Recent findings reveal that rocky material influencing Mars is embedded within Earth’s mantle, offering insights into Mars’ internal structure and ancient history. Detected by NASA’s retired InSight lander, these fragments date back to significant impacts occurring 4.5 billion years ago, which reshaped Mars’ surface and injected debris into its interior.
The study, published in Science, highlights that the Martian mantle contains enormous masses of ancient material, preserved due to Mars’ lack of tectonic plate activity, allowing scientists to explore its structure in detail. InSight’s seismometer mapped the Martian crust, mantle, and core, revealing that the mantle houses these fragments, indicating a slow evolution over time.
Seismic data showed that meteor impacts create high-frequency waves, which travel differently through various mantle compositions. By analyzing these signals, researchers traced back the origins of the mantle material, concluding it likely came from early asteroid collisions in the solar system, creating molten rock layers.
Mars’ unique geological characteristics stand in contrast to Earth’s active plate tectonics. This study underscores the potential for discovering more about Mars and other rocky planets that might share similar hidden histories. The collaborative mission involved multiple international institutions and provided crucial data about Mars’ geological past.
