Question

•  Which volcano on the Tharsis region of Mars is the youngest?

 

Importance

•  We believe that this question is important and interesting because we don’t have any evidence of recent tectonic activity on Mars. Therefore, we were interested in which volcano is the youngest.

Hypotheses

•  Our main hypotheses, the volcano on the Tharsis Region that is youngest is Pavonis Mons.

•  Our alternative hypotheses, the volcano on the Tharsis Region that is youngest is Olympus Mons.

Definitions

•  Volcano-A volcano is an opening, or rupture in a planet’s surface or crust, which allows hot magma, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from below the surface.

•  Crater-A basin resulting from the collision of an object with a planetary surface. (Made by meteorites)  

Citation:  class  notes

Themis image of volcano •  There is no image I.D. •  Olympus Mons is the largest volcano on Mars.

•  It is about as large as the state of Arizona. •  It has four to six visible craters on the top. (not 46, 4 to 6)

h#p://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/atlas/olympus-­‐mons.html  

THEMIS IMAGE OF CRATER

•  The  image  I.D.  of  this  crater  is  V07993020  •  This  crater  was  most  likely  created  by  a  large  

meteorite  •  It  seems  to  be  about  as  wide  as  the  several  craters  

on  top  of  Olympus  Mons.  

VOLCANO FORMATION •  Volcanoes on Earth are created from a weak spot in the

crust where molten material from the asthenosphere (mantle) comes to the surface. They are found on plate boundaries that are diverging or in subduction zones around the edges of the oceans.

•  Volcanoes on Mars were formed in a similar fashion as Earth’s. Except the one shown below and the rest of the volcanoes on the Tharsis region are a shield volcano and those are found in the middle of the plate.

Olympus Mons (left) Mt. Saint Helens (right) Cita9on:  class  notes  

Crater Formation •  Craters on Earth were formed my meteorite impacts. •  Craters on Mars were also created my meteorite impact. The reason

why Mars has so many craters is because Mars doesn’t have the same atmosphere as we do, so it isn’t protected like Earth is.

A crater on Mars (left)

Barringer Crater (Right)

Science Research •   The Mariner 9 image of Olympus Mons is one of the first images to show

that Mars has large volcanoes. •  THEMIS image of lava flows. Note the lobate shape of the edges. Volcanic

activity, or volcanism, has played a significant role in the geologic evolution of Mars. Scientists have known since the Mariner 9 mission in 1972 that volcanic features cover large portions of the Martian surface. These features include extensive lava flows, vast volcanic plains, and the largest known volcanoes in the Solar System. Martian volcanic features range in age from Noachian (>3.7 billion years) to late Amazonian (< 500 million years), indicating that the planet has been volcanically active throughout its history and probably still is so today.

•  When scientists analyzed the ages and chemical composition of several ... Believe it or not, "recent" in geological terms can actually mean "180 million years young. ... To the Tharsis region, home to Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in our ... come from volcanic regions on Mars ? their ages are as young as 180 million ...

•  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanology_of_Mars

Procedures 1.  On JMARS (MSIP) software, type in following coordinates: 244E, 7.812. 2.  Make a 7x14 data table with following labels: Image I.D. #, Latitude, Longitude, preserved

craters, Modified craters, Destroyed craters, region. 3.  Magnify onto volcanic feature that you will collect data on. 4.  Click “add new layer”. 5.  Go to “MSIP” in first category box. 6.  Click on “stamps”. 7.  Click on “THEMIS”. 8.  Click “set Lon/Lat to bounds of view”. 9.  Click “okay” (blue overlapped boxes should appear). 10.  Click on a box (should turn yellow). 11.  Right click and click on “view THEMIS stamps”. 12.  Click on “web browse (image I.D. #)”. 13.  Find info table (located at the right- hand side). 14.  Copy and paste image I.D. #, longitude, and latitude in to data table made earlier. 15.  Count number of preserved, modified, and destroyed. 16.  Record data in data table. 17.  Repeat steps 2-16 for each volcano.

Spacecraft and Camera Used

•  Spacecraft- the Odyssey •  Camera- THEMIS (thermal emission

imaging system)

Geologic features •  We’ll be focusing on geologic

features such as volcanoes and craters. We will study this because our science question asks which volcano in the Tharsis region on Mars is the youngest. We’ll use THEMIS images of craters on the volcanoes and see which volcano has the most and the least which will show the age by using the technique of super positioning.

Geographic regions

•  We’ll be focusing on the Tharsis region of Mars. The Tharsis region holds some of Mars’ largest volcanoes.

THEMIS Images

•  We used 59 THEMIS images to answer our science question.

Olympus Mons

Arsia Mons

Pavonis Mons

Ascraeus Mons

Column names of data table

•  Image I.D. # •  Latitude •  Longitude •  # of preserved craters •  # of modified craters •  # of destroyed craters •  Region ( all of them will state Tharsis since

that is our main focus)  

Measurements

•  THE ONLY MEASURING WE’LL BE DOING IS COUNTING THE NUMBER OF CRATERS ON EACH THEMIS IMAGE. THIS IS THE ONLY WAY OF RESEARCHING OUR QUESTION USING THEMIS IMAGES.

