NASA Probe Captured High-Definition Details of the Martian River

Mars, as we know it, is a dry and cold planet. All along, some scientists believe that Mars also owned water and atmosphere billions of years ago, and tried to find evidence of the evolution of liquid water and atmosphere on Mars. After the white object was photographed by NASA's Phoenix Mars probe in 2008, and the scientist judged that this white object might be ice, the long path of exploring water on Mars began. Recently, an international research team composed of Utrecht University and British and French scientists published the high-resolution image research results on the surface of the Martian rock cliff in the "Nature News" magazine, which revealed that the surface of Mars existed 3.7 billion years ago. Evidence of ancient rivers over 100,000 years old. This is the first time that scientists have been able to observe these rock outcrops up close through orbital data and high-resolution structural analysis, and based on sedimentary stratigraphic evidence, have derived a reliable interpretation of the ancient environment.

This set of high-resolution images is taken from NASA's High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) photos taken on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Space Station. The photo was taken in the huge Hellas crater on the southern hemisphere of Mars. The southern hemisphere was hit by more craters and the average altitude was higher than that of the northern hemisphere. Mars pseudo-color topographic map-Heras Basin, a large dark blue area on the picture, with a diameter of 1430 miles (2300 kilometers), is one of the largest known impact craters on Mars and the solar system. It is believed to have been formed about 4 billion years ago. (Source: MOLA Science Team). The Heras Basin spans 2,300 kilometers and is the best-preserved impact structure on Mars and the third or fourth-largest impact structure in the solar system. The basin has a depth of more than 4 kilometers and contains a variety of 3.7 billion-year-old sedimentary plains covered with 3.3 billion-year-old lava flows. This environment has preserved evidence of the existence of huge lakes, ancient rivers and watercourse networks. Izola is a rocky outcrop on the northwestern edge of the Hellas crater on Mars. According to the latest analysis of the sedimentary orbital images of the region 3.7 billion years ago, the deep rivers in the area have been active for more than 100,000 years.

HiRISE imaging photos (a. Hellas crater topographic map; b. Izola high-definition contour topographic map; c. Izola3D view)

The author of the paper, Francesco Salese, and his colleagues studied a 1500-meter-wide and 190-meter-thick sedimentary rock stratum structure in Izola. Through research, scientists determined that this rock pile is a sedimentary rock formed by running water. Rivers will constantly change their ravines, forming riverbed landforms. After the photo is converted into a 3D view, the direction of the sediment can be clearly seen. This study demonstrates the continued river deposition on Mars 3.7 billion years ago, "similar to the Rhine or a river you can find in northern Italy," the author said in the research report.

High-definition map of the sedimentary layer taken by NASA

3D view of the deposited layer

Francesco Salese said the extremely high-resolution images allow scientists to "read" the rock as if standing close to the cliff. Unfortunately, scientists are currently unable to climb and see finer details, but the striking similarities with sedimentary rocks on Earth are hard to imagine. The research team's observations and analysis support that the water cycle on Mars is most consistent with the precipitation-driven water cycle. The rivers that formed these rock piles are not one-off events-they may have been active for tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years, Francesco Salese explained, "This kind of river that flows all the year needs water that can maintain a lot of water for a long time The environment is almost certainly a precipitation-driven water cycle process." William McMahon, a collaborator of the paper, said that Mars has an ancient record of sedimentary rocks that is even older than the situation on Earth millions of years or billions of years ago. "Sustained fluvial deposition recorded in Mars' Noachian stratigraphic record"-Salese, F. et al.-Nature Communications.

https://www.sciencealert.com/we-just-found-new-evidence-that-a-rushing-river-once-existed-on-mars

http://www.sci-news.com/space/rivers-early-mars-08404.html