Extensive Middle Amazonian mantling of debris aprons and plains in Deuteronilus Mensae, Mars: Implications for the record of mid-latitude glaciation
Authors:
Baker et al
Abstract:
The mid-latitudes of Mars are host to a record of recent episodes of accumulations of ice-rich materials. The record includes debris aprons, interpreted to be debris-covered glaciers, that may represent the preserved remnants of a much more extensive ice sheet. We assessed the possibility of former glacial extents by examining debris aprons and the surrounding plains in Deuteronilus Mensae. Geomorphic units and stratigraphic relationships were mapped and documented from Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Context (CTX) and High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera images, and crater retention ages were estimated from crater size–frequency distributions. Three major units are observed within the study area: debris aprons, lower plains, and upper plains. Debris aprons exhibit characteristics typical for these features documented elsewhere and in previous studies, including integrated flow lineations and patterns, convex-upward profiles, and knobby and brain terrain surface textures. A lower bound on the age for debris aprons is estimated to be 0.9 Ga. Debris aprons are superposed on a lower plains unit having a lower bound age of 3.3–3.5 Ga. A 50–100 m thick upper plains unit superposes both debris apron landforms and lower plains units and has a best-fit minimum age of 0.6 Ga. The upper plains unit exhibits characteristics of atmospherically-emplaced mantle material, including fine-grained nature, sublimation textures, cyclic layering, draping character, and widespread spatial distribution. Fracturing and subsequent sublimation/erosion of upper plains on debris aprons has contributed to many of the surface textures on debris aprons. The upper plains unit has also been eroded from the lower plains and plateaus, evidenced by isolated blocks of upper plains in the interiors of craters and on the walls and tops of plateaus. While no conclusive evidence diagnostic of former cold-based ice sheets are observed in the plains within the study region, such landforms and units may have been poorly developed or absent, as is often the case on Earth, and would have been covered and reworked by later mantling episodes. These observations suggest that emplacement of thick ice-rich mantle deposits extended at least to near the Early/Middle Amazonian boundary and overlapped with the waning stages of glaciation in Deuteronilus Mensae.
The high seas of Mars may never have existed, according to a new study that looks at two opposite climate scenarios of early Mars and suggests that a cold and icy planet billions of years ago better explains water drainage and erosion features seen on the planet today.
For decades, researchers have debated the climate history of Mars and how the planet's early climate led to the many water-carved channels seen today. The idea that 3 to 4 billion years ago Mars was once warm, wet and Earth-like with a northern sea -- conditions that could have led to life -- is generally more popular than that of a frigid, icy planet where water is locked in ice most of the time and life would be hard put to evolve.
To see which early Mars better explains the modern features of the planet, researcher Robin Wordsworth of the Harvard Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and his colleagues used a 3-dimensional atmospheric circulation model to compare a water cycle on Mars under different scenarios 3 to 4 billion years ago, during what's called the late Noachian and early Hesperian periods. One scenario looked at Mars as a warm and wet planet with an average global temperature of 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit) and the other as a cold and icy world with an average global temperature of minus 48 degrees Celsius (minus 54 degrees Fahrenheit).
The study's authors found that the cold scenario was more likely to have occurred than the warm scenario, based on what is known about the history of the Sun and the tilt of Mars's axis 3 to 4 billion years ago. The cold model also did a better job explaining the water erosion features that have been left behind on the Martian surface, and which have puzzled and intrigued scientists since they were first discovered by the Viking orbiters in the 1970s.
A paper presenting the results has been accepted for publication in AGU's Journal of Geophysical Research - Planets.
The colder scenario was more straightforward to model, Wordsworth explained, because Mars only gets 43 percent of the solar energy of Earth, and early Mars was lit by a younger Sun believed to have been 25 percent dimmer than it is today. That makes it very likely early Mars was cold and icy, he said.
