North polar geysers?

exoscientist · Jul 22, 2007

Fan shaped deposits at the south pole have been attributed to CO2 gas geysers: Gas jets spawn dark 'spiders' and spots on Mars icecap. http://themis.asu.edu/news-polarjets This MOC image might show a similar process occurs at the north pole: North polar terrain. http://ida.wr.usgs.gov/html/r15000/r1500035.html Bob Clark <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Hi Bob, I think this may be relevant. Cracks within crater in Utopia Planitia. Viking 2 orbiter context image. MGS MOC 136b release. Text from the NASA / JPL/ MSSS website. Many of the craters found on the northern plains of Mars have been partly filled or buried by some material (possibly sediment). The Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) image presented here (MOC2-136b, above right) shows a high-resolution view of a tiny portion of the floor of one of these northern plains craters. The crater, located in Utopia Planitia at 44Â°N, 258Â°W, is shown on the left (MOC2-136a) with a small white box to indicate the location of the MOC image. The MOC image reveals that the material covering the floor of this crater is cracked and pitted. The origin and source of material that has been deposited in this crater is unknown. The MOC image was acquired in June 1999 and covers an area only 1.1 kilometers (0.7 miles) wide at a resolution of 1.8 meters (6 feet) per pixel. The context picture is a mosaic of Viking 2 orbiter images 010B53 and 010B55, taken in 1976. Both images are illuminated from the left. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Whilst not active geysers, I wonder if these cracks could have been in the past? The MSSS caption states that the crater infill material source is not known. Could it have erupted throgh geyser action, before the ambient Martian dust covered it? Shame that the Viking 2 lander did not land here. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Hi Bob, perhaps further evidence of northern geysers. I know this area is not exactly 'arctic', but does show some interesting aerological features. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Text from the NASA / JPL/ MSSS website. In September 1976, NASA's Viking 2 lander touched down on a rocky plain in Utopia Planitia near 48.0Â°N, 225.7Â°W. Utopia is a vast and varied region. Nearly 1,700 kilometers (~1,060 miles) west of the Viking 2 site lies a pitted and fractured plain unlike anything found by the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Orbiter Camera (MOC) elsewhere on Mars. Although the martian northern plains are often considered to be "flat" or "featureless," the MOC has shown that, at the scale of a few tens of meters, these plains aren't all flat, featureless, or even "boring". In the 2001 MOC image shown here, a suite of sharply-oulined pits and fractures indicate that the upper surface materials are strong and indurated (cemented). The parallel and polygonal alignments of fractures and pits indicate that this area has been subjected to directional stress--perhaps weaker but not unlike the stresses in the Earth's crust that cause faulting and earthquakes. The pits furthermore indicate that something has been removed from beneath the rigid, upper crusted material. Unfortunately, the image does not provide obvious or direct answers as to what the rigid, indurated upper surface is made of, nor the composition of the material underneath it that was removed to cause the pitting. Some Mars scientists have speculated that removal of ground ice could cause the pitting, but whether this is actually the case is unknown and cannot be known with any certainty from the photograph alone. Sunlight illuminates the scene from the lower left; the box at the upper right <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Found this one, it is about as interesting a watching a car rust or a puddle dry out, but it does shown many dark spots. Could these dark spots be geyser vents? This small patch of ground (about 2 km on a side) is almost at the Martian North Pole. Resolution 12.5 metres per pixel. 86Â° 42'N, 117Â° 12' W. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Also found this one, shows many dark spots at the bottom. Resolution 13 metres per pixel. 86Â° 24'N, 112Â° 34' W. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Also found this one, shows many of the features that could be from geysers. Resolution 8 metres per pixel. This is the northern most high resolution image I have found. 87Â° 7'N, 124Â° 19' W. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

3488 · Jul 23, 2007

Resolution 1 metre & 62 cm per pixel. 86Â° 33'N, 116Â° 39' W. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

exoscientist · Jul 27, 2007

Here's a blown up image of the fan deposits: http://img238.imageshack.us/img238/3719/r1500035aimgnorthpolardhy1.jpg Dana Johnson produced this blown up image on the Mars forum Markcarey.com/mars/ : North polar geysers? http://www.marsroverblog.com/discuss--north-polar-geysers.html In post #5 in that thread he noticed there are deposits on both sides of dunes that are fan shaped. On one side of the dunes, the fan-shaped deposits are more compact and not as blown out by the wind. The wind direction determines which side the more blown out deposits are on. The deposits on either sides of the dunes seem to originate from a point source at the crests of the dunes. In his post, Johnson argues the deposits are due to a liquid flow but I can't confirm this. Bob Clark <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

