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NASA Orbiter Reveals Rock Fracture Plumbing on Mars

Written by thomas · Filed Under Aeronautics News 

September 26, 2008

thomas

PASADENA, Calif., Sept. 25 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — NASA’s Mars
Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed hundreds of small fractures exposed on
the Martian surface that billions of years ago directed flows of water
through underground Martian sandstone.

Researchers used images from the spacecraft’s High Resolution Imaging
Science Experiment, or HiRISE, camera. Images of layered rock deposits at
equatorial Martian sites show the clusters of fractures to be a type called
deformation bands, caused by stresses below the surface in granular or
porous bedrock.

“Groundwater often flows along fractures such as these, and knowing
that these are deformation bands helps us understand how the underground
plumbing may have worked within these layered deposits,” said Chris Okubo
of the U.S. Geological Survey in Flagstaff, Ariz.

Visible effects of water on the color and texture of rock along the
fractures provide evidence that groundwater flowed extensively along the
fractures.

“These structures are important sites for future exploration and
investigations into the geological history of water and water-related
processes on Mars,” Okubo and co-authors state in a report published online
this month in the Geological Society of America Bulletin.

Deformation band clusters in Utah sandstones, as on Mars, are a few
yards wide and up to a few miles long. They form from either compression or
stretching of underground layers, and can be precursors to faults. The ones
visible at the surface have become exposed as overlying layers erode away.
Deformation bands and faults can strongly influence the movement of
groundwater on Earth and appear to have been similarly important on Mars,
according to this study.

“This study provides a picture of not just surface water erosion but
true groundwater effects widely distributed over the planet,” said Suzanne
Smrekar, deputy project scientist for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. “Ground water movement
has important implications for how the temperature and chemistry of the
crust have changed over time, which in turn affects the potential for
habitats for past life.”

The recent study focuses on layered deposits in Mars’ Capen crater,
approximately 43 miles in diameter and 7 degrees north of the equator. This
formerly unnamed crater became notable due to this discovery of deformation
bands within it and was recently assigned a formal name. The crater was
named for the late Charles Capen, who studied Mars and other objects as an
astronomer at JPL’s Table Mountain Observatory in southern California and
at Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, Ariz.

The HiRISE camera is one of six science instruments on the orbiter. It
can reveal smaller details on the surface than any previous camera to orbit
Mars. The orbiter reached Mars in March 2006 and has returned more data
than all other current and past missions to Mars combined.

The mission is managed by JPL for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.
Lockheed Martin Space Systems of Denver built the spacecraft. The
University of Arizona operates the HiRISE camera, built by Ball Aerospace
and Technology Corp. of Boulder, Colo.

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