An extreme tilt of the Martian axis would have pointed the planet's poles at the Sun and driven polar ice to the equator, where water drainage and erosion features are seen today. More importantly, under a thicker atmosphere that likely existed under the colder scenario, highland regions at the equator get colder and northern low-lying regions get warmer - the so-called 'icy highlands effect' that is responsible for making the peaks of mountains snow-covered on Earth today. Despite a number of warming factors - including a thicker atmosphere filled with climate-warming carbon dioxide -- Mars still would have been quite cold, Wordsworth added.
Firn densification in a Late Noachian “icy highlands” Mars: Implications for ice sheet evolution and thermal response
Authors:
Cassanelli et al
Abstract:
Recent modeling of a thicker early CO2 martian atmosphere and Late Noachian climate predicts that for pressures beyond a fraction of a bar, atmosphere-surface thermal coupling occurs, resulting in adiabatic cooling of high areas across Mars. This promotes the transport of water ice from relatively warmer low-lying areas to the highlands, where deposition and accumulation of water ice result in an “icy highlands” Late Noachian Mars. Deposits will remain stable in the highlands under nominal Late Noachian conditions, but the potential exists for punctuated heating by both top-down (e.g. impacts, volcanism) and bottom-up (e.g. elevated geothermal heat flux) processes. Important in understanding melt generation from these processes is the state of the accumulated snow and ice. Through modeling of the firn densification process in the “icy highlands” framework we assess: (1) the nature of snow accumulation and the physical growth and evolution of the predicted ice deposits, and (2) the implications for the thermal properties of the ice sheets and the response to heating events. Analysis of the firn densification process in the “icy highlands” context indicates that: (1) the upper layers of the ice sheet will be more vulnerable to melting from top-down heating processes because they are comprised of the least dense and least thermally conductive ice, and (2) even with a low thermal conductivity firn layer, basal melting is only likely to occur through a combination of top-down and bottom-up heating. This is because at the nominal mean annual surface temperatures and estimated effective thermal conductivities, the predicted ice sheet thicknesses do not produce enough basal warming to initiate melting for plausible geothermal heat fluxes. Variations in spin-axis/orbital parameters alone are not predicted to cause widespread ablation (melting and sublimation) of the icy highlands ice sheets.
Sources of water for the outflow Channels on Mars: Implications of the Late Noachian “Icy Highlands” Model for Melting and Groundwater Recharge on the Tharsis Rise
Authors:
Cassenelli et al
Abstract:
From the Late Noachian period, through the Hesperian, and into the Amazonian periods on Mars, large outflow channels were formed. Many are interpreted to have originated through the catastrophic discharge of groundwater from martian aquifers, involving the release of up to millions of cubic-kilometers of water. Such a mechanism for outflow channel formation requires that martian aquifers were supplied with significant quantities of water some time prior to the discharge events. Typical groundwater recharge occurs due to the infiltration of surficial waters through a permeable substrate down into aquifers. However, some climate models predict an early martian climate dominated by generally “cold and icy” conditions. In this scenario, a globally continuous, impermeable cryosphere prevents infiltration of liquid water (that might be generated at the surface through anomalous heating conditions), leaving the martian aquifers without an apparent source of recharge to supply later outflow channel formation by groundwater discharge. More recent global climate modeling of an early, thicker CO2 martian atmosphere predicts that, when coupled with a full water cycle, the atmosphere of Mars will behave adiabatically causing temperatures to decrease with elevation. The high standing areas of Mars, such as the southern highlands and the Tharsis region, then act as cold traps. This leads to the preferential accumulation of snow and ice, resulting in the formation of regional ice sheets throughout the highlands that characterize the Late Noachian “icy highlands” early Mars climate model (LNIH). We make the initial assumption that the LNIH model is representative of the early Mars climate, and seek to test the model against the presence of the Hesperian and Amazonian outflow channels to determine if it can be consistent. In order to reconcile the LNIH early Mars climate model with the presence of the later outflow channels a groundwater recharge mechanism that can operate under the predicted “cold and icy” conditions is required. We test basal melting of surface snow and ice in response to a regionally elevated geothermal heat flux throughout the Tharsis rise (resulting from widespread volcanic and magmatic activity during the Noachian) as a mechanism that can provide: (1) liquid water generation at the surface of Mars under generally “cold and icy” conditions, and (2) potentially large scale integration of the hydrological system (through thinning or breaching of the cryosphere), allowing for infiltration of meltwater to provide groundwater recharge during the Late Noachian to supply the later formation of outflow channels. We find: (1) Regional scale basal melting of LNIH ice sheets is not likely to occur at the predicted nominal average ice sheet thicknesses, even in the presence of the anomalous bottom-up heating conditions expected in the Tharsis region (although the increased baseline heating will render the LNIH ice sheets more susceptible to melting through additional anomalous heating conditions introduced by top-down and bottom-up processes). (2) Local scale basal melting and groundwater recharge through a “heat-pipe drain pipe” mechanism is likely to occur, but is not predicted to produce sufficient groundwater recharge to supply the water needed to form the outflow channels. (3) Under the assumption of an ice saturated cryosphere, regional scale melting of the cryosphere due to the insulating effect of the LNIH ice sheets does not provide enough water to explain the formation of all of the outflow channels. Therefore, if the LNIH model is correct, the groundwater recharge that supplied outflow channel formation requires a source that operated earlier in martian history, or the recharge was supplied by other mechanisms.