exoscientist · Jul 31, 2007

This report to the 7th International Conference on Mars may give another example of the north polar geysers in Fig. 4: BASAL SUBLIMATION OF THE SEASONAL CAPS AND SUB-ICE GAS FLOW: A MAJOR GEOMORPHOLOGICAL AGENT IN THE MARTIAN POLAR REGIONS. Sylvain Piqueux and Philip R. Christensen, School of Earth and Space Exploration, Mars Space Flight Facility, Arizona State University, Tempe AZ 85287, USA, ****@asu.edu. Seventh International Conference on Mars 3069.pdf http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/7thmars2007/pdf/3069.pdf In Fig. 5 of this report is also given an example of a formation that might be a north polar analogue of the "spiders" that had already been seen at the south pole. The authors also discuss polygonal terrain seen nearby. They attribute these polygons to CO2 gas release, as has been used to explain the geysers and the "spiders". However, on Earth such polygonal terrain is due to freeze-thaw cycles in periglacial regions requiring liquid water in the thaw phase. Then liquid water or brines at the poles on Mars, perhaps protected by a dust or ice cover, may be involved in the formation of the geysers and "spiders" as well. Here's the image containing possible north polar geysers in that report: Traverse across north polar scarp. http://ida.wr.usgs.gov/html/e20001/e2000185.html A follow up to that image is contained here: North polar defrosting dunes repeat portion of E20-00185. http://ida.wr.usgs.gov/html/e21002/e2100248.html The authors of the report also noted the geysers appeared to orginate from dune crests. Here is a list of MOC images of north polar dunes: MOC Images of North Polar Dunes. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

exoscientist · Jul 31, 2007

This report presented to the 7th International Conference on Mars suggests they *might* have seen one of the more common south polar geysers actively venting: HiRISE Views of the Sublimation of Marsâ€™ Southern Seasonal CO2 Cap. C. J. Hansen1 , C. Okubo2, A. McEwen 2, Shane Byrne3, E. DeJong1, K. Herkenhoff3, M. Mellon4, P. Russell5, and N. Thomas5, 1Jet Propulsion Lab, Pasadena, CA 91101, 2University of Arizona, Department of Planetary Sciences, Tucson, AZ 85721, 3USGS, 2255 N. Gemini Dr., Flagstaff, AZ 86001, 4University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, 5Physikalisches Institut, Universitaet Bern, Schweiz. Seventh International Conference on Mars 3364.pdf http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/7thmars2007/pdf/3364.pdf From the report: "Our approach was to attempt to detect dust plumes by acquiring stereo images separated by a very short time interval. Near the pole the orbit groundtracks are closely spaced allowing us to image a given location with just one orbit (~2 hour) separation. Any geyser-like activity should be detectable in stereo images as a plume rising above the surface. The hypothesis that every spot is a site of gas jets [3,4] implies that the probability of catching a geyser in action is very high." HiRISE Views of the Sublimation of Marsâ€™ Southern Seasonal CO2 Cap, p. 1. "At one location in the Manhattan Island region, using our stereo imaging technique, we may have captured a geyser in the process of eruption. It is a tenuous detection at best, very near the limits of the camera capability. The putative plume is not high above the surface (< 10m high) and is optically very thin. In stereo small bumps on the surface can be observed that may be the site of other gas jets. Figure 5 shows the bumps and small fans that may be the in <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

3488 · Jul 31, 2007

Thank you very much Bob. I will go through your links & see what else I can find. I like that link to the North polar dunes. Fantastic stuff. Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

exoscientist · Jul 31, 2007

The 3-D anaglyph *possibly* showing a geyser venting. Bob Clark <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

exoscientist · Sep 11, 2007

I have numbered the MOC images of the north polar dunes and saved them in a compressed file available at this link: http://physicsforums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=10841 (You may need to do free registration at physicsforums.com to access this.) There are over 1500 images in list. Let me know if you would like to search some of them for the fan-shaped deposits, and if you locate any within the 68N to 75N latitude zone for the Phoenix landing site. Bob Clark <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

3488 · Sep 11, 2007

Hi Bob, I am interested. I will look at your new links later. Thank you for updates on this. Phoenix is going extremely well right now, so I think we can debate what Phoenix may find, when she lands. Thanks Bob, Andrew Brown. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "I suddenly noticed an anomaly to the left of Io, just off the rim of that world. It was extremely large with respect to the overall size of Io and crescent shaped. It seemed unbelievable that something that big had not been visible before". Linda Morabito on discovering that the Jupiter moon Io was volcanically active. Friday 9th March 1979.http://www.launchphotography.com/ http://anthmartian.googlepages.com/thisislandearthhttp://web.me.com/meridianijournal </div>

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