Evidence of a giant mantle plume found on Mars

According to scientists, a giant mantle plume may be situated underneath a low-lying area of the red planet.

Scientists have often considered Mars to be a dead planet due to the lack of the geological activity that rocks Earth and Venus. However, a new study shows evidence of what could be an active mantle plume beneath the surface of the red planet.

Published in Nature Astronomy, the study suggests a more dynamic interior of Mars than previously thought.

“Our study presents multiple lines of evidence that reveal the presence of a giant active mantle plume on present-day Mars,” said Dr. Adrien Broquet, co-author of the paper and a postdoctoral research associate in the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at University of Arizona, in a press release.

According to the evidence found by the scientists, the mantle plume is situated underneath a low-lying area called Elysium Planitia that lies north to the equator. Though an otherwise indistinctive area, scientists found unexpected evidence of geological activities in Elysium in the recent past.

Mantle plumes are large blobs of molten rock that rise towards the surface from the interiors of a planet. They pushthrough the intermediate or mantle layers and accumulate at the base of the crust. This geological phenomenon can be witnessed on Earth in Hawaii where the warm materials from the plume ooze out of fissures to create great volcanic plains.

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Associate professor and study co-author Dr. Jeff Andrews-Hanna noted that the predominant view is that Mars is essentially dead today as most of its geological activity, which created some of the tallest volcanoes in the solar system, happened three to four billion years ago. Though there is little activity in the form of quakes (marsquakes) or volcanic eruptions now, these have mostly been attributed to the ‘passive processes on a cooling planet.’