Patterned frozen lava in Mars’ volcano country
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and enhanced to post here, was taken on May 31, 2025 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The camera team label this “patterned ground.” And it is indeed. Though the topography is almost flat for large distances, the ground itself has these various patterns on it, from meandering small ridges to stippled roughness to very smooth sections.
The location is at 4.6 degrees north latitude, in the dry equatorial regions of Mars. No near surface ice created these features. All we can deduce from this picture is that this landscape is relatively young, as there are no craters seen.
So what caused these features? The location as always provides a clue.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, within the southeastern flood lava flow of the Athabasca Valles eruption, considered to be the youngest major lava event on Mars, having taken place an estimated 600 million years ago. Athabasca itself is only one of the numerous lava events that coat this entire vast region between Mars’ giant volcanos.
A close look at the inset shows the smooth streaks in this flood lava are related somehow with the two-mile wide unnamed crater to the southeast. That crater is relative recent, smashing into this hard frozen lava plain so that it appears to have not penetrated very deeply.
I suspect the melt from this impact flowed northeast, producing the new bright and smooth layer of melt sitting above the older Athabasca lava.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and enhanced to post here, was taken on May 31, 2025 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
The camera team label this “patterned ground.” And it is indeed. Though the topography is almost flat for large distances, the ground itself has these various patterns on it, from meandering small ridges to stippled roughness to very smooth sections.
The location is at 4.6 degrees north latitude, in the dry equatorial regions of Mars. No near surface ice created these features. All we can deduce from this picture is that this landscape is relatively young, as there are no craters seen.
So what caused these features? The location as always provides a clue.
The white dot on the overview map to the right marks the location, within the southeastern flood lava flow of the Athabasca Valles eruption, considered to be the youngest major lava event on Mars, having taken place an estimated 600 million years ago. Athabasca itself is only one of the numerous lava events that coat this entire vast region between Mars’ giant volcanos.
A close look at the inset shows the smooth streaks in this flood lava are related somehow with the two-mile wide unnamed crater to the southeast. That crater is relative recent, smashing into this hard frozen lava plain so that it appears to have not penetrated very deeply.
I suspect the melt from this impact flowed northeast, producing the new bright and smooth layer of melt sitting above the older Athabasca lava.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Wow, look at that mountain/rock in the overview picture that’s in line with the slightly oval impact crater. It must be huge because it shadow is as long as the shadow in the crater. Could it possibly be the astroid that created the crater? Mars version of Ayres rock? (Vibranium to survive an impact and stay intact?)
Unobtainium or just leaveright? (as in “leave it right there”) Somebody contact Iron Man Elon musk… good find.
Max: That mountain is not huge, only about 400 to 600 feet high. Go to this website:
https://murray-lab.caltech.edu/CTX/V01/SceneView/MurrayLabCTXmosaic.html
Locate the hill using the lat/long at the MRO image page, and use the profile tool to get the height.
I’ve suggested this site to you previously. It is always better to use the known facts than to guess.