Among our various robotic minions currently exploring the solar system is a vehicle called the Mars Reconaissance Orbiter (MRO). As its name would suggest, the MRO is circling the red planet, mapping the martian surface in greater detail than ever before. It’s also taking some spectacular photographs with its on-board high-rez camera, including the one below, which Phil Plait of the Bad Astronomy Blog calls “the best Mars picture EVAH” (i.e., ever, for those who don’t speak Hipster):

And just what, you may wonder, is so great about that photo? Well, I think it’s a pretty cool shot of a major Martian landmark (Victoria Crater) just on its own terms, but the real coolness is revealed when you zoom in. See that the little silver speck on the left side of the crater? That’s the plucky Opportunity rover, which recently arrived at Victoria Crater after a long trudge across the desert from the nearby Erebus Crater. You can even see the rover’s tracks in the sand, marking the path it took from Erebus to Victoria.

Maybe you still don’t see what’s so great here, but stuff like this fills me with child-like wonder. We’ve got hardware circling another planet that can take photos of hardware that we’ve placed on the surface of the planet. Those machines are all active, moving, seeing things on our behalf and sending back the data so we can learn more. And one of these days, a photo like this may reveal a human shape standing on that dune, waving up to the passing orbiter…

Technical info on this photo and other sizes and versions of it can be found here…