprints were then overlaid. The colors indicate a progressive reddening of the spectra (from green to red) and correlate with landforms of Titan's surface. Most steps including the sophisticated calibration of the instruments were performed using IDL routines.