Degradation processes on ice-cored moraines on Svalbard: a terrestrial analog for Mars

• Main Authors: Desjardins, Marine, Hauber, Ernst, Bucher, Tilman, Gessner, Matthias, Hiesinger, H., Schmedemann, N., Johnsson, Andreas, Ellermann, Fabian, Sassenroth, C., Brauchle, Jörg, Conway, S., Noblet, A.
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2022
• Subjects: Planetengeologie; Echtzeit-Datenprozessierung; Sicherheitsforschung und Anwendungen; glacier; Svalbard; Spitsbergen
• Online Access: https://elib.dlr.de/188844/; https://meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EPSC2022/EPSC2022-1035.html

The mid-latitudes of Mars host a large amount of buried ice deposits, which bear a record on the very Late Amazonian climate evolution (107 to 108 yr.) and are a possible resource for future exploration. The reconstruction of the history of these ice reservoirs and the characterization of their current state is critical to enable putting constraints on the interplay between climate change, volatile migration and landform evolution. Examination of terrestrial analogs can help to identify similarities and equally important differences between the response of buried ice on Mars and Earth to changing environmental parameters. Here we report on our long-term investigations of an ice-cored moraine on Svalbard, a proxy for mid-latitude debris-covered glacier on Mars. Our study area is an ice-cored lateral moraine of Kongsvegen glacier on the southern shore of Kongsforden in NW Spitsbergen (Svalbard). This site is subject to rapid degradation by melting and redistribution of surficial sediment, e.g., by thaw slumps and debris flows. We couple multi-year fieldwork with repeat remote-sensing observations. Fieldwork includes DGPS-supported monitoring of surface changes by several imaging methods comparisons to environmental data. In 2008, a flight campaign with HRSC-AX (an airborne version of DLR’s High Resolution Stereo Camera on Mars Express) provided orthoimages (20 cm/px) and a Digital Elevation Model (DEM; 50 cm ground sampling distance, GSD). In 2020 a repeat campaign with DLR’s MACS (Modular Airborne Camera System) achieved ground pixel sizes between 5 cm and 10 cm for RGB images, and 10 cm to 15 cm for NIR images. The associated DEM has the same resolution. MACS also acquires TIR data,which we use to identify regions with anomalous temperatures (e.g., exposed ice). We use for detailed mapping of ice-rich viscous flow features on Mars. This study focuses on the Nereidum Montes area in the northern part of the Argyre basin. Image analysis, mapping of landforms and documentation of results were carried out using the ...