in the Arabia Terra region on Mars, it was tough – with consequences for the entire planet. The unusual leave crater suggest the researchers discovered recently.
The surface of Mars is a rugged landscape of craters – and quite dusty. Debt to the inhospitable conditions should be super volcanoes, among other things, which spewed millions of years ago ash and lava and influenced the development of the planet so significantly.
show the geologist Joseph Michalski and Jacob Bleacher at a Nature study several rock formations, which prove the existence of super volcanoes. “The discovery changed our image of volcanism on Mars basically,” says Michalski in a press release from the Natural History Museum in London.
super volcanoes differ significantly from conventional volcanoes. They produce during an eruption more than 1,000 cubic meters of volcanic material and their magma chambers are huge. In a volcanic eruption, these chambers empty, at least partially, so that it comes to the collapse of overlying large areas. What remains is a huge crater called calderas.
In Eden crater
Exactly such
have now discovered three-dimensional images of the Arabia Terra Michalski and Bleacher. The Mars region is characterized by vast deposits of laminated, fine-grained, easily erodible material of unknown origin. The theory of geologists: The dust layers are residues of the explosions of super volcanoes. A total of seven calderas, extending over several hundred kilometers, according to witness Michalski and his colleagues from the hell that is supposed to have been raging billions of years ago on the Red Planet.
The best evidence for the existence of former super volcanoes Eden Patera. The crater complex to have originated in the early history of Mars estimated from three to four billion years between the Noachian and Hesperian epoch. Today it is about 1,800 feet deep and measures at the widest point 70 km in diameter.
“Eden Patera appears to be a new class of volcanic features on Mars, created by the displacement of magma chambers in the crust and explosions, the ashes have spread regionally or even globally,” the researchers write. Thus Eden Patera is very similar to the super volcanoes on Earth, such as that beneath Yellowstone National Park in the western U.S. or the super volcano Santorini in the Aegean Sea.
- Magma
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Magma is hot, molten rock within the earth. Through underground channels and tunnel systems, this rock, which is often a silicate mixture to reach the surface. As soon as it flows out of a volcano, it is called lava . However, magma may also be blocked on their way up and then cool slowly back inside. This leads to different formations, called Intrusivstöcke.
- lava
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Once magma reaches the surface by an eruption, it is called lava. These can be blown by explosive eruptions as fine particles in the air flow in streams or. This material is called volcanic ash or volcanic ash several kilometers high and may rise as a cloud. Glowing lava is between 1,000 and 1,200 degrees Celsius hot. The solid rock that forms when the melt cools, also called lava.
- eruption
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the eruption of lava and gases from the interior of the earth are thrown on their surface and in the atmosphere.
- eruption column
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eruption column consists of a mixture of volcanic ash , including pyroclastic material and hot gases, which can be seen as a pillar above the volcano. It may extend up to thousands of meters into the air.
“It’s a meaningful interpretation of the data,” says Harald Hiesinger, a geologist at the Institute of Planetology, Muenster. None of the conventional theories would apply in this case. The structures would for example be distinguishable from normal craters that no crater and no ejecta are seen. “Therefore, it is possible that the sinks are not caused by an impact.”
New form of volcanism
is absurd that there is a thermokarst area. Such areas occur when a permafrost thaws. Because of the melting ice, the ground sinks, then fill the pit with the condensation that disappears in the course of millions of years – remain the only characteristic soil formations. “The structures in Arabia Terra, however, are much too large, as they could have by the thawing of permafrost originated with a depth of over a mile,” says Hiesinger.
Arabia Terra puts it more into the focus of scientists. “It is remarkable that described here may require a new form of volcanism on Mars,” says Hiesinger, who now hopes to further analyzes of the extraordinary crater. Still, there are multiple camera systems that deliver new data for Mars near detailed, three-dimensional map of the surface. “This is important in order to investigate the discoveries of Michalski and Bleacher further.”
If future studies support the theory of super volcanoes, some assumptions about the evolution of Mars would have to be reconsidered. Was to clarify how the atmosphere had changed by the ejected gases and the extent to surrounding deposits have formed by the ash, explains study author Michalski – and how the habitable surface of the red planet might once have been
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