An extended period of episodic northern mid-latitude glaciation on Mars during the Middle to Late Amazonian: Implications for long-term obliquity history
Authors:
Fassett et al
Abstract:
Mars is the only planet other than Earth in the Solar System that has a preserved nonpolar geological record of glaciation on its surface. Nonpolar ice deposits on Mars have been linked to variations in spin-axis obliquity that cause mobilization of polar ice and redeposition at lower latitudes, forming ice-rich and glacial deposits. Remnant nonpolar glacial deposits are found across the northern mid-latitudes where surface ice is not currently stable, implying that different climatic conditions existed on Mars in the past. Individual glacial deposits are often too small to date reliably using impact crater size-frequency data. We describe a novel approach that allows us to derive new information about when glaciation occurred in broad areas of the northern mid-latitudes. In this region we have classified (1) craters that superpose preexisting glacial deposits and were modified by later accumulation (and therefore formed during an epoch when glaciation was occurring), and (2) craters that are superposed on glacial deposits but are themselves unmodified by ice accumulation (and thus post-date significant glaciation). The sparse population of post-glacial craters reveals that the last period of extensive ice deposition of this type in this latitude band was recent (Late Amazonian). The substantial number of craters formed during the recurring glacial periods implies that northern mid-latitude glaciation was a long-lived recurring process, occurring over a period of at least ∼600 m.y. On the basis of Mars atmospheric general circulation models, these results are consistent with higher obliquity being common in the past, with recurring periods of obliquity exceeding the 25° axial tilt of Mars today. These observations support the statistical prediction of J. Laskar and colleagues that the median obliquity during the Amazonian was ∼35°–40°.
Amazonian Mid- to High-Latitude Glaciation on Mars:Supply-Limited Ice Sources, Ice Accumulation Patterns, and Concentric Crater Fill Glacial Flow and Ice Sequestration
Authors:
Fastook et al
Abstract:
Concentric Crater Fill (CCF) occurs in the interior of impact craters in mid- to high latitudes on Mars and is interpreted to have formed by glacial ice flow and debris covering. We use the characteristics and orientation of deposits comprising CCF, the thickness of pedestal deposits in mid- to high-latitude pedestal craters (Pd), the volumes of the current polar caps, and information about regional slopes and ice rheology to address questions about 1) the maximum thickness of regional ice deposits during the Late Amazonian, 2) the likelihood that these deposits flowed regionally, 3) the geological regions and features most likely to induce ice-flow, and 4) the locations and environments in which ice is likely to have been sequestered up to the present. We find that regional ice flow under Late Amazonian climate conditions requires ice thicknesses exceeding many hundreds of meters for slopes typical of the vast majority of the surface of Mars, a thickness for the mid-latitudes that is well in excess of the total volume available from polar ice reservoirs. This indicates that although conditions for mid- to high-latitude glaciation may have persisted for tens to hundreds of millions of years, the process is “supply limited”, with a steady state reached when the polar ice cap water ice supply becomes exhausted.
