NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC'S BEST SPACE PICTURES THIS WEEK CXIII

See a Mars Rover Selfie and Saturn's Broken Ring
By Victoria Jaggard, National Geographic News, 17 June 2016.

This week, a mystery blob disrupts one of Saturn's rings, the Curiosity rover strikes a pose at its latest drilling site, and Hubble peers deep into the colourful constellation Sagittarius.

1. Shades of Gray

NASA's Mars rover, Curiosity, stopped for a selfie after drilling into a plateau near Mount Sharp. Gray spots show where the rover took a sample of Martian soil.

2. Glitter Party

The Milky Way galaxy is brimming with stars in a variety of hues, as seen in this Hubble image of the stellar field around the constellation Sagittarius, the archer.

3. Icy Wound

NASA's Cassini probe caught an unseen object making a mess in Saturn's outermost F ring. The dusty break was probably caused by a "jet" created by the moon Prometheus.

4. Valley Vista

The floor of Marathon Valley undulates across Mars in an image by the rover Opportunity. The valley gets its moniker from the rover's odometer - Opportunity surpassed a marathon distance around the time it arrived here.

5. Shimmering Shores

An astronaut aboard the International Space Station took this picture of Lake Tengiz, the only large lake in this semi-arid grassland in Kazakhstan.

6. Mars Dust Up

Colourful curtains map the temperature of the atmosphere during an active dust storm in Acidalia Planitia - the region of northern Mars where the fictional Mark Watney was famously swept away by a storm in The Martian.

[Source: National Geographic News. Edited. Some links added.]