Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking
Boulder halos are circular arrangements of clasts present at martian middle to high latitudes. Boulder halos are thought to result from impacts into a boulder-poor surficial unit that is rich in ground-ice and/or sediments and that is underlain by a competent substrate. In this model, boulders are e...
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ftunivtexas:oai:repositories.lib.utexas.edu:2152/62901 2023-05-15T16:37:36+02:00 Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking Levy, Joseph 2017-12-04 application/zip http://hdl.handle.net/2152/62901 https://doi.org/10.15781/T2NG4H803 eng eng UT Faculty/Researcher Works doi:10.15781/T2NG4H803 http://hdl.handle.net/2152/62901 Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 United States http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/us/ Open CC-BY-NC Geology Mars Permafrost Data set 2017 ftunivtexas https://doi.org/10.15781/T2NG4H803 2020-12-23T22:13:49Z Boulder halos are circular arrangements of clasts present at martian middle to high latitudes. Boulder halos are thought to result from impacts into a boulder-poor surficial unit that is rich in ground-ice and/or sediments and that is underlain by a competent substrate. In this model, boulders are excavated by impacts and remain at the surface as the crater degrades. To determine the distribution of boulder halos and to evaluate mechanisms for their formation, we mapped boulder halos over 4,188 HiRISE images located between 50-80° north and south latitude. We evaluate geological and climatological parameters at halo sites. Boulder halos are about three times more common in the northern hemisphere than in the southern (19% vs. 6% of images), and have size-frequency distributions suggesting recent Amazonian formation (tens to hundreds of millions of years). In the north, boulder halo sites are characterized by abundant shallow subsurface ice and high thermal inertia. Spatial patterns of halo distribution indicate that excavation of boulders from beneath non-boulder-bearing substrates is necessary for the formation of boulder halos, but that alone is not sufficient. Rather, surface processes either promote boulder halo preservation in the north or destroy boulder halos in the south. Notably, boulder halos predate the most recent period of near-surface ice emplacement on Mars and persist at the surface atop mobile regolith. Finally, larger minimum boulder halo sizes in the north indicate thicker icy soil layers on average throughout climate variations driven by spin/orbit changes during the last 10s to 100s Ma. This work was supported by NASA Mars Data Analysis Program award NNX16AJ41G to JSL Institute for Geophysics Other/Unknown Material Ice permafrost The University of Texas at Austin: Texas ScholarWorks |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
The University of Texas at Austin: Texas ScholarWorks |
op_collection_id |
ftunivtexas |
language |
English |
topic |
Geology Mars Permafrost |
spellingShingle |
Geology Mars Permafrost Levy, Joseph Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
topic_facet |
Geology Mars Permafrost |
description |
Boulder halos are circular arrangements of clasts present at martian middle to high latitudes. Boulder halos are thought to result from impacts into a boulder-poor surficial unit that is rich in ground-ice and/or sediments and that is underlain by a competent substrate. In this model, boulders are excavated by impacts and remain at the surface as the crater degrades. To determine the distribution of boulder halos and to evaluate mechanisms for their formation, we mapped boulder halos over 4,188 HiRISE images located between 50-80° north and south latitude. We evaluate geological and climatological parameters at halo sites. Boulder halos are about three times more common in the northern hemisphere than in the southern (19% vs. 6% of images), and have size-frequency distributions suggesting recent Amazonian formation (tens to hundreds of millions of years). In the north, boulder halo sites are characterized by abundant shallow subsurface ice and high thermal inertia. Spatial patterns of halo distribution indicate that excavation of boulders from beneath non-boulder-bearing substrates is necessary for the formation of boulder halos, but that alone is not sufficient. Rather, surface processes either promote boulder halo preservation in the north or destroy boulder halos in the south. Notably, boulder halos predate the most recent period of near-surface ice emplacement on Mars and persist at the surface atop mobile regolith. Finally, larger minimum boulder halo sizes in the north indicate thicker icy soil layers on average throughout climate variations driven by spin/orbit changes during the last 10s to 100s Ma. This work was supported by NASA Mars Data Analysis Program award NNX16AJ41G to JSL Institute for Geophysics |
format |
Other/Unknown Material |
author |
Levy, Joseph |
author_facet |
Levy, Joseph |
author_sort |
Levy, Joseph |
title |
Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
title_short |
Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
title_full |
Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
title_fullStr |
Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
title_full_unstemmed |
Distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on Mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
title_sort |
distribution and characteristics of boulder halos at high latitudes on mars: ground ice and surface processes drive surface reworking |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/2152/62901 https://doi.org/10.15781/T2NG4H803 |
genre |
Ice permafrost |
genre_facet |
Ice permafrost |
op_relation |
UT Faculty/Researcher Works doi:10.15781/T2NG4H803 http://hdl.handle.net/2152/62901 |
op_rights |
Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 United States http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/us/ Open |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY-NC |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.15781/T2NG4H803 |
_version_ |
1766027888641966080 |