Impact craters are by far the most abundant landform with associated slopes (interior wall and exterior rim) sufficiently high to induce glacial ice flow under Late Amazonian climate conditions, and topographic slope data show that Amazonian impact craters have been clearly modified, undergoing crater interior slope reduction and floor shallowing. We show that these trends are the predictable response of ice deposition and preferential accumulation and retention in mid- to high-latitude crater interiors during episodes of enhanced spin-axis obliquity. We demonstrate that flow from a single episode of an inter-crater terrain layer comparable to Pedestal Crater deposit thicknesses (∼50 m) cannot fill the craters in a time period compatible with the interpreted formation times of the Pedestal Crater mantled ice layers. We use a representative obliquity solution to drive an ice flow model and show that a cyclical pattern of multiply recurring layers can both fill the craters with a significant volume of ice, as well as transport debris from the crater walls out into the central regions of the craters. The cyclical pattern of waxing and waning mantling layers results in a rippled pattern of surface debris extending out into the crater interiors that would manifest itself as an observable concentric pattern, comparable in appearance to concentric crater fill. In this scenario, the formation of mantling sublimation till layers seals the accumulating ice and sequesters it from significant temperature variations at diurnal, annual and spin-axis/orbital cycle time scales, to produce ancient ice records preserved today below CCF crater floors.
Lack of meltwater features associated with concentric crater fill provides evidence that the Late Amazonian climate did not exceed the melting temperature in the mid- to high-latitudes for any significant period of time. Continued sequestration of ice with time in CCF and related deposits (lobate debris aprons and lineated valley fill) further reduces the already supply-limited polar ice sources, suggesting that there has been a declining reservoir of available ice with each ensuing glacial period. Together, these deposits represent a candidate library of climate chemistry and global change dating from the Late Amazonian, and a non-polar water resource for future exploration.
The Ages of Pedestal Craters on Mars: Evidence for a Late-Amazonian Extended Period of Episodic Emplacement of Decameters-Thick Mid-Latitude Ice Deposits
Authors:
Seth J. Kadish and James W. Head
Abstract:
There is significant geomorphologic evidence for the past presence of longitudinally widespread, latitudinally zoned deposits composed of ice-rich material at northern and southern mid latitudes on Mars (lobate debris aprons, lineated valley fill, concentric crater fill, pedestal craters, etc.). Among these features, pedestal craters (Pd) are impact craters interpreted to have produced a protective layer on top of decameters-thick ice deposits now missing in intercrater regions. The time during which these various deposits were present is still highly debated. To address this question we have analyzed the distribution and characteristics of pedestal craters; here, we use a population of 2287 Pd to derive a crater retention age for the entire population, obtaining a minimum timescale of formation of ∼90 Myr. Given that the ice-rich deposit has not been continuously present for this duration, the timescale of formation is necessarily longer than ∼100 Myr. We then compiled impact crater size-frequency distribution dates for 50 individual pedestal craters in both hemispheres to assess further the frequency distribution of individual ages. We calculated pedestal crater ages that ranged from ∼1 Myr to ∼3.6 Gyr, with a median of ∼140 Myr. In addition, 70% of the pedestal ages are less than 250 Myr. During the 150 Myr period between 25 Ma and 175 Ma, we found at least one pedestal age every 15 Myr. This suggests that the ice-rich paleodeposit accumulated frequently during that time period. We then applied these results to the relationship between obliquity and latitudinal ice stability to suggest some constraints on the obliquity history of Mars over the past 200 Myr. Atmospheric general circulation models indicate that ice stability over long periods in the mid latitudes is favored by moderate mean obliquities in the ∼35° range. Models of spin-axis/orbital parameter evolution predict that the average obliquity of Mars is ∼38°. Our data represent specific observational evidence that ice-rich deposits accumulated frequently during the past 200 Myr, supporting the prediction that Mars was characterized by this obliquity range during an extensive part of that time period. Using these results as a foundation, the dating of other non-polar ice deposits will permit the specific obliquity history to be derived and lead to an assessment of volatile transport paths in the climate history of Mars.
