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The base of Mars’ Mount Sharp - the rover’s eventual science destination - is pictured in this August 27, 2012 Nasa handout photo taken by the Curiosity rover. The image is a portion of a larger image taken by Curiosity’s 100-millimeter Mast Camera on August 23. Image Credit: Reuters/Nasa

Experts at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, released more pictures taken by the rover, which landed at Gale Crater on the Red Planet on August 6.

One shows a panorama, in pin-sharp resolution showing individual rocks, of the landscape visible from the rover, including Mount Sharp, the slopes of which Curiosity plans to drive toward in the coming weeks and months.

John Grotzinger, the mission’s chief scientist, said the landscape looked like “something that comes out of a John Ford movie”, referring to typical backdrop in films by the classic Western director.

And he compared the tire tracks made by Curiosity, visible in some of the photos, to images of the first footprints on the Moon made by Armstrong, whose death at 82 was announced by his family on Saturday

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Nasa scientists in California comment on the newest image of the tracks left by Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars. Image Credit: AP
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Mars’ Mount Sharp - the rover’s eventual science destination - is pictured in this August 27, 2012 NasA handout photo taken by the Curiosity rover. The image is from a test series used to characterize the 100-millimeter Mast Camera on Nasa’s rover. Image Credit: Reuters/Nasa
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In this image released by Nasa on August 27, 2012, a photo taken by the Mast Camera (MastCam) highlights the geology of Mount Sharp, a mountain inside Gale Crater, where the rover landed. Image Credit: AP
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