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Solar System Montage - High Resolution 2001 Version

March 29, 2001
This is a montage of planetary images taken by spacecraft managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA. Included are (from top to bottom) images of Mercury, Venus, Earth (and Moon), Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.

This is a montage of planetary images taken by spacecraft managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, CA. Included are (from top to bottom) images of Mercury, Venus, Earth (and Moon), Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The spacecraft responsible for these images are as follows:

  • the Mercury image was taken by Mariner 10,
  • the Venus image by Magellan,
  • the Earth and Moon images by Galileo,
  • the Mars image by Mars Global Surveyor,
  • the Jupiter image by Cassini, and
  • the Saturn, Uranus and Neptune images by Voyager.
  • Pluto is not shown as no spacecraft has yet visited it.

The inner planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Moon, and Mars) are roughly to scale to each other; the outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) are roughly to scale to each other. Two other versions of this montage exist, PIA01341 and PIA00545, which include data from earlier missions. Actual diameters are given below:

  • Sun 1,390,000 km
  • Mercury 4,879 km
  • Venus 12,104 km
  • Earth 12,756 km
  • Moon 3,475 km
  • Mars 6,794 km
  • Jupiter 142.984 km
  • Saturn 120,536 km
  • Uranus 51,118 km
  • Neptune 49,528 km
  • Pluto 2,390 km

For more information on the Planets, a good place to start is the Planets section of the NASA Solar System Exploration Home Page at http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/index.cfm.