What can marsquakes teach scientists about the Red Planet’s present-day, frozen interior, along with its early history? This is what a recent study published in Science hopes to address as a team of researchers investigated how evidence preserved in the present-day mantle of Mars could teach us about its evolutionary pathway, specifically what Mars could have been like billions of years ago.
For the study, the researchers analyzed seismic data obtained from NASA’s now-retired InSight lander with the goal of better understanding the physical and geological composition of Mars’ interior. This is because while the Earth’s interior is separated into various layers, known as planetary differentiation, the interior of Mars is completely frozen, or literally rock solid. The Earth’s active interior drives plate tectonics and volcanism, while neither exists on the Red Planet, resulting in materials being recycled and lost to time. In contrast, Mars’ interior could contain frozen pieces of history.
In the end, the researchers discovered that Mars’ interior contains geological fragments up to 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) wide with smaller fragments surrounding the larger ones. It’s possible these fragments are remnants of ancient Mars from billions of years ago that could be used to teach scientists about the conditions on early Mars.
“These signals showed clear signs of interference as they travelled through Mars’s deep interior,” said Dr. Constantinos Charalambous, who is a Research Fellow in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Imperial College London and lead author of the study. “That’s consistent with a mantle full of structures of different compositional origins - leftovers from Mars's early days. What happened on Mars is that, after those early events, the surface solidified into a stagnant lid. It sealed off the mantle beneath, locking in those ancient chaotic features — like a planetary time capsule.”
Going forward, this study could open the door for using seismic data on other worlds to learn more about their interiors and evolutionary histories, as well.
What new discoveries about the interior of Mars will researchers make in the coming years and decades? Only time will tell, and this is why we science!
As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!
Sources: Science, EurekAlert!
Featured Image: Artist's illustration of a giant collision on Mars that potentially created its magma interior long ago. (Credit: Vadim Sadovski / Imperial College London)
