Talk:Viking 1

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[edit] Test of General Relativity ?!

"Scientists sent radio signals to the lander on Mars, and instructed the lander to send back signals. Scientists then found that the time signals needed to make a round trip match the prediction of Gravitational Time Dilation."

Well, time dilation due to (rather feeble) gravity field of Mars will be many orders of magnitude smaller than delay due to uncertainty of Earth-Mars distance, delays in electronics which processes received signal and sends echo back, and even slight variations of signal propagation thru the solar wind.

If I am wrong, I would like to read about this experiment. Any URLs?

[edit] Did the Viking use a digital camera?

Sorry if this sounds like an obvious question but it just occured to me that the photos would have to have been transmitted electronically, meaning the photos could never have been film, right? The picture at the top of the article (with the rock left of centre) is of amazing quality for a digital camera of 1975. I never even knew they had them back then! --Matt0401 11:49, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

The Viking cameras were digital, yes, and worked kind of like a scanner, so that the image was created by sweeping a vertical line of sensors from left to right to create a panorama. This put very simple, of course. The original data is of very high quality. Ricnun 22:16, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I agree... the photos were of amazing quality for when they were taken, especially compared to most probes of the time era. Most photos from other probes of this time were plagued with bad lossy compression and low resolution. Maybe some more info on the cameras used would be a great addition to the article.

[edit] First panoramic view by Viking 1 from the surface of Mars

I don't think "First panoramic view by Viking 1 from the surface of Mars" should be the largest image presented on the page, but rather be in the thumbnail gallery section. Altough it was historically significant, it is not otherwise a very remarkable image. For one, the sun angle makes for low constrast, making it hard to see features and texture. We should seek out a better main image. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tablizer (talk • contribs) 04:25:07, August 19, 2007 (UTC).

Tablizer is probably right and there are more spectacular or detailed photos available for the article. On the other hand, if I remember well, this picture has been the subject of a couple of comments (by Carl Sagan? Arthur Clark?) about "not finding the little green men" in it and bringing Mars closer to Earth more than any previous photo: you can see the dust and the rocks and somehow it made you feel, for the first time, that you're there. Compare the resolution to previous images of Mars or Venus and check the previous comments in this page on the quality of the funny cameras (with a cilindrical lens) they used. Perhaps what the picture needs is a better caption or some text on it.--Ciroa 04:35, 3 September 2007 (UTC)


[edit] References to Viking biology experiments

I miss in the article references to Viking biology experiments, perhaps the most interesting part of the mission, at least for laymen like me. I remember clearly reading that the first reports indicated life-like activity and, later, this activity was attributed to effects of materials similar to earth clays. This deserves some explanation, I think.--Ciroa 04:33, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Was this the first landing of a man made spacecraft on Mars?

Was this the first landing of a man made spacecraft on Mars? The wording on the matter is somewhat ambiguous. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.48.128.21 (talk) 04:05, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it was the first successful landing of a man made spacecraft on Mars. Others have tried before it and either missied mars, crashed into the surface, or lost contact shortly after landing. See this table for more info: [1] Cody-7 (talk) 04:56, 7 March 2008 (UTC)