A Candidate Glaciovolcanic Plateau near Pavonis Mons, Mars
Kathleen Scanlon1,2 and W. Brent Garry2
Affiliations: 1University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Baltimore, MD, USA; 2Planetary Geology, Geophysics, & Geochemistry Lab, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Presentation type: Talk [Invited]
Presentation time: Monday 10:45 - 11:00, Room R290
Programme No: 3.3.2
Abstract
Lava and ice are thought to have interacted in several regions of Mars, including the flanks of the Tharsis Montes, the Sisyphi Montes near the south pole, and Northeast Syrtis Major. Due to the limited resolution of orbital data and the unconsolidated material that covers many of these regions, candidate glaciovolcanoes on Mars are typically identified based on morphometry and context alone. The glacial fan-shaped deposit (FSD) northwest of the Pavonis Mons volcano contains several landforms that are well-exposed and which have been repeatedly imaged by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's HiRISE camera at ~26 to 52 cm/px resolution. Having recently published an analysis of a steep-sided ridge in the northeastern part of the FSD, which we interpreted as a hyalotuff-dominated glaciovolcanic ridge, we now present a description and interpretation of a steep-sided plateau in the center of the deposit, which we term the "Central Plateau". The Central Plateau is ~30 km long by ~15 km wide and ~350 m high, with several ridges and mounds hundreds of meters high superimposed atop it. Outcrops mostly appear subhorizontally layered, with some appearing bouldery or vertically striated. Evidence for collapse of the sides is frequent and includes boulders tens of meters wide at the foot of the plateau and edge-parallel fractures along its upper surface. Its large-scale morphology is similar to an enigmatic subset of buried mounds at nearby Arsia Mons; our ongoing study of the better-exposed Central Plateau may provide insight into the buried mounds' formation processes.