• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

The UA's HiRISE camera brings us photos of the Martian South Pole and a bunch of other cool shots in the latest release.

HiRISE team member Shane Byrne tells us about the above shot:

The south polar layered deposits are a stack of layered ice up to 3000 meters (9800 feet) thick which is similar to terrestrial ice sheets. In places, this stack extends up to 1100 kilometers (680 miles) from the pole and many of the impact craters surrounding this ice-sheet appear to be filled with mounds of similar icy material and also sand dunes.

This image shows the material within one of these

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

More new images from the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab's HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter are up.

HiRISE team member Ginny Gulick tells us:

This observation shows the complex, gullied western wall of a kilometer-deep impact crater in the Terra Sirenum region. This is an interesting crater because it appears to be mantled by the fluidized ejecta blanket of a slightly smaller crater just to the West.

A diverse set of gullies originate at multiple elevations along

• KAITE FLYNN
• A Mexican gray wolf at the Arizona-Sonara Desert Museum looks out of its enclosure.

Mexican wolf F521 was born in captivity at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo., in 1997 as part of the Mexican Wolf Recovery Program managed by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Later, F521 was brought to a wildlife refuge pre-release facility in New Mexico. She was paired with a male, M507. The wolves bred in captivity and were released into the wild with a litter in 2002.

Mexican wolf F521 was born in captivity at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo., in 1997 as part of the Mexican Wolf Recovery Program managed by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.Later, F521 was brought to a wildlife refuge pre-release facility in New Mexico. She was paired with a male, M507. The wolves bred in captivity and were released into the wild with a litter in 2002.

The Bluestem Pack was born and became one of the most prolific packs in Mexican wolf recovery.
Reintroduction has had its success stories like F521 and her Bluestem Pack, but the recovery program is still struggling.

Currently, the Blue Range Wolf Recovery Area, which stretches from New Mexico into Arizona, is the only area authorized to carry out recovery, said Michael Robinson, a conservation advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity.

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

We mentioned this a few days ago, but our post somehow got lost in the whirlpools of the World Wide Web. Anyways, there's a big celebration of the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab's work this Saturday on the UA mall.

Details after the jump:

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

The latest shots from the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab's HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter can be found here.

HiRISE team member Patrick Russell tells us:

This HiRISE image shows at least three isolated clouds of particles near a steep cliff in the northern polar region of Mars.

These clouds, rolling or hovering close to the ground yet reaching up tens of meters high (up to 180 feet), are likely the result of an avalanche or fall of mostly carbon-dioxide frost. The frost

The UA's Mind and Brain lecture series wraps up tonight with "Morality and the Emotional Brain."

Shaun Nichols, a professor of philosophy, will discuss:

Does morality come from the emotions, or from rational thought? Philosophers have struggled with this question for centuries. Recent work in cognitive science suggests that emotions play a critical role in the normal ability to think about morality. Studies indicate that psychopaths have a deficient understanding of morality, and when abnormalities are found in brain regions associated with emotions, these same patients make atypical decisions about difficult moral problems. Emotions alone do not completely account for moral judgment, but the emotional brain shapes our models of what it is to be moral.

This has been a fascinating series that has packed the house at Centennial Hall. Check it out tonight at 7 p.m. if you get a chance. Details here.

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

The Christian Science Monitor reports on the HiWish program run by Alfred McEwen and the HiRISE team at the UA Lunar and Planetary Lab:

Scientists with NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter yesterday released the craft's first images of the Martian surface taken at the behest of everyday folks with a keen interest in the red planet.

It's an aspect of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission scientists started in January. It's called HiWish.

So far, only about 1 percent of the Martian surface has gotten the Ansel Adams treatment from the spacecraft's high-resolution camera. From its orbit, which ranges from 200 to 400 kilometers (125 to 250 miles) above the planet, HiRISE can spot objects as small as 1 meter across on the surface.

The HiRISE team has its ever-evolving science agenda, to be sure. But "we appreciate fresh thinking outside the box," notes Alfred McEwen, the lead scientist for HiRISE. Input from the public prompts his team to "look for things we may not have chosen otherwise."

A description of the above image by HiRISE team member Lazslo Kestay:

This image covers the northern edge of the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons. The margin

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

A new batch of photos from the HiRISE camera have been posted online. These shots are from the HiWish suggestions made by members of the public.

HiRISE team member Shane Byrne tells us about this shot of the Martian north pole:

Sometimes icy layers can be ablated away during warm climates. Later the ice sheet can be buried by new ice layers and grow in size again; it's likely that many of these cycles have occurred over the ice sheet's history.

The Martian north polar layered deposits are an ice sheet much like the Greenland ice sheet on the Earth. Just as with the ice sheet in Greenland, this Martian ice sheet contains

For those of you who missed scientist-turned filmmaker Randy Olson's science and media lecture at the UA yesterday, here's a clip where the former Marine biologist discusses two PSAs in his Shifting Baselines Ocean Media Project. One of which features Jack Black and a host of other celebrities.

The Large Hadron Collider is up and running. Details here.

Mari Jensen of the UA College of Science gives us the local angle:

Now the research begins for the team of University of Arizona physicists who
built pieces of the largest scientific instrument ever, the Large Hadron
Collider.

At 4:06 a.m. Tucson time, two beams of protons smashed together inside the
Large Hadron Collider at 7 trillion electron volts, or TeV — more than
three times the energy previously achieved in a particle accelerator.

Today's collisions mark the start of a decades-long research program.
Experiments conducted using the LHC will provide fundamental discoveries
about the matter that makes up our universe.

Shortly after 4:15 a.m. Tucson time, UA-LHC team member Walter Lampl wrote
in an e-mail from Switzerland, "The first collisions arrived only a