Eridania Lake is a theorized ancient lake on

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...

with a surface area of roughly 1.1 million square kilometers. It is located at the source of the Ma'adim Vallis outflow channel and extends into Eridania quadrangle and the

Phaethontis quadrangle The Phaethontis quadrangle is one of a series of 30 quadrangle maps of Mars used by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Astrogeology Research Program. The Phaethontis quadrangle is also referred to as MC-24 (Mars Chart-24). The name com ...

. As Eridania Lake dried out in the late Noachian epoch it divided into a series of smaller lakes. PIA22059 fig1eridaniadepths.jpg, Map showing estimated water depth in different parts of Eridania Sea This map is about 850 km (530 miles) across. PIA22059 fig1eridaniadepthslabeled.jpg, Features around Eridania Sea labeled Later research with

CRISM The Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) is a visible-infrared spectrometer aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter searching for mineralogic indications of past and present water on Mars. The CRISM instrument team compris ...

found thick deposits, greater than 400 meters thick, that contained the minerals

saponite Saponite is a trioctahedral mineral of the smectite group. Its chemical formula is . It is soluble in sulfuric acid. It was first described in 1840 by Svanberg. Varieties of saponite are griffithite, bowlingite and sobotkite. It is soft, ...

, talc-saponite, Fe-rich mica (for example,

glauconite Glauconite is an iron potassium phyllosilicate ( mica group) mineral of characteristic green color which is very friable and has very low weathering resistance. It crystallizes with a monoclinic geometry. Its name is derived from the Gre ...

nontronite Nontronite is the iron(III) rich member of the smectite group of clay minerals. Nontronites typically have a chemical composition consisting of more than ~30% Fe2 O3 and less than ~12% Al2O3 (ignited basis). Nontronite has very few economic de ...

), Fe- and Mg-serpentine, Mg-Fe-Ca-

carbonate A carbonate is a salt of carbonic acid (H2CO3), characterized by the presence of the carbonate ion, a polyatomic ion with the formula . The word ''carbonate'' may also refer to a carbonate ester, an organic compound containing the carbonate ...

and probable Fe- sulphide. The Fe-sulphide probably formed in deep water from water heated by

volcano A volcano is a rupture in the Crust (geology), crust of a Planet#Planetary-mass objects, planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and volcanic gas, gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Ear ...

es. Such a process, classified as

hydrothermal Hydrothermal circulation in its most general sense is the circulation of hot water (Ancient Greek ὕδωρ, ''water'',Liddell, H.G. & Scott, R. (1940). ''A Greek-English Lexicon. revised and augmented throughout by Sir Henry Stuart Jones. with th ...

may have been a place where

life Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for Cell growth, growth, reaction to Stimu ...

began. PIA22058 hireseridanaregion.jpg, Deep-basin deposits from the floor of Eridania Sea. The mesas on the floor are there because they were protected against intense erosion by deep water/ice cover.

measurements show minerals may be from seafloor hydrothermal deposits. Life may have originated in this sea. PIA22060 hireseridania.jpg, Diagram showing how volcanic activity may have caused deposition of minerals on floor of Eridania Sea. Chlorides were deposited along the shoreline by evaporation.

References

External links

Lakes on Mars – Nathalie Cabrol (SETI Talks)
Surface features of Mars Former lakes {{Mars-stub

See also

References

External links