Perseverance spots a rock made of many tiny spherules
Click for wide shot. The original of the inset
can be found here.
In their exploration of the outer flanks of the rim of Jezero Crater, the science team operating the Perseverance rover have discovered an unusual rock different than everything around it, appearing to be made of many very tiny spherules.
The picture to the right illustrates this. The wider picture was taken by Perseverance’s left high resolution camera, with the inset a close-up mosaic of three images taken by the rover’s micro-imager, designed to get very very high resolution pictures of small objects. From the press release:
The rock, named “St. Pauls Bay” by the team, appeared to be comprised of hundreds of millimeter-sized, dark gray spheres. Some of these occurred as more elongate, elliptical shapes, while others possessed angular edges, perhaps representing broken spherule fragments. Some spheres even possessed tiny pinholes! What quirk of geology could produce these strange shapes?
This isn’t the first time strange spheres have been spotted on Mars. In 2004, the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity spotted so-called, “Martian Blueberries” at Meridiani Planum, and since then, the Curiosity rover has observed spherules in the rocks of Yellowknife Bay at Gale crater. Just a few months ago, Perseverance itself also spied popcorn-like textures in sedimentary rocks exposed in the Jezero crater inlet channel, Neretva Vallis. In each of these cases, the spherules were interpreted as concretions, features that formed by interaction with groundwater circulating through pore spaces in the rock.
Not all spherules form this way, however. They also form on Earth by rapid cooling of molten rock droplets formed in a volcanic eruption, for instance, or by the condensation of rock vaporized by a meteorite impact.
At the moment the science team has no idea which of these theories explains the spherules. That the rock is located on the crater rim, where ejecta from the impact will be found, strongly suggests the impact was the cause, not groundwater flow.
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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
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 wide shot. The original of the inset
can be found here.
In their exploration of the outer flanks of the rim of Jezero Crater, the science team operating the Perseverance rover have discovered an unusual rock different than everything around it, appearing to be made of many very tiny spherules.
The picture to the right illustrates this. The wider picture was taken by Perseverance’s left high resolution camera, with the inset a close-up mosaic of three images taken by the rover’s micro-imager, designed to get very very high resolution pictures of small objects. From the press release:
The rock, named “St. Pauls Bay” by the team, appeared to be comprised of hundreds of millimeter-sized, dark gray spheres. Some of these occurred as more elongate, elliptical shapes, while others possessed angular edges, perhaps representing broken spherule fragments. Some spheres even possessed tiny pinholes! What quirk of geology could produce these strange shapes?
This isn’t the first time strange spheres have been spotted on Mars. In 2004, the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity spotted so-called, “Martian Blueberries” at Meridiani Planum, and since then, the Curiosity rover has observed spherules in the rocks of Yellowknife Bay at Gale crater. Just a few months ago, Perseverance itself also spied popcorn-like textures in sedimentary rocks exposed in the Jezero crater inlet channel, Neretva Vallis. In each of these cases, the spherules were interpreted as concretions, features that formed by interaction with groundwater circulating through pore spaces in the rock.
Not all spherules form this way, however. They also form on Earth by rapid cooling of molten rock droplets formed in a volcanic eruption, for instance, or by the condensation of rock vaporized by a meteorite impact.
At the moment the science team has no idea which of these theories explains the spherules. That the rock is located on the crater rim, where ejecta from the impact will be found, strongly suggests the impact was the cause, not groundwater flow.
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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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
The individual nodules appear almost glassy, which would also lend itself to them being remnants of an impact into an area consisting mostly of silicon dioxide (sand).
Bear in mind that this is just me BS-ing about something I know next to nothing about (geology).
Is there anything analogous to this found in Earth geology?
Surely this warrants a drilling and one of those sample tubes?
Offgassing of dissolved volatiles (water vapor, CO2, etc) from volcanic rock at eruption often results in ‘bubbles’ of gas (vesicular basalt for example) and even ‘froth’ (pumice). Whether from a volcanic source or from melting of rock following an impact, it occurs to me that offgassing on Mars may result in larger or at least different ‘bubbles’ due to the much lower density of the martian atmosphere. Gas bubbles could expand more dramatically because of the greater pressure differential. Wild-looking rock in any case!
Or perhaps a fossil of early bacterial life on the red planet…. I was intrigued by the “blueberry’s” opportunity discovered pretty much as soon as it landed. Perhaps early life on Mars favoured a spherical form? Or perhaps I’m just hoping too much… Either way, it’s an extremely interesting lump of rock… Let’s hope Perseverance gets some good close ups and takes a sample on the off chance we will ever get it’s samples back to earth.
Iron oxide nodules from a meteorite?
And as an aside…. It’s intriguing that the rock is all on its own… If it is a product of an impact event, you would expect to see bits scattered over the whole area….. My current best theory is that it was dropped in the rovers path, by Martians, just to mess with us.
Spiders eggs. Similar to…
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/6e/3e/c4/6e3ec4f25e498e90d9c2bc7f1b720555.jpg