Mars has many weird geological features, from deep underground cave-like systems formed by the passage of lava to global dust storms which can cover the entire planet . It has strange features on its surface too, like bizarre looking "spiders" more formally known as araneiform terrain. Now, researchers have been able to recreate these spider features in a lab here on Earth, showing how they may have formed on the red planet.
The research, published in a paper in The Planetary Science Journal , describes how the researchers were able to recreate the features that were first observed by spacecraft orbiting Mars in 2003. Since then, researchers have wondered about how they were formed, as they are not something which is observed on Earth. The features can stretch as long as half a mile wide, with a central raised area surrounded by hundreds of creepy-looking legs, from which they take their name.
The researchers thought that there must be something particularly about the atmosphere and pressure on Mars, which is different from that here on Earth, which was helping them to form. Studying the features could help them to understand Mars and its climate better, as scientists gain a better idea of how Mars's unique conditions contribute to its geological features. "The spiders are strange, beautiful geologic features in their own right," said researcher Lauren Mc Keown of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
"These experiments will help tune our models for how they form." The theory was.