A paper has been published claiming to have discovered an unknown giant volcano on Mars that is taller than Everest/Space Frontiers/Archive Photos/Getty Images
2024.03.30 Sat posted at 17:30 JST
(CNN) Scientists may have discovered a strangely shaped volcano taller than Mount Everest on the surface of Mars. The results of such new research have been announced. It has been overlooked for decades.
Pascal Lee, director of the US Mars Research Institute, presented the results of his research at the 55th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference held in The Woodlands, Texas, on the 13th of this month. The possibility that a previously unknown volcano on Mars has been discovered is causing ripples throughout the planetary science community.
While there is excitement about the new study, there is also some skepticism.
Lee worked with Sourav Shubham, a doctoral student at the University of Maryland, College Park, to locate a volcano in Mars’ Noctis Labyrinth. Noctis Labyrinth is a region near the Martian equator that is a network of canyons.
Lee said the volcano is not particularly high compared to the surrounding terrain, so it may have been overlooked despite years of satellite observations.
If the research team’s theory is correct, it could have major implications for scientists’ understanding of Mars’ geology. Lee hopes the discovery will help direct future exploration missions to the region, looking for water ice and signs of life.
Initially, the research team’s efforts led to study results published in March 2023. The study suggested that a huge glacier covered with salt deposits may exist in the Noctis Labyrinthus area.
Since then, Lee and Shubham have been scrutinizing data collected by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and have found that there may be frozen water beneath the salt. I was trying to figure out if there was one.
But as he closely surveyed the terrain, Lee was surprised by “small lava flows flowing next to glaciers.”
If the lava had been oxidized, it would have taken on the same reddish-brown color as the surrounding surface, but it had not yet completely oxidized.
This suggested that the lava was relatively new. This was the first sign that an undiscovered volcano may be lurking nearby.
“I started looking at the terrain carefully,” Lee said. “As expected, we looked at several high-elevation points in the area and found that they form an arc.”
Lee added that this arc is reminiscent of shield volcanoes that also exist on Earth. Shield volcanoes are characterized by wide, gently sloping slopes, with their width being more noticeable than their height.
This discovery led Lee and Shubham to gather further evidence and discover that the 9,022-metre peak is actually the tip of a volcano.
Compared to Mount Everest, which is 8,848 meters above sea level, it is several hundred meters higher.
Lee and Shubham are currently working on compiling their findings into a peer-reviewed paper. If more detailed results can be produced, the scientific community as a whole may gain more confidence in this theory.
Everest-sized volcano discovered on Mars?
