NASA Unveils The Blue Marble Beauty With A 64MP Image Of Earth

A picture speaks a thousand words. This picture speaks a thousand worlds.

NASA has revealed a 64 million pixel image of Planet Earth captured from one of its satellites on January 4th, 2012. The image which measures 8000x8000 is a beautiful impression of the blue planet and was uploaded by NASA to its Most Amazing High Definition Image of Earth - Blue Marble … | Flickr on January 25th 2012. The image, named 'Blue Marble' by NASA, has been viewed more than 1.3 million times since.

NASA has been publishing pictures taken from satellites for a while now. The first image was taken by the famous Apollo 17 and came to be known as the Blue Marble photo.  There have been a number of 'Blue Marble' photos, the latest in the string being the one released on January 25th which depicts a portion of the globe containing North America.

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The image is actually a composite, made up of a number of photos of Earth taken through the satellite on January 4th. The image was shot from the Suomi NPP satellite, which is a new generation satellite launched by NASA recently for observation purposes. The satellite sits 512 miles above the Earth, enjoying a complete view of the planet.

The VIIRS (Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite) instrument aboard the satellite is responsible for the brilliant capture. VIIRS is designed to span the surface of the earth in long stretches measuring approximately 3,000 kilometers (1,900 miles) across. With an ability to see the Earth at around 250 metres per pixel, the VIIRS will serve purposes of recording a variety of things such as ocean temperature, clouds, and the location of fires.

A composite image of the Earth was also previously taken and was released in November 2011.

Source & Image Credit: 64MP image of earth shot by NASA | TechRadar

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