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The European Space Agency (ESA) recently shared photos of mysterious spider-like clusters on Mars. However, the space agency clarified that these spider-like dark shapes on the Red Planet “form when spring sunlight hits layers of carbon dioxide deposited during the dark winter months.”
“Sunlight turns the carbon dioxide ice at the bottom of the layer into gas, which then builds up and breaks up through the ice slab above. “Gas erupts freely in the Martian spring, pulling deep material to the surface and breaking up layers of ice up to a meter thick,” ESA explained.
Explaining further, ESA said, “The rising gas, laden with dark dust, shoots out through cracks in the ice as tall fountains or geysers, before falling back down and settling on the surface. This creates dark spots between 45 meters and 1 km across. This process is what creates the distinctive ‘spider-shaped’ patterns beneath the ice.”
According to ESA, these dark spots were spotted by ESA’s Mars Express on the outskirts of an area called “Inca City” in the Red Planet’s southern polar region. NASA’s Mariner 9 probe discovered the city of Inca in 1972. Speaking on the formation of the city, ESA have stated that they are unsure about the exact formation process of the city, but they added several possibilities that it could have been caused by materials such as sand dunes or magma. Or sand may be seeping from fractured Martian rock, with some possibilities associated with glaciers.
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Published: April 27, 2024, 09:23 am IST
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