Mysterious Crater Deposits
NASA/JPL-Caltech/UArizona
Mysterious Crater Deposits
ESP_076130_2165  Science Theme: Fluvial Processes
HiRISE images often raise more questions than answers. For example, this image of the northern plains of Arabia Terra shows craters that contain curious deposits with mysterious shapes and distribution.

The deposits are found only in craters larger than 600 meters in diameter and are absent from craters measuring 450 meters and less. The deposits are located on the south sides of the craters but not in the north (although the cutout shows a crater that also has windblown deposits in the north). The deposits have horizontal laminations that could be layers or terraces. The deposits also have radial striations formed by small bright ridges.

We suspect that these features formed by sublimation of ice-rich material. The terraces might represent different epochs of sublimation. Perhaps the larger craters penetrated to a water table between 45 and 60 meters below the surface and were flooded after formation.

Written by: Paul Geissler  (14 December 2022)
 
Acquisition date
23 October 2022

Local Mars time
14:15

Latitude (centered)
36.224°

Longitude (East)
0.483°

Spacecraft altitude
294.6 km (183.1 miles)

Original image scale range
59.3 cm/pixel (with 2 x 2 binning) so objects ~178 cm across are resolved

Map projected scale
50 cm/pixel and North is up

Map projection
Equirectangular

Emission angle
7.0°

Phase angle
54.7°

Solar incidence angle
60°, with the Sun about 30° above the horizon

Solar longitude
326.2°, Northern Winter

For non-map projected images
North azimuth:  96°
Sub-solar azimuth:  314.7°
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POSTSCRIPT
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The HiRISE camera was built by Ball Aerospace and Technology Corporation and is operated by the University of Arizona.