They find on Mars a volcanic area the size of Europe that can erupt

Most of the volcanic and tectonic activity on Mars occurred during its first 1.5 billion years, but it now considers it a dead planet. However, a new study has identified what is considered an active mantle plume.

The work analyzes data from various orbital probes and also the dozens of earthquakes captured by Insight, the NASA spacecraft perched near the red planet’s equator and which was the first to record seismic movements on Mars.

The study published in Nature and conducted by the University of Arizona (United States) suggests that this mantle plume, approximately 4,000 kilometers in diameter, would be located under Elysium Planitia, in the north of the planet, which pushes the crust upwards and brings the hot magma to the surface.

That plume could explain the low but constant seismic activity, recently detected by NASA’s InSight lander which has been on Mars since 2018 and exploring an area called Cerberus Fossae.

The study highlights that Mars becomes the third planet in the inner solar system with known active volcanism, along with Earth and Venus.

It is precisely in this region that the most recent volcano on the planet was located 53,000 years ago and the authors estimate that the center of the plume is also located there.

The team led by Adrien Broquet and Jeffrey Andrews-Hanna analyzed the topography, gravity and geology of the Elysium Planitia region.

Adrien Broquet explains: “In another work of our group we have found the most recent case of volcanism in the history of Mars; a small ash deposit about 20 kilometers in diameter right in the center of the mantle plume. Its age is 50,000 years, which means yesterday in geological terms. All of this tells us that this region is currently active.”

Using geophysical modeling, they found evidence that the entire area sits atop a plume of hot material between 95 and 285 kelvins, hotter than its surroundings.

As on Earth, the presence of an active plume drives sustained local geological activity, including earthquakes detected by InSight, and is the cause of the slow opening of the crust beneath the Cerberus trenches.