Ascraeus Mons Data Table

Image  ID  #   La*tude   Longitude   Preserved  Craters  

Modified  Craters  

Destroyed  Craters  

Region  

V26937030     11.405907     253.76805     15   2   1   Tharsis  

V17777019     11.396997     254.34744     150   2   2   Tharsis  

V41486003     12.340611     254.45581     12   0   0   Tharsis  

V26051009     10.718286     254.1094     25   1   0   Tharsis  

V19312020     12.99556     254.96169     8   3   1   Tharsis  

V45268014     12.113349     256.8067     9   12   2   Tharsis  

V05546023     11.094465     256.26218     18   2   0   Tharsis  

Continued

Image  ID  #   La*tude   Longitude   Preserved  Craters  

Modified  Craters  

Destroyed  Craters  

Region  

V25728003   -­‐8.06292     238.41304   13   0   0   Tharsis  

V34262002     -­‐7.705117     237.16313     8   3   1   Tharsis  

V18078003     -­‐7.37774     237.73502     11   2   2   Tharsis  

V42361003   -­‐10.058286     237.57123     3   2   0   Tharsis  

V31904003     -­‐8.851785     240.11969     250   2   1   Tharsis  

V36396002     -­‐8.323527     241.38252     6   2   1   Tharsis  

V37856001     -­‐8.638034     242.84215     3   2   2   Tharsis  

V16755003     -­‐7.724043     242.19498     12   3   1   Tharsis  

Arsia Mons Data Table

Image  ID  #   La*tude   Longitude   Preserved  Craters  

Modified  Craters  

Destroyed  Craters  

Region  

V27138002     -­‐10.892619     240.79674     6   2   1   Tharsis  

V17379001     -­‐11.234431     241.20654     4   1   0   Tharsis  

V40801003     -­‐10.470305     241.3511     5   2   0   Tharsis  

V16755004     -­‐11.114345     241.73778     11   2   1   Tharsis  

V18290003     -­‐10.29354     241.80913     26   2   0   Tharsis  

V18265002     -­‐7.94486     243.30635     4   2   2   Tharsis  

V27088003     -­‐8.870664     243.56337     5   2   1   Tharsis  

Continued

Olympus Mons Data Table Image  ID  #  

La*tude   Longitude   Preserved  Craters  

Modified  Craters  

Destroyed  Craters  

Region  

 V04461003    18    227    2    0    0    Tharsis  

 V18377009    18    227    1    0    0    Tharsis  

 V04848015      17.259539      226.58228      5    0    0    Tharsis  

 V08543016      17.467382      227.64622      25    15    0    Tharsis  

 V04461003      19.16305      227.01256      20   25   0    Tharsis  

 V26052010      17.520014      226.20972      15   10    0    Tharsis  

 V11351008      18.349787      225.8119      20    10    0    Tharsis  

 V06321015      17.417927      226.98459   15    10    0    Tharsis  

 V27225040      17.509874      225.91606      15    10    5    Tharsis  

 V28086021      17.078766      226.27505      10    15    6    Tharsis  

 V42036009      18.57207    228.8494      15   10   7    Tharsis  

 V10702005      17.246044      227.17497      25   15    0    Tharsis  

 V26052010      17.520014      226.20972      15    15    12    Tharsis  

 V28086021      17.078766      226.27505      20   10    0    Tharsis  

Pavonis Mons data table Image  ID  #  

La*tude   Longitude   Preserved  Craters  

Modified  Craters  

Destroyed  Craters  

Region  

V12386009     1.830684     246.81087     7   15   8   Tharsis  

V17615024     1.606787   246.28279     12   12   7   Tharsis  

V11450010     1.196657     247.63454     5   10   7   Tharsis  

V15743004     0.326678   247.59819   15   6   8   Tharsis  

V27636035     0.724564     246.41652     17   10   20   Tharsis  

V14258014     1.266217     245.18036   4   0   2   Tharsis  

V15169007     0.722308     245.78075     31   20   10   Tharsis  

V01639008     0.425045     247.363     3   10   20   Tharsis  

V27062043     2.394495     246.32822     15   20   20   Tharsis  

V41324003     2.256716   246.54724     20   16   30   Tharsis  

V18551012     2.344226     245.58382     9   7   10   Tharsis  

V04660006     1.520217     245.91081   5   5   10   Tharsis  

V27063001     -­‐0.397498     245.95433     12   10   15   Tharsis  

V19412011     -­‐0.815804     248.52803     6   10   10   Tharsis  

Crater Data Graph

-­‐90  

-­‐60  

-­‐30  

0  

30  

60  

90  

0   30   60   90   120   150   180   210   240   270   300   330   360  

Latitude  

Longitude  

Mola  Map  

Conclusion (part 1)

•  Our scientific question was: which volcano on the Tharsis region of Mars is the youngest?

•  Our main hypothesis was: the volcano on the Tharsis Region that is youngest is Pavonis Mons.

•  Our alternative hypotheses was: the volcano on the Tharsis Region that is youngest is Olympus Mons

Conclusion (part 2)

•  We believe that this question is important and interesting because we don’t have any evidence of recent tectonic activity on Mars. Therefore, we were interested in how old the youngest volcano is.

•  The evidence was how many craters were found on each volcano. We found a reasonable amount to support our hypothesis.

•  The possible noise we could have made was that we could have miscounted the amount of craters on each volcano in the Tharsis region and this could lead to incorrect data tables.

Conclusion (part 3)

•  Our hypothesis was proven to be wrong by the data that we collected. The volcano on the Tharsis Region that is youngest is Ascraeus Mons, was proved to be supported in our experiment. Ascraeus Mons ended up having 309 craters in all. The volcano that had the largest amount was actually the one that we thought that would be the youngest, Pavonis Mons. Pavonis Mons had 489 craters. We say the volcano that has the least amount of craters would be the youngest because it makes sense that the longer the volcano has been around, the more craters it would have.

References •   h#p://themis.asu.edu/  

•  h#p://marsed.mars.asu.edu/msip-­‐home  

•  h#p://www.geology.sdsu.edu/how_volcanoes_work/mars.html  

•  h#p://www.astrobio.net/pressrelease/4723/the-­‐history-­‐of-­‐volcanism-­‐on-­‐mars  

End of Presentation, thank you for watching!