The latest image taken by ESA's Mars Express spacecraft shows two breaks in the crust.
The image shows two trenches (or gorges)which are part of the western Marineris Valley. On the left (south) is the Ius Gorge, 840 km long, and on the right (north) is the Titonius Gorge, 805 km long and 7 km deep. The highest mountain in the Alps, Mont Blanc, at 4,809m, would be dwarfed if placed in the Titonium Gorge, the European Space Agency noted in a press release.
The area marked with a bold white rectangledenotes the area taken by the Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera on April 21, 2022, orbiting 23123. Credit: NASA/MGS/MOLA Science Team
The scientists also provided images made on the basis of a digital terrain model, nadir and color channels of a high-resolution stereo camera on board Mars Express.
Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
The image below shows a number of smallbulges from the bottom of the gorge. Using data from Mars Express, scientists discovered water-bearing sulfate minerals in the region. This suggests that these bulges may have formed when the liquid that once filled the chasm evaporated. Although this theory is still actively discussed.
Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
Valles Marineris crosses Mars like the Grand Canyon- United States. However, the canyon system on the Red Planet is almost ten times longer, 20 times wider and five times deeper than the Grand Canyon on Earth. Its length is almost 4,000 km, its width is 200 km, and its depth is up to 7 km. It is also the largest canyon system in the Solar System. On Earth, it would cover the distance from northern Norway to southern Sicily.
There is another big difference between them:While the Grand Canyon was formed when the Colorado River eroded rocks, Valles Marineris is believed to have been formed by the movement of tectonic plates.
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