Spirit PanCam, NASA/JPL/Cornell
Mars Crust: Made of Basalt
• Compositions from
Mars meteorites,
rovers, and
orbiters reveal that
Mars is dominated
by basaltic rock
• TES data indicate
that most of the
surface has been
weathered
PSRDpresents
http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/May09/Mars.Basaltic.Crust.html
Spirit PanCam, NASA/JPL/Cornell
Mars Crust: Made of Basalt
• Compositional
variations are more
like those of terrestrial
tholeiites than calcalkaline rocks (which
form by partial melting
of hydrous mantle)
PSRDpresents
Mars basalts might resemble this typical
terrestrial tholeiite from Hawaii
http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/May09/Mars.Basaltic.Crust.html
Spirit PanCam, NASA/JPL/Cornell
Mars Crust: Made of Basalt
• Martian meteorites plot
along a separate trend
than do basalts on Earth
• This was taken as a
distinctive feature of
Martian basalts
• But complete data
indicate that most of the
Martian surface is more
like the Earth on this
diagram
PSRDpresents
http://www.psrd.hawaii.edu/May09/Mars.Basaltic.Crust.html