Recent and Present-Day Martian Landscapes Form
Europlanet | 2017 Oct 27
Scientists from The Open University (OU) have discovered a process that could explain the long-debated mystery of how recent and present-day surface features on Mars are formed in the absence of significant amounts of water.
Experiments carried out in the OU Mars Simulation Chamber – specialised equipment that is able to simulate the atmospheric conditions on Mars – reveal that Mars’s thin atmosphere (about 7 mbar – compared to 1,000 mbar on Earth), combined with periods of relatively warm surface temperatures, causes water flowing on the surface to boil violently. This process can then move large amounts of sand and other sediment, which effectively ‘levitate’ on the boiling water. This means that relatively small amounts of liquid water moving across Mars’s surface could form the large dune flows, gullies and other features that characterise the Red Planet.
Jan Raack said: “Whilst planetary scientists already know that the surface of Mars has features such as dune flows, gullies and recurring slope lineae that occur as a result of sediment transportation down a slope, the debate continues about what is forming these recent and present-day active features. Our research has discovered that the levitation effect caused by boiling water under low pressure enables the rapid transport of sand and sediment across the surface. This is a new geological phenomenon that doesn’t happen on Earth, and could be vital to understanding similar processes on other planetary surfaces.” ...
What formed the recent Martian landscape?
Latest research might have the answer.
Open University, UK | 2017 Oct 27
Water Induced Sediment Levitation Enhances Downslope Transport on Mars - Jan Raack et al
- Nature Communications 8:1151 (online 27 Oct 2017) DOI: 10.1038/s41467-017-01213-z