Mars Express Bistatic Radar Observations in Northern Mars Plains with Possible Application to Phoenix Landing Site Characterization

Introduction: Mars Express (MEX) bistatic radar (BSR) ground tracks will not move to far northern (e.g., Phoenix) latitudes until June 2006. But the generally uniform appearance of these plains areas suggests that certain surface characteristics may be inferred from observations already in hand. Of particular interest are two MEX experiments conducted in the vicinity of the Viking Lander 2 site (Table 1).