This animation, composed of four images taken by the front hazard-identification camera on the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit, shows the rover stretching out its robotic arm, or instrument deployment device. This is the first use of the arm on Mars to deploy the microscopic imager, one of four geological instruments located on the arm. (NASA website)

     This animation strings together five different snapshots of the martian soil captured by the microscopic imager onboard the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. (NASA website)

the rover's robotic arm (NASA website)

a close-up look at a patch of martian soil (NASA website)