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releases 2008  Mars Express closes in on the origin of Mars'
larger moon  16 October 2008  zum Bild Phobos (Animation: DLR)
European space scientists are getting closer to unravel the
origin of Mars' larger moon, Phobos. Thanks to a series of close
encounters by ESA's Mars Express spacecraft and images captured
by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC), operated by the
German Aerospace Center (DLR), the moon looks almost certain to
be a 'rubble pile', rather than a single solid object. However,
mysteries remain about where the rubble came from.  Unlike
Earth, with its single large moon, Mars plays host to two small
moons. The larger one is Phobos, an irregularly sized lump of
space rock measuring just 27 km x 22 km x 19 km.  During the
Summer, Mars Express made a series of close passes to Phobos. It
captured images at almost all flybys with the High Resolution
Stereo Camera (HRSC). A te