ESA – Sandblasting on Mars

The ridges, mounds, or columns left standing when the encompassing floor is eroded away are technically referred to as yardangs, and are widespread on Mars. They’re proof of highly effective martian winds performing as a cosmic sandblaster, pulling sand grains into the air and sculpting grooves within the floor that stretch throughout tens of kilometres.

These strongly erosive, sand-laden winds dig into tender layers of sedimentary rock, discovering present cracks and sporting away the fabric there. Distinctive, elongated ridges or mounds stay standing as the encompassing floor is blasted away, forming a powerful panorama (seen clearly within the related chicken’s-eye view beneath).

In the principle picture, which covers a patch of floor virtually the dimensions of Belgium, the yardangs all slant in the identical route because of the prevailing wind, curving in from the underside left (south-east). They sit on the northern finish of the Eumenides Dorsum mountains, which have been seen earlier than by Mars Specific; these mountains prolong far out of body to the west (high) of an particularly volcanic area referred to as Tharsis, and type a part of the large, immensely dusty Medusae Fossae Formation (one other acquainted function).

The place options meet

This picture additionally captures two different fascinating forces of nature we see on the Purple Planet, with all three coming collectively to fulfill simply left (south) of the massive crater to the suitable.

First is the crater itself, which appears to be like moderately recent and is surrounded by a big, wavy-edged blanket of fabric (‘ejecta’) that was thrown out in the course of the affect that created it.

Second is a more subtle feature, visible only upon closer inspection (and marked in the annotated view): just below and beside the main bulk of yardangs lies so-called ‘platy flow’, which is somewhat reminiscent of floating ice sheets – or floes – seen here on Earth. As ancient lava moved across the terrain here, its surface crusted over. Lava continued to flow below, tugging at the solid surface, breaking it into chunks, and moving these about as solidified ‘rafts’ or ‘plates’ of lava.

As well as bordering it, the yardangs are thought to have formed atop this platy flow, indicating that they likely formed more recently.

Decades of Mars exploration

This image was captured by Mars Express’s High Resolution Stereo Camera, one of eight state-of-the-art instruments aboard the Mars orbiter.

Mars Express has been capturing and exploring Mars’s many landscapes since it launched in 2003. The orbiter has mapped the planet’s surface at unprecedented resolution, in colour, and in three dimensions for over two decades now, returning insights that have drastically changed our understanding of our planetary neighbour (read more about Mars Express and its findings here).

The Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) was developed and is operated by the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR). The systematic processing of the camera data took place at the DLR Institute of Space Research in Berlin-Adlershof. The working group of Planetary Science and Remote Sensing at Freie Universität Berlin used the data to create the image products shown here.