Tianwen-1: Chinese 2020 Mars orbiter and rover

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/shujianyang/status/1665957876240621568

Images from Zhurong rover just released by CNSA/PEC/GRAS. All taken in December 2021.

https://twitter.com/shujianyang/status/1665959152726822915

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/cnsawatcher/status/1667766617642606593

Upper Kasei Valles on Mars, shot by Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter. Pictures processed by @WLR_2678

[Dalhousie]

First results from the ground magnetometer survey are just out.

A joint research team led by Prof. Du Aimin from the Institute of Geology and Geophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IGGCAS) has found extremely weak magnetic fields during the Zhurong rover's first 1-km traverse on Mars. This indicates no detectable magnetization anomalies below Zhurong's landing site.

https://phys.org/news/2023-06-zhurong-rover-extremely-weak-magnetic.html?fbclid=IwAR0xEnxVYZddcLwR7KbK38I5et57it3uBDDx-oWlf30_fhTFgtValDCnfMY

[Dalhousie]

The magnetometer paper is open access and can be viewed at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-023-02008-7

[Dalhousie]

The climate of Mars changed dramatically 400,000 years ago


https://www.space.com/mars-climate-shift-china-mars-rover-zhurong?fbclid=IwAR0zKx-z4QWZ0zGONXlSBHJWzCQp1FRyy6XzZ73vf1MmfwP2o45wA6Zn0_g

Open access paper can be found at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06206-1

Paper explains the reasons why both light and dark dunes are present in the Zhurong rover images.

[Phil Stooke]

https://twitter.com/AJ_FI/status/1678438370291113986

A nice Tianwen-1 orbiter selfie.

[Dalhousie]

The climate of Mars changed dramatically 400,000 years ago


https://www.space.com/mars-climate-shift-china-mars-rover-zhurong?fbclid=IwAR0zKx-z4QWZ0zGONXlSBHJWzCQp1FRyy6XzZ73vf1MmfwP2o45wA6Zn0_g

Open access paper can be found at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06206-1

Paper explains the reasons why both light and dark dunes are present in the Zhurong rover images.

Figure 2K shows very nice mud cracks and what appears to be a sliding pebble.  Perhaps similar to what we find on Race Track playa, Death Valley, albeit on a much smaller scale (https://geology.com/articles/racetrack-playa-sliding-rocks.shtml)

[Vahe231991]

https://twitter.com/CNSpaceflight/status/1681496351773966336

[FutureSpaceTourist]

https://twitter.com/cnsawatcher/status/1688055557976981504

Martian surface aeolian wind erosion around 65.4E, 5.1N, taken by Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter. Source: buff.ly/3OHTQnS

[deadman1204]

https://twitter.com/cnsawatcher/status/1688055557976981504

Martian surface aeolian wind erosion around 65.4E, 5.1N, taken by Tianwen-1 Mars orbiter. Source: buff.ly/3OHTQnS

Thats a pretty awesome picture

[FutureSpaceTourist]

Edit to add:

https://twitter.com/cnsawatcher/status/1703312362437042552

Zhurong Mars rover has a "hot water bottle". Two skylights, known as heat-collecting windows, are covered with a high-transparency film. Beneath, a material called Undecane melts by day, absorbing heat, and solidifies at night, releasing warmth. Full HD: buff.ly/3LqIp1D

[FutureSpaceTourist]

Mars is near 173.4° W 13.9° S, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium resolution camera on 2022-03-04 ~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

https://twitter.com/segeryu/status/1719233087371202924

Mars is near 25.1° W 20.9° S, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium resolution camera on 2022-03-07 ~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

Mars is near 39.1° W 24.6° S, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium resolution camera on 2022-03-13 ~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

https://twitter.com/segeryu/status/1719235413544673421

Near Mars 109.1° E 26.2° S, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium-resolution camera on 2022-03-16~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

Mars near 10.7° E 31.1° N, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium resolution camera on 2022-03-14 ~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

https://twitter.com/segeryu/status/1719242859671646288

Mars is near 102.7° W 27.8° S, taken by the Tianwen-1 medium resolution camera on 2022-03-18~
(Data thanks to CAS/NAOC/GRAS)

[Dalhousie]

Buried palaeo-polygonal terrain detected underneath Utopia Planitia on Mars by the Zhurong radar
Lei Zhang et al., Nature Astronomy, November 23, 2023


As the largest basin on Mars, Utopia Planitia has both experienced and recorded variations of the Martian palaeoclimate. Layered subsurface structures have been identified by ground-penetrating radar in southern Utopia Planitia but lateral variations of the subsurface, potentially linked to the Martian palaeoclimatic evolution, have not been investigated. Here we report the lateral frequency-variation patterns of Zhurong radar reflections and interpret them as buried polygonal terrain below a depth of 35 m. Sixteen polygonal wedges were identified within ∼1.2 km distance, suggesting a wide distribution of such terrain under Utopia Planitia. The contrast above and below ∼35 m depth represents a notable transformation of aqueous activity or thermal conditions in the Late Hesperian–Early Amazonian. The interpreted buried polygons, possibly generated by freeze–thaw cycles, imply that there was a strong palaeoclimatic variability at low-to-mid latitudes (∼25° N), potentially due to the high obliquity of ancient Mars.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-023-02117-3#Fig1

[Dalhousie]

Tianwen-1 images dust storm on Mars with the MoRIC Camera.  Location is probably Lycus Sulci near Olympus Mons.


