HiPOD: Saturday, 12 September 2020
Folded Layers in Melas Chasma

Folded Layers in Melas Chasma
There are folded layered deposits in the bottom half of this image. How did this folding occur? On Earth, rocks are commonly folded when deeply buried and subject to high heat and pressure, which can make any rock flow. Such deep burial (and re-exposure or exhumation) is unlikely at this location.

In general Mars has experienced much less vertical motion of geologic strata than on Earth. Another possibility is that these layers were soft and deformable near the surface, such as wet or icy sediments. There are other folded layers in the giant Hellas impact basin, such as ESP_025780_1415.

ID: ESP_026312_1700
date: 7 March 2012
altitude: 264 km

https://uahirise.org/hipod/ESP_026312_1700
NASA/JPL-Caltech/UArizona
#Mars #science #NASA

Black & white is less than 5 km across; enhanced color is less than 1 km. For full observation details, visit the ID link.