The grand Valles Marineris of Mars
Click for original image.
Time for another cool image of the grand canyon of Mars, Valles Marineris. The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on May 24, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a small section of the floor of this gigantic canyon, where orbital data has detected light-toned materials. From the caption:
Many of the Valles Marineris canyons, called chasmata, have kilometer-high, light-toned layered mounds made up of sulfate materials. Ius Chasma, near the western end of Valles Marineris, is an exception.
The light-toned deposits here are thinner and occur along both the floor and walls, as we see in this HiRISE image. Additionally, the sulfates are mixed with other minerals like clays and hydrated silica. Scientists are trying to use the combination of mineralogy, morphology, and stratigraphy to understand how the deposits formed in Ius Chasma and why they differ from those found elsewhere in Valles Marineris.
The picture however gives no sense of the monumental terrain that surrounds it.
The overview to the right is an oblique mosaic created from MRO’s context camera. The white box marks this picture’s location on the floor of Valles Marineris, in the section of the canyon dubbed Ius Chasma.
In the picture above, the small east-west ridge is really a north-facing cliff, the grade heading almost entirely downhill to the north and dropping as much as 4,500 feet to the bottom of southern canyon of Ius. The large mountain chain that divides Ius raises as much as 18,000 feet above the floor, but its top is still between 8,000 to 10,000 feet below the north and south rims. And the distance from rim to rim is more than 80 miles, eight times wider than the widest point in the Grand Canyon on Earth.
The large canyon feeding into Ius from the south suggests the materials found on the floor might have been carried here from somewhere higher, though that hypothesis is pure uneducated speculation. What one must try to understand is that seemingly small side canyon is actually comparable if not larger in some ways than most of the Grand Canyon itself.
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 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.
Time for another cool image of the grand canyon of Mars, Valles Marineris. The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on May 24, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a small section of the floor of this gigantic canyon, where orbital data has detected light-toned materials. From the caption:
Many of the Valles Marineris canyons, called chasmata, have kilometer-high, light-toned layered mounds made up of sulfate materials. Ius Chasma, near the western end of Valles Marineris, is an exception.
The light-toned deposits here are thinner and occur along both the floor and walls, as we see in this HiRISE image. Additionally, the sulfates are mixed with other minerals like clays and hydrated silica. Scientists are trying to use the combination of mineralogy, morphology, and stratigraphy to understand how the deposits formed in Ius Chasma and why they differ from those found elsewhere in Valles Marineris.
The picture however gives no sense of the monumental terrain that surrounds it.
The overview to the right is an oblique mosaic created from MRO’s context camera. The white box marks this picture’s location on the floor of Valles Marineris, in the section of the canyon dubbed Ius Chasma.
In the picture above, the small east-west ridge is really a north-facing cliff, the grade heading almost entirely downhill to the north and dropping as much as 4,500 feet to the bottom of southern canyon of Ius. The large mountain chain that divides Ius raises as much as 18,000 feet above the floor, but its top is still between 8,000 to 10,000 feet below the north and south rims. And the distance from rim to rim is more than 80 miles, eight times wider than the widest point in the Grand Canyon on Earth.
The large canyon feeding into Ius from the south suggests the materials found on the floor might have been carried here from somewhere higher, though that hypothesis is pure uneducated speculation. What one must try to understand is that seemingly small side canyon is actually comparable if not larger in some ways than most of the Grand Canyon itself.
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 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
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.