Buried and Visible Impact Basins on Mars: Constraints on the Timing of Major Events in Early Martian History

Details Buried and Visible Impact Basins on Mars: Constraints on the Timing of Major Events in Early Martian History Buried and Visible Impact Basins on Mars: Constraints on the Timing of Major Events in Early Martian History

May 2004

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2004agusm.p32a..04f&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2004, abstract #P32A-04

Physics

5420 Impact Phenomena (Includes Cratering), 5455 Origin And Evolution, 5499 General Or Miscellaneous, 6230 Martian Satellites

Scientific paper

The large population of buried impact basins found in MOLA elevation data on Mars provides compelling evidence for a "pre-Noachian" crust below the oldest visible Early Noachian surface units, and lowland crust below the younger plains that is Early Noachian in age, older than much of the visible highlands, but not as old as the buried "pre-Noachian" highlands. The large (D greater than 200 km) buried basins are suggested by "Quasi-Circular Depressions" (QCDs) that are not apparent in image data, and include features up to 3000 km diameter in both the lowlands (Utopia) and highlands (a newly found "Ares Basin"). There are about a dozen QCDs larger than 1000 km diameter which we can place in a relative age sequence based on superimposed smaller QCD. This and the N(200) crater retention age for the highlands and lowlands provide a chronology for early Mars, including when the global magnetic field may have died. The youngest and most obvious large basins (Hellas, Argyre, Isidis) lack magnetic anomalies within their main rings and may have formed after the magnetic field died. These all have an N(200) less than 2.5. The oldest, most subdued basins (including Ares) with N(200) greater than about 4.0 have many strong magnetic anomalies within their main ring and likely formed before the main magnetic field died. Intermediate age, "lowland-making" basins (Utopia, Chryse, Acidalia) have only a few weak anomalies. These, and the lowlands they created, occurred at about N(200) about 3.0-3.2.

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