Enormous Volcanic Eruptions Occurred on Ancient Mars

Not only on Earth, it came out that another planet had also experienced violent volcanic eruptions. Several billions of years ago, this volcanic phenomenon stroke upon the Red Planet, Mars. NASA confirmed the existence of Mars volcanoes that erupted during these ancient times.

Scientists discovered the evidence in the northern region of Mars, known as Arabia Terra. This area is believed to have been home to plenty of volcanoes that blew “super-eruptions”, termed for an extremely powerful volcanic eruption, over a 500 million year span.

Gigantic calderas were discovered in Arabia Terra

The erupting Mars volcanoes caused massive explosions. They spurted water vapor, carbon dioxide, and sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere, ripping the Red Planet’s surface apart. The heavy gas and thick dust also blanketed the sky and blocked the sunlight to reach Mars’ surface. As a result, a long-term climate change hit on Mars.

“Each one of these eruptions would have had a significant climate impact — maybe the released gas made the atmosphere thicker or blocked the Sun and made the atmosphere colder,” Patrick Whelley, a NASA’s geologist stated.

These Mars volcanoes collapsed, leaving giant craters known as ‘calderas’ after erupting violently through the surface and spewing tons of ash that expanded thousands of miles from the site. There are at least seven calderas on Arabia Terra, indicating super-erupted volcanoes formerly inhabited this region.

Prior to this discovery, scientists assumed that the calderas on Mars were the result of an asteroid impact eons ago. Nonetheless, in 2013, experts carried out research that suggested the basins were volcanic craters after examining their structures.

Credit: NASA

Further investigation on Mars’ volcanic eruptions

There was another finding for further evidence of volcanic eruptions on Mars. Whelley and his colleagues conducted an investigation of the existence of ancient Mars volcanoes by looking for volcanic ash.

“Instead of looking for volcanoes themselves, we looked for the ash, because you can’t hide that evidence,” Whelley explained.

Whelley collaborated with Alexandra Matiella Novak, a volcanologist at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, who identified ash on Mars by analyzing data from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Together with their team, they looked particularly at the Arabia Terra spot.

They drew on earlier research that claimed minerals on Arabia Terra’s surface were from volcanoes and also looked at another study that determined where ash from super-eruptions would collect in Arabia Terra.

“We’re going to look at how the minerals are distributed to see if they follow the pattern we would expect to see from super-eruptions,” Matiella Novak said.

The team identified minerals on the surface by using pictures from MRO’s Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars, then constructed a three-dimensional topographic map of Arabia Terra.

According to nasa.gov, “By laying the mineral data over the topographic maps of the canyons and craters analyzed, the researchers could see in the mineral-rich deposits that the layers of ash were very well preserved.”

“That’s when I realized this isn’t a fluke, this is a real signal,” Jacob Richardson, a geologist at NASA Goddard who teamed up with Whelley and Novak said. “We’re actually seeing what was predicted and that was the most exciting moment for me,” he added.

Credits: NASA Goddard

Thousands of volcanic explosions took place on the Red Planet

Based on the volume of each caldera, the 2013 research that identified the calderas calculated how much material erupted from Mars volcanoes. It helped Whelley in estimating the volcanic eruptions required to produce the thickness of ash found.

Whelley reported that there turned out to be thousands of volcanic eruptions on Mars. Arabia Terra is the only region where super-volcanic eruptions have occurred so far.

RELATED VIDEO: Mars Volcanoes: Enormous Eruptions Occurred on Ancient Mars