November 7, 2011
Two (Or Three) Ring Circus
image by Juan Miguel González Polo, Cáceres, Spain
The Basin near Schiller - or the Zucchius-Schiller Basin as it is more commonly known - is an unusual nearside basin. It is like the Grimaldi Basin in being a two-ring basin but with a possible third, inner ring. Juan's image shows some less commonly seen features. Three small hills in the middle of the inner ring depression - above the secondary chain from Orientale - could be the remnant of a central peak, except multi-ting basins don't have central peaks - somehow they morph into inner rings. The low lighting also shows two possible lava flow lobes, the first just a little way to the upper left of the largest central hill. The second one is larger and easier to see; it is near the left end of the Orientale crater chain near two or three shadowed craters. I am not sure how to interpret these delicate features but if I had only looked at the high Sun LRO Quick Map I wouldn't know they exist. Perhaps a future LRO global mosaic will be constructed with lower angles of illumination.
Chuck Wood
Technical Details
10/19/2010. 10" LX200 telescope, at f/20 + QHY5-C camera. The video, with over 600 snapshots, was stacked and processed with Registax 5 and finished with Photoshop CS.
Related Links
Rükl plate 71
Juan's website
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