Curtin University researchers have helped discover the largest meteorite impact craters on Mars since NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter began scanning the planet for them 16 years ago.
On December 24, 2021, NASA’s InSight Lander recorded a magnitude five earthquake, which was recently discovered to be caused by a meteorite impact. One of the excavated meteorites contained ice at the lowest altitude ever observed on the planet, an important discovery for NASA’s future exploration plans.
The discovery was assisted by two scientists from Curtin University, the only two Australian representatives of the international research team led by NASA. The research, titled “Largest Recent Impact Craters on Mars: Orbital Imaging and Surface Seismic Co-Investigation,” was published in the journal. science
Discovering the craters with NASA technology
The meteorite is estimated to extend between 16 and 39 feet, resulting in the rare discovery of two impact craters, both more than 130 meters in diameter each. The craters, which are believed to be among the largest craters ever seen forming in the solar system, were detected using NASA’s imaging technology and seismometers. There are larger boxes on Mars, but these predate any mission to the planet.
Research co-author Associate Professor Katarina Miljkovic, from the Curtin Center for Space Science and Technology and the School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, said: “In addition to the Reconnaissance Orbiter image of NASA’s Mars, NASA’s InSight seismometers were operating during the second half of 2021, which is when these impacts were recorded as occurring.
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“They detected these impact events in the form of large seismic activity, or a ‘bang’, first when the meteorite passed through the atmosphere and then again when it hit the ground.
“Impact events happen all the time on both Earth and Mars, but they usually involve small space rocks that just graze the atmosphere. Sometimes, we get impacts that can penetrate deeper into the atmosphere to form a notable explosion in the atmosphere or on the ground, which was the case here.”
The importance of studying meteor impact events
The size of the meteorite impacts, which occurred in a region called Amazonis Planitia, generated the only two earthquakes known to have been caused by it, said study co-author PhD student Andrea Rajšić , who completed the research while in Curtin space. Science and Technology Center.
The earthquake caused by this impact is the first to have surface waves rippling through the planet’s crust.
“Not many large earthquakes have been detected on Mars, whether they are driven by internal geological forces or, in this case, by external impacts, but when they do occur, they help map the deep interior of Mars,” Rajšić said .
“Impact events are extremely useful in seismology because they can be thought of as a constrained seismic source with a known location. This is a great way to look at the interior structure of the Red Planet.”
One of the meteorite impacts had excavated large chunks of buried ice closer to the Martian equator than had ever been found before. These findings will help contribute to our current understanding of Mars’ water reservoir.
Associate Professor Miljkovic said: “This knowledge is useful for many reasons, from the potential future habitation of Mars by humans and their ability to locate water as a resource, to the fundamental understanding of the structure of Mars as a planet. If we want to understand the formation and evolution of our own planet, we should also understand other terrestrial planets.”
Dr Rajšić completed her PhD studies contributing to this work at the Curtin Center for Space Science and Technology. Curtin’s part of this research was funded by the Australian Research Council.