Back to Glossary

Mars

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the seventh largest in the Solar System. A cold, dusty desert world with a thin atmosphere (mostly CO₂), the planet features extinct volcanoes, deep canyons, polar ice caps, and seasons. Mars has two small moons (Phobos and Deimos), a day just over 24 hours long, and a year lasting about 687 Earth days. It is a prime focus of robotic exploration and studies about past water and habitability.

Source: science.nasa.gov

APODs including "Mars"

Swiss Cheese-Like Landscape on Mars

27/03/2001

Swiss Cheese-Like Landscape on Mars
Image Credit: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day

Why do parts of the south pole of Mars look like swiss cheese? This little-understood landscape features flat-topped mesas nearly 4 meters high and circular indentations over 100 meters across. Since this swiss-cheese topography is unique to the polar cap covering southern Mars, exogeologists speculate that mesa composition might be high in frozen carbon dioxide (dry ice). Additionally, dry ice might have had a role in this strange landscape's creation. In the above picture, the Martian surface is illuminated by sunlight from the upper right. The above picture was taken in August 1999 by the robot Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft currently orbiting Mars.