A field of Martian knobs
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on August 9, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). Uncaptioned, the image is merely dubbed a “knob field.”
I won’t spend much time trying to explain this geology. It might be related to pedestal craters, but these ridges and mesas don’t really look like those features, since they don’t really stand above the surrounding terrain.
Maybe they are a very ancient field of craters long buried, now partly exposed due to erosion, but also partly buried by wind-blown Martian sand and dust. Once again, that many of their shapes don’t resemble craters discounts this explanation.
The location of this photo is in the southern cratered highlands, as shown by the black cross in the overview map below.
Noachis Terra, with its many craters, is considered some of the oldest terrain on Mars, formed during the Late Heavy Bombardment period about 4 billion years ago when the planets in the inner solar system were consolidating by incessant impacts from the crowded debris disk surrounding the Sun. This history favors an impact explanation.
This particular feature is also likely located in a very dry place on Mars, at 15 degrees north latitude close to the equator. Since pedestal craters are thought to form when an impact lands on what was once an icy plain — which subsequently sublimated away to leave the crater above the surrounding terrain — it is unlikely that explains these features. Noachis Terra was probably never an icy plain, though it would be a mistake to rule this out completely. Over Mars’ long history, with its wildly swinging rotational tilt, ice could have once been here.
In the end, we simply could be looking at the remains of some geological feature that was created by processes we can’t guess at with the data available. To get an answer will require some digging, either here on Earth (to find research papers on the subject) or on Mars, at the location itself. The former is possible. The latter is years in the future.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on August 9, 2020 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). Uncaptioned, the image is merely dubbed a “knob field.”
I won’t spend much time trying to explain this geology. It might be related to pedestal craters, but these ridges and mesas don’t really look like those features, since they don’t really stand above the surrounding terrain.
Maybe they are a very ancient field of craters long buried, now partly exposed due to erosion, but also partly buried by wind-blown Martian sand and dust. Once again, that many of their shapes don’t resemble craters discounts this explanation.
The location of this photo is in the southern cratered highlands, as shown by the black cross in the overview map below.
Noachis Terra, with its many craters, is considered some of the oldest terrain on Mars, formed during the Late Heavy Bombardment period about 4 billion years ago when the planets in the inner solar system were consolidating by incessant impacts from the crowded debris disk surrounding the Sun. This history favors an impact explanation.
This particular feature is also likely located in a very dry place on Mars, at 15 degrees north latitude close to the equator. Since pedestal craters are thought to form when an impact lands on what was once an icy plain — which subsequently sublimated away to leave the crater above the surrounding terrain — it is unlikely that explains these features. Noachis Terra was probably never an icy plain, though it would be a mistake to rule this out completely. Over Mars’ long history, with its wildly swinging rotational tilt, ice could have once been here.
In the end, we simply could be looking at the remains of some geological feature that was created by processes we can’t guess at with the data available. To get an answer will require some digging, either here on Earth (to find research papers on the subject) or on Mars, at the location itself. The former is possible. The latter is years in the future.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Readers: the rules for commenting!
No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.
However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.
Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.