The subglacial birth of Olympus Mons and its aureoles.
Abstract
Similarities between the morphologies of small Martian buttes and mesas, especially concentrated in latitudes north of 40 degrees, and those of Icelandic table mountains, which are presumed to have formed by subglacial eruption, suggest that the geologic and climatic regimes of Mars may be analogous to the environment of Iceland, where volcanism and glaciation have interacted throughout recent geologic history. A hypothesis is investigated according to which Olympus Mons and the broad lobate aureole deposits around its base may have had similar subglacial beginnings. The hypothesis requires an ice cap several kilometers thick in the vicinity of this shield during its initial stages of eruption. The amounts of water ice required do not appear excessive but the mechanism for localizing such ice has to be explained.
- Publication:
-
Journal of Geophysical Research
- Pub Date:
- December 1979
- DOI:
- 10.1029/JB084iB14p08061
- Bibcode:
- 1979JGR....84.8061H
- Keywords:
-
- Aerial Photography;
- Buttes;
- Geological Surveys;
- Mars Surface;
- Mesas;
- Satellite-Borne Photography;
- Geomorphology;
- Glaciology;
- Landforms;
- Landsat Satellites;
- Planetary Evolution;
- Volcanology;
- Mars Craters:Origin