February

February 17, 2015

The bright barchan

A piece of Mars: Most dunes on Mars are dark, like these and these. So why is this one bright? It’s adjacent to a more typical, dark dune. It’s possible that there are two populations of sand here that are […]
February 9, 2015

Sometimes I just have no idea

A piece of Mars: The smooth areas are eroded dunes, separated by fields of boulders (the scene is 1.51×1.14 km or 0.93×0.71 mi). The largest boulder near the center is 7.5 m (25 ft) across, the size of a small […]
February 2, 2015

Dunes ignoring small hills

A piece of Mars: What happens to dunes as they move over rough terrain? This is what a barchan looks like on a relatively flat surface. If the hills are smaller than the dune, then it does its best to […]