Nasa has released new photographs of the surface of Mars taken by the Curiosity rover.

They include a stunning panoramic colour image of Gale Crater, the vast basin in which the nuclear-powered, six-wheeled rover touched down on Sunday following its eight month journey.

During a news conference, Nasa officials said the new images were crucial to understanding the Martian landscape.

"The images have given us our first sense of what the terrain is like and we are now discussing what it means in the broader context, ways that it might have formed, what observations we can make to understand how it formed," said Dawn Sumner.

Curiosity's primary mission is to search for signs of life on the planet most similar to Earth.

Scientists expect it will be months before Curiosity heads to the 3-mile high mountain at the centre of the crater, the primary target for the two-year science mission.