Early crust on Mars may be more complex than researchers previously thought—and it may even be similar to Earth’s original crust. The Martian surface is uniformly basaltic, a consequence of billions of years of volcanism and flowing lava on the surface that eventually cooled. Scientists had thoug
This oblique perspective view of Tithonium Chasmata, which forms part of Mars’ Valles Marineris canyon structure, was generated from the digital terrain model and the nadir and color channels of the High Resolution Stereo Camera on ESA’s Mars Express. Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGOmay be more complex than researchers previously thought—and it may even be similar to Earth’s original crust.
“There is more silica in the composition that makes the rocks not basalt, but what we call more evolved in composition,” says Valerie Payré, the study’s corresponding author. “That tells us how the crust formed on Mars is definitely more complex than what we knew. So, it’s more about understanding that process, and especially what it means for how Earth’s crust first formed.
“This was the first clue,” Payré says. “It is because the terrains are feldspar-rich that we explored the silica concentrations there.” The researchers also dated the crust to about 4.2 billion years, which would make it the oldest crust found on Mars to date.“There have been rovers on the surface that have observed rocks that were more silicic than basaltic,” she says. “So, there were ideas that the crust could be more silicic. But we never knew, and we still don’t know, how the early crust was formed, or how old it is, so it’s kind of a mystery still.
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