Estimation of Aeolian Dune Migration Over Martian Surface Employing High Precision Photogrammetric Measurements

Abstract

ABSTRACT:At the present time, arguments continue regarding the migration speeds of Martian dune fields and their correlation with atmospheric circulation. However, precisely measuring the spatial translation of Martian dunes has been rarely successful due to the technical difficulties to quantitatively observe expected small surface migrations. Therefore, we developed a generic procedure to measure the migration of dune fields employing a high-accuracy photogrammetric processor and sub-pixel image correlator on the 25-cm resolution High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE). The established algorithms have been tested over a few Martian dune fields. Consequently, migrations over well-known crater dune fields appeared to be almost static for the considerable temporal periods and were weakly correlated with wind directions estimated by the Mars Climate Database. Only over some Martian dune fields, such as Kaiser crater, meaningful migration speeds (>1m/year) considering photogrammetric error residual have been detected. Currently a technically improved processor to compensate error residual using time series observation is under development and expected to produce the long term migration speed over Martian dune fields where constant HiRISE image acquisitions are available.