As NASA's Curiosity rover prepares to take her first long drive to a spot called Glenelg, her keepers back on Earth continue to test and inspect several of the robot's cameras and high-tech tools on its arm. These instruments, which include a drill, a camera and the dust removal tool, will eventually be used to collect and analyze samples from the ground.
In a series of "checkouts," the one-ton rolling laboratory stretched its seven-foot robotic arm and snapped a bunch of pictures of itself. The images were taken by the rover's Mars Hand Lens Imager, or MaHLI, which is designed to take very close, high-resolution images of rock and soil at Curiosity's landing site, Gale Crater.
A view of Curiosity three left wheels. The rover's ultimate destination, Mount Sharp, is seen in the background.
This pictures shows the rover's underbelly and hazard avoidance cameras on the front.
A color image of the Mars Hand Lens Imager's calibration target. The colored blocks are used as a reference point to calibrate the color in images of the Martian landscape.
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