Martian slope streaks as plausible indicators of transient water activity

Anshuman Bhardwaj; Lydia Sam; F. Javier Martín-Torres; María-Paz Zorzano; Ricardo M. Fonseca

doi:10.1038/s41598-017-07453-9

Martian slope streaks as plausible indicators of transient water activity

Anshuman Bhardwaj^*, Lydia Sam, F. Javier Martín-Torres, María-Paz Zorzano, Ricardo M. Fonseca

^*Corresponding author for this work

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Abstract

Slope streaks have been frequently observed in the equatorial, low thermal inertia and dusty regions of Mars. The reason behind their formation remains unclear with proposed hypotheses for both dry and wet mechanisms. Here, we report an up-to-date distribution and morphometric investigation of Martian slope streaks. We find: (i) a remarkable coexistence of the slope streak distribution with the regions on Mars with high abundances of water-equivalent hydrogen, chlorine, and iron; (ii) favourable thermodynamic conditions for transient deliquescence and brine development in the slope streak regions; (iii) a significant concurrence of slope streak distribution with the regions of enhanced atmospheric water vapour concentration, thus suggestive of a present-day regolith-atmosphere water cycle; and (iv) terrain preferences and flow patterns supporting a wet mechanism for slope streaks. These results suggest a strong local regolith-atmosphere water coupling in the slope streak regions that leads to the formation of these fluidised features. Our conclusions can have profound astrobiological, habitability, environmental, and planetary protection implications.

Original language	English
Article number	7074
Number of pages	14
Journal	Scientific Reports
Volume	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-07453-9
Publication status	Published - 1 Aug 2017

Bibliographical note

We thank NASA/JPL/University of Arizona/Malin Space Science systems/Arizona State University for providing the Gamma Ray Spectrometer (GRS) data, HiRISE images, ConTeXt Camera (CTX) images, LROC images, and JMARS software free of charge. Although we have cited all the previous research results used in the paper, here we acknowledge the efforts of all those researchers for providing the essential inputs to our study. L.S. acknowledges German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) for her PhD scholarship.

Keywords

Geodynamics
Geomorphology

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Cite this

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title = "Martian slope streaks as plausible indicators of transient water activity",

abstract = "Slope streaks have been frequently observed in the equatorial, low thermal inertia and dusty regions of Mars. The reason behind their formation remains unclear with proposed hypotheses for both dry and wet mechanisms. Here, we report an up-to-date distribution and morphometric investigation of Martian slope streaks. We find: (i) a remarkable coexistence of the slope streak distribution with the regions on Mars with high abundances of water-equivalent hydrogen, chlorine, and iron; (ii) favourable thermodynamic conditions for transient deliquescence and brine development in the slope streak regions; (iii) a significant concurrence of slope streak distribution with the regions of enhanced atmospheric water vapour concentration, thus suggestive of a present-day regolith-atmosphere water cycle; and (iv) terrain preferences and flow patterns supporting a wet mechanism for slope streaks. These results suggest a strong local regolith-atmosphere water coupling in the slope streak regions that leads to the formation of these fluidised features. Our conclusions can have profound astrobiological, habitability, environmental, and planetary protection implications. ",

keywords = "Geodynamics, Geomorphology",

author = "Anshuman Bhardwaj and Lydia Sam and Mart{\'i}n-Torres, {F. Javier} and Mar{\'i}a-Paz Zorzano and Fonseca, {Ricardo M.}",

note = "We thank NASA/JPL/University of Arizona/Malin Space Science systems/Arizona State University for providing the Gamma Ray Spectrometer (GRS) data, HiRISE images, ConTeXt Camera (CTX) images, LROC images, and JMARS software free of charge. Although we have cited all the previous research results used in the paper, here we acknowledge the efforts of all those researchers for providing the essential inputs to our study. L.S. acknowledges German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) for her PhD scholarship.",

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doi = "10.1038/s41598-017-07453-9",

language = "English",

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T1 - Martian slope streaks as plausible indicators of transient water activity

AU - Bhardwaj, Anshuman

AU - Sam, Lydia

AU - Martín-Torres, F. Javier

AU - Zorzano, María-Paz

AU - Fonseca, Ricardo M.

N1 - We thank NASA/JPL/University of Arizona/Malin Space Science systems/Arizona State University for providing the Gamma Ray Spectrometer (GRS) data, HiRISE images, ConTeXt Camera (CTX) images, LROC images, and JMARS software free of charge. Although we have cited all the previous research results used in the paper, here we acknowledge the efforts of all those researchers for providing the essential inputs to our study. L.S. acknowledges German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) for her PhD scholarship.

PY - 2017/8/1

Y1 - 2017/8/1

N2 - Slope streaks have been frequently observed in the equatorial, low thermal inertia and dusty regions of Mars. The reason behind their formation remains unclear with proposed hypotheses for both dry and wet mechanisms. Here, we report an up-to-date distribution and morphometric investigation of Martian slope streaks. We find: (i) a remarkable coexistence of the slope streak distribution with the regions on Mars with high abundances of water-equivalent hydrogen, chlorine, and iron; (ii) favourable thermodynamic conditions for transient deliquescence and brine development in the slope streak regions; (iii) a significant concurrence of slope streak distribution with the regions of enhanced atmospheric water vapour concentration, thus suggestive of a present-day regolith-atmosphere water cycle; and (iv) terrain preferences and flow patterns supporting a wet mechanism for slope streaks. These results suggest a strong local regolith-atmosphere water coupling in the slope streak regions that leads to the formation of these fluidised features. Our conclusions can have profound astrobiological, habitability, environmental, and planetary protection implications.

AB - Slope streaks have been frequently observed in the equatorial, low thermal inertia and dusty regions of Mars. The reason behind their formation remains unclear with proposed hypotheses for both dry and wet mechanisms. Here, we report an up-to-date distribution and morphometric investigation of Martian slope streaks. We find: (i) a remarkable coexistence of the slope streak distribution with the regions on Mars with high abundances of water-equivalent hydrogen, chlorine, and iron; (ii) favourable thermodynamic conditions for transient deliquescence and brine development in the slope streak regions; (iii) a significant concurrence of slope streak distribution with the regions of enhanced atmospheric water vapour concentration, thus suggestive of a present-day regolith-atmosphere water cycle; and (iv) terrain preferences and flow patterns supporting a wet mechanism for slope streaks. These results suggest a strong local regolith-atmosphere water coupling in the slope streak regions that leads to the formation of these fluidised features. Our conclusions can have profound astrobiological, habitability, environmental, and planetary protection implications.

KW - Geodynamics

KW - Geomorphology

U2 - 10.1038/s41598-017-07453-9

DO - 10.1038/s41598-017-07453-9

M3 - Article

SN - 2045-2322

VL - 7

JO - Scientific Reports

JF - Scientific Reports

M1 - 7074

ER -

Martian slope streaks as plausible indicators of transient water activity

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

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