Source https://www.space.com/china-tianwen-1-mars-dust-storm-olympus-mons

[AndrewM]

"A true color Mars global image map in Robinson projection is created with Tianwen-1 MoRIC image data, the resolution of the original data is ~76 m per pixel, and the horizontal accuracy is 68 m."

https://www.universetoday.com/168317/a-global-color-map-of-mars-courtesy-of-chinas-tianwen-1-mission/

[Dalhousie]

Great newly published research by Li et al. on evidence in RoPeR GPR data  for rapidly prograding marine beach deposits.  Postulated and often fiercely debated and denied since first proposed in the 1970s, it good to see such strong evidence for it collected by the Zhurong mission.

See https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/feb/24/mars-ocean-sandy-beaches-radar-data-suggests

Link to the just-published paper can be found in The Guardian article.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

Radar data gathered by the Zhurong rover (祝融) revealed ancient ocean coastal deposits in the subsurface of southern Utopia Planitia region of Mars. In May 2022, the Zhurong rover has been switched to sleep mode and hasn’t resumed operations since. Tianwen-1 (天问一号) is China’s first Mars exploration mission with an orbiter, a lander and a rover named Zhurong (祝融).
Credit: China National Space Administration (CNSA)/China Central Television (CCTV)
Ancient ocean coastal deposits imaged on Mars
Jianhui Li, Hai Liu [email protected], Xu Meng, Diwen Duan, Haijing Lu, Jinhai Zhang, Fengshou Zhang, Derek Elsworth, Benjamin T. Cardenas, Michael Manga, Bin Zhou, and Guangyou Fang
PNAS DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2422213122

[sandha]

Tianwen-1 orbiter's high resolution camera employed to observe 3I/Atlas from Martian orbit while the orbiter was about 30 million kilometers away from the interstellar object:

http://www.news.cn/politics/20251106/227d8d9752fc4079b2bb4990bd5e252f/c.html

Google translation:

On November 6th, the China National Space Administration announced that the Tianwen-1 orbiter, using its high-resolution camera, successfully observed the interstellar object Atlas (3I/ATLAS). During the observation, the Tianwen-1 orbiter was approximately 30 million kilometers away from the target object, making it one of the closest probes to observe this celestial body to date.

What is Atlas?

Liu Jianjun, chief designer of the ground application system for China's first Mars exploration mission, explained that Atlas is the third known interstellar object to visit the solar system. It was discovered on July 1, 2025, by a survey telescope in Chile, and it traverses the solar system along a hyperbolic orbit.

This celestial object likely formed around an ancient star at the center of the Milky Way, estimated to be between 3 and 11 billion years old—potentially older than our solar system. Like an "ancient book," it is a rare sample for exploring the composition, evolution, and early stellar history of exoplanets, holding significant scientific importance.

What were the findings of this observation?

In this mission, data acquired by the high-resolution camera aboard the Tianwen-1 orbiter was received and processed by the ground application system and displayed. The images clearly show the comet's characteristics, consisting of a nucleus and a surrounding coma, with a diameter of several thousand kilometers.

"Researchers created an animation using a series of 30-second images to illustrate the object's trajectory. Based on this observational data, the team is further conducting in-depth research on Atlas," said Liu Jianjun.

What preparations did Tianwen-1 make?

The Tianwen-1 probe is already a veteran, having entered Mars orbit in February 2021 and has been operating stably for over four years in good condition. Liu Jianjun stated that the Tianwen-1 research team began preparations for the Atlas observation mission in early September.

This mission was akin to searching for a needle in a haystack in the vast universe. Due to the distance of the celestial body (approximately 30 million kilometers), its high speed (even faster than the Tianwen-1 orbiter), and its relatively small size, the target was extremely faint in Mars' orbit, making imaging incredibly challenging and placing high demands on the orbiter's attitude control and imaging strategies.

Through collaborative research, the team combined the orbital characteristics, brightness features, geometric dimensions, and the orbiter's scientific payload capabilities, repeatedly simulating and calculating to determine the use of the high-resolution camera onboard the Tianwen-1 orbiter. They meticulously designed key imaging strategies and successfully completed the observations. Simultaneously, considering the characteristics of the faint target, they pushed the high-resolution camera's imaging capabilities to their limits.

It is noteworthy that the optical payload onboard the Tianwen-1 orbiter was originally designed for photographing the bright Martian surface; this is the first attempt to photograph such a distant and relatively faint target. Liu Jianjun explained that the successful observation of Atlas was an important extension mission of Tianwen-1. The use of the detector to observe faint celestial bodies provided technical experiments for Tianwen-2 to carry out asteroid exploration and accumulated experience.