Olympus Mons is a large shield volcano on Mars. It is over 21.9 km high as measured by the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter (MOLA), and is about two and a half times Mount Everest's height above sea level. It is Mars's largest volcano, its tallest planetary mountain, and is approximately tied with Rheasilvia on Vesta as the tallest mountain currently discovered in the Solar System. It is associated with the Tharsis Montes, a large volcanic region on Mars. It last erupted 25 million years ago.
Regolith is a blanket of unconsolidated, loose, heterogeneous superficial deposits covering solid rock. It includes dust, broken rocks, and other related materials and is present on Earth, the Moon, Mars, some asteroids, and other terrestrial planets and moons.
Volcanic glass is the amorphous (uncrystallized) product of rapidly cooling magma. Like all types of glass, it is a state of matter intermediate between the closely packed, highly ordered array of a crystal and the highly disordered array of liquid. Volcanic glass may refer to the interstitial material, or matrix, in an aphanitic (fine-grained) volcanic rock, or to any of several types of vitreous igneous rocks.
In planetary geology, a ray system comprises radial streaks of fine ejecta thrown out during the formation of an impact crater, looking somewhat like many thin spokes coming from the hub of a wheel. The rays may extend for lengths up to several times the diameter of their originating crater, and are often accompanied by small secondary craters formed by larger chunks of ejecta. Ray systems have been identified on the Moon, Earth, Mercury, and some moons of the outer planets. Originally it was thought that they existed only on planets or moons lacking an atmosphere, but more recently they have been identified on Mars in infrared images taken from orbit by 2001 Mars Odyssey's thermal imager.
Alba Mons is a volcano located in the northern Tharsis region of the planet Mars. It is the biggest volcano on Mars in terms of surface area, with volcanic flow fields that extend for at least 1,350 km (840 mi) from its summit. Although the volcano has a span comparable to that of the United States, it reaches an elevation of only 6.8 km (22,000 ft) at its highest point. This is about one-third the height of Olympus Mons, the tallest volcano on the planet. The flanks of Alba Mons have very gentle slopes. The average slope along the volcano's northern flank is 0.5°, which is over five times lower than the slopes on the other large Tharsis volcanoes. In broad profile, Alba Mons resembles a vast but barely raised welt on the planet's surface. It is a unique volcanic structure with no counterpart on Earth or elsewhere on Mars.
Amazonis Planitia is one of the smoothest plains on Mars. It is located between the Tharsis and Elysium volcanic provinces, to the west of Olympus Mons, in the Amazonis and Memnonia quadrangles, centered at 24.8°N 196.0°E. The plain's topography exhibits extremely smooth features at several different lengths of scale. A large part of the Medusae Fossae Formation lies in Amazonis Planitia.
Sideromelane is a vitreous basaltic volcanic glass, usually occurring in palagonite tuff, for which it is characteristic. It is a less common form of tachylite, with which it usually occurs together; however it lacks the iron oxide crystals dispersed in the glass, and therefore appears transparent and pure, with yellow-brown color, instead of tachylite opaque black. It forms at higher temperatures and with more rapid chilling. Presence of sideromelane indicates higher temperature of the lava, and solidifying of the flow closer to the vent, probably by rapid quenching in a wet environment.
A cinder cone is a steep conical hill of loose pyroclastic fragments, such as volcanic clinkers, volcanic ash, or scoria that has been built around a volcanic vent. The pyroclastic fragments are formed by explosive eruptions or lava fountains from a single, typically cylindrical, vent. As the gas-charged lava is blown violently into the air, it breaks into small fragments that solidify and fall as either cinders, clinkers, or scoria around the vent to form a cone that often is symmetrical; with slopes between 30 and 40°; and a nearly circular ground plan. Most cinder cones have a bowl-shaped crater at the summit.
Olympia Undae is a vast dune field in the north polar region of the planet Mars. It consists of a broad "sand sea" or erg that partly rings the north polar plateau from about 120° to 240°E longitude and 78° to 83°N latitude. Stretching about 1,100 km (680 mi) across and covering an area of 470,000 km2, Olympia Undae is the largest continuous dune field on Mars. It is similar in size to the Rub' Al Khali in the Arabian Peninsula, the largest active erg on Earth.
Bruce Martin Jakosky is a professor of Geological Sciences and associate director of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He has been involved with the Viking, Solar Mesosphere Explorer, Clementine, Mars Observer, Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Odyssey, Mars Science Laboratory and MAVEN spacecraft missions, and is involved in planning future spacecraft missions.
