April

April 25, 2016

Old ripples

A Piece of Mars: In this 480×270 m scene (0.3×0.17 mi), there are a bunch of “ripples” spaced by 5-20 m (the quotes are because we don’t know yet if these are ripples, dunes, or some other new kind of […]
April 19, 2016

Stripes by wind and gravity

A Piece of Mars: This scene (800×450 m or 0.5×0.28 mi) is a steep slope, with high rocky outcrops on the upper right and both gullies and ripples heading downslope to the lower left. The wider, brighter stripes are gullies […]
April 11, 2016

Windy windows

A Piece of Mars: Here’s a tiny bit (0.69×0.39 km or 0.43×0.24 mi) of Jezero crater, one of the candidate landing sites for the Mars 2020 rover. On the bottom and left is high-standing volcanic terrain, former lava that flowed […]
April 4, 2016

The wind paints

A Piece of Mars: For the last few billion years, the wind has (by far) moved more sediment around on Mars than any other geological process. Not tectonics, volcanism, fluvial activity, or impact cratering (although a case has been made […]