ESA Discovers ‘Spider Signs from Mars’ in Stunning New Images

Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – The European Space Agency (ESA) published pictures of a phenomenon they called “spider signs from Mars”.

The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter took this image in the south polar region of Mars. In the photo you can see the surface of Mars full of structures that look like hundreds of giant spiders.

ESA believes that these structures were formed in the ice when winter on Mars turned to spring.

“These small, dark clumps form when the spring sun illuminates layers of carbon dioxide that were buried during the dark winter,” the ESA said.

The sunlight causes the carbon dioxide ice in the lower layer to turn into a gas, which increases over time and jumps through the ice above it. Gas exploded in the middle of the Martian spring, bringing dark matter to the surface.

When the gas found its way out between the cracks in the meter-thick ice, the dark material fell like a waterfall. This spider-like structure is between 45 meters and 1 kilometer wide.

ESA also explained that the human habit of imagining familiar shapes when looking at certain objects is called pareidolia. It is this pareidolia that makes forms on Mars look like spiders to the inhabitants of Earth.

“Our brain is always trying to understand the world. One of the ways the brain uses to understand the world is by finding and learning certain patterns. these patterns help the brain to respond and behave in an effort to survive,” said Jess Taubert from the University of Queensland to IFLS science.

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