Volcanic activity, or volcanism, has played a significant role in the geologic evolution of Mars. Scientists have known since the Mariner 9 mission in 1972 that volcanic features cover large portions of the Martian surface. These features include extensive lava flows, vast lava plains, and the largest known volcanoes in the Solar System. Martian volcanic features range in age from Noachian to late Amazonian, indicating that the planet has been volcanically active throughout its history, and some speculate it probably still is so today. Both Earth and Mars are large, differentiated planets built from similar chondritic materials. Many of the same magmatic processes that occur on Earth also occurred on Mars, and both planets are similar enough compositionally that the same names can be applied to their igneous rocks and minerals.
Martian soil is the fine regolith found on the surface of Mars. Its properties can differ significantly from those of terrestrial soil, including its toxicity due to the presence of perchlorates. The term Martian soil typically refers to the finer fraction of regolith. So far, no samples have been returned to Earth, the goal of a Mars sample-return mission, but the soil has been studied remotely with the use of Mars rovers and Mars orbiters.
A lunar regolith simulant is a terrestrial material synthesized in order to approximate the chemical, mechanical, or engineering properties of, and the mineralogy and particle size distributions of, lunar regolith. Lunar regolith simulants are used by researchers who wish to research the materials handling, excavation, transportation, and uses of lunar regolith. Samples of actual lunar regolith are too scarce, and too small, for such research, and have been contaminated by exposure to Earth's atmosphere.
The Noachian is a geologic system and early time period on the planet Mars characterized by high rates of meteorite and asteroid impacts and the possible presence of abundant surface water. The absolute age of the Noachian period is uncertain but probably corresponds to the lunar Pre-Nectarian to Early Imbrian periods of 4100 to 3700 million years ago, during the interval known as the Late Heavy Bombardment. Many of the large impact basins on the Moon and Mars formed at this time. The Noachian Period is roughly equivalent to the Earth's Hadean and early Archean eons when the first life forms likely arose.
Hesperia Planum is a broad lava plain in the southern highlands of the planet Mars. The plain is notable for its moderate number of impact craters and abundant wrinkle ridges. It is also the location of the ancient volcano Tyrrhena Mons. The Hesperian time period on Mars is named after Hesperia Planum.
CheMin, short for Chemistry and Mineralogy, is an instrument located in the interior of the Curiosity rover that is exploring the surface of Gale crater on Mars. David Blake, from NASA Ames Research Center, is the Principal Investigator.
Martian lava tubes are volcanic caverns on Mars that are believed to form as a result of fast-moving, basaltic lava flows associated with shield volcanism. Lava tubes usually form when the external surface of the lava channels cools more quickly and forms a hardened crust over subsurface lava flows. The flow eventually ceases and drains out of the tube, leaving a conduit-shaped void space which is usually several meters below the surface. Lava tubes are typically associated with extremely fluid pahoehoe lava. Gravity on mars is about 38% that of Earth's, allowing Martian lava tubes to be much larger in comparison.
Martian regolith simulant is a terrestrial material that is used to simulate the chemical and mechanical properties of Martian regolith for research, experiments and prototype testing of activities related to Martian regolith such as dust mitigation of transportation equipment, advanced life support systems and in-situ resource utilization.
Von Kármán is an impact crater in the Argyre quadrangle of Mars, located at 64.6°S latitude and 58.5°W longitude. It is 90 km (56 mi) in diameter. It was named after Hungarian-American aeronautical engineer Theodore von Kármán.
Astropedology is the study of very ancient paleosols and meteorites relevant to the origin of life and different planetary soil systems. It is a branch of soil science (pedology) concerned with soils of the distant geologic past and of other planetary bodies to understand our place in the universe. A geologic definition of soil is “a material at the surface of a planetary body modified in place by physical, chemical or biological processes”. Soils are sometimes defined by biological activity but can also be defined as planetary surfaces altered in place by biologic, chemical, or physical processes. By this definition, the question for Martian soils and paleosols becomes, were they alive? Astropedology symposia are a new focus for scientific meetings on soil science. Advancements in understanding the chemical and physical mechanisms of pedogenesis on other planetary bodies in part led the Soil Science Society of America (SSSA) in 2017 to update the definition of soil to: "The layer(s) of generally loose mineral and/or organic material that are affected by physical, chemical, and/or biological processes at or near the planetary surface and usually hold liquids, gases, and biota and support plants". Despite our meager understanding of extraterrestrial soils, their diversity may raise the question of how we might classify them, or formally compare them with our Earth-based soils. One option is to simply use our present soil classification schemes, in which case many extraterrestrial soils would be Entisols in the United States Soil Taxonomy (ST) or Regosols in the World Reference Base for Soil Resources (WRB). However, applying an Earth-based system to such dissimilar settings is debatable. Another option is to distinguish the (largely) biotic Earth from the abiotic Solar System, and include all non-Earth soils in a new Order or Reference Group, which might be tentatively called Astrosols.
