A snakelike Martian ridge
Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on November 22, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the science team labeled a sinuous ridge. Make sure you also look at the full image. The ridge goes on to the south, but then fades way as an almost perfect ramp, only to have another even more wiggly but thinner north-south ridge begin only a few feet to the west.
Sinuous ridges like this are found in many places on Mars. Almost always their origin is thought the result of a former river channel that became a ridge when the surrounding softer material eroded away.
That explanation however does not seem to work for this ridge. It has too many other inexplicable features. For example, note how the peak of the ridge smoothly transitions from sharp to flat-topped. It has a soft appearance that is strengthened by the gap near the top.
It is almost as if this ridge is a kind of elongated sand dune! And guess what: The overview map below gives that explanation some believability.
» Read more
Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on November 22, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the science team labeled a sinuous ridge. Make sure you also look at the full image. The ridge goes on to the south, but then fades way as an almost perfect ramp, only to have another even more wiggly but thinner north-south ridge begin only a few feet to the west.
Sinuous ridges like this are found in many places on Mars. Almost always their origin is thought the result of a former river channel that became a ridge when the surrounding softer material eroded away.
That explanation however does not seem to work for this ridge. It has too many other inexplicable features. For example, note how the peak of the ridge smoothly transitions from sharp to flat-topped. It has a soft appearance that is strengthened by the gap near the top.
It is almost as if this ridge is a kind of elongated sand dune! And guess what: The overview map below gives that explanation some believability.
» Read more