Mysterious Circular Landform on Mars

Whats the deal with this line? Is that just a glitch in the photo processing?

originally posted by: Tucket
Whats the deal with this line? Is that just a glitch in the photo processing?

Ventilation pipe ?

Looks strangely artificial.

Phage will be along shortly to make us look like complete idiots.

In 3 2 1

a reply to: Tucket
There are several. Here's a higher res version.
photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov...

Told you...

👌

a reply to: Phage

Ah ok, so no vent pipes..

Those gorges look a heckuvalot deeper in the photo from your link.

a reply to: Tucket

Those gorges look a heckuvalot deeper in the photo from your link.

As long as you can keep your brain from turning them into hills for you.

a reply to: Phage
Ha, yeah.

Dont blink.

So the lines are stitching, many in parallel. Also, there are time differences in the stitched panels, as the shadows shift in the different elevations of the sun.

I do not think it could possibly be caused by an impact. Most of the structure is raised, and you can see the gradual rise in the outer ring. No crater "Lip" if you will, and the lack of ejecta in the area around it. Stranger still, is that usually huge round structures are almost always caused by impact, and volcanic activity on this scale can be circular, but not as perfect as this. A very curious feature indeed.

a reply to: charlyv

Stranger still, is that usually huge round structures are almost always caused by impact, and volcanic activity on this scale can be circular, but not as perfect as this.

Mars is Mars, not Earth. An significant thing to keep in mind.
Nothing on Earth approaches the scale of Mons Olympus.

a reply to: Phage

True enough. Mons Olympus is absolutely gigantic. It is, though, irregular shaped.

What could possibly cause something to be so symmetrical in this new image and not be impact nor volcanic?

a reply to: charlyv

That's what the geologists are wondering.

heh, when I stare at it long enough, I start to think it looks like an imprint from a ring people used to do on wax seals of letters.

Of course in this case, that's a BIG ring.

Another observation; The overall landscape has very few features and sparse small impact craters. I would think that this means it is really new surface in the more recent geological past. It would think that would be important as to why this feature looks the way it does. An ocean maybe?

a reply to: charlyv

Or a huge lava field.

a reply to: Phage

Interesting. And that image could be a caldera, and they can be very symmetrical. One could imagine a giant round hole oozing lava in every direction.... I suppose it is a possibility.

originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: Soylent Green Is People
Try it this way.

That was f# bizarre. Thanks.

a reply to: Domo1
The psychological explanation is pretty simple.
We are conditioned to think of the light source being "up". Even when it isn't.

OK, greytone colour me impressed but for the uninitiated can someone please explain what Phage just did to that photo? I'm missing something fundamentally simple I think but I'm just not understanding. Thanks in advance.

a reply to: LightSpeedDriver
I rotated it.
That's it.

a reply to: Phage

Duh...that simple huh?

/facepalm

ETA But thanks for the explanation. I wasn't quite seeing it myself...