Wind As a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D

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Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-35962-7 - Wind as a Geological Process on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan Ronald Greeley and James D. Iversen Excerpt More information © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org.

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AEOLIAN GEOLOGY of the MARS PATHFINDER SITE. Ronald
AEOLIAN GEOLOGY OF THE MARS PATHFINDER SITE. Ronald Greeley, Michael Kraft, Gregory Wilson (Arizona State University); Robert Sullivan (Cornell University); Ruslan Kuzmin (Vernadsky Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences); Michael Malin (Malin Space Science Systems); Nathan Bridges, Kenneth Herkenhoff, Matthew Golombek (Jet Propulsion Laboratory); Peter Smith (University of Arizona). Introduction wind tails, 2) drift deposits, 3) ripplelike deposits, duneforms of several types, and 4) material on the The Mars Pathfinder landing site contains abun- tops of some rocks and spacecraft components, dant features attributed to aeolian, or wind, proc- presumably settled from atmospheric suspension. esses. These include wind tails, drift deposits, duneforms of various types, ripplelike features, Wind-tails are found in association with many and ventifacts (the first seen on Mars). Many of rocks. Typically they taper to a point away from these features are consistent with formation in- the rock in the inferred downwind direction (at volving sand-size particles. Although some fea- the time of their formation). They range in length tures, such as the barchan dunes, could develop from a cm to nearly a meter and are bright red. from saltating sand-size aggregates of finer Drift deposits are also bright red, but occur as grains, the discovery of ventifact flutes cut in patches, only some of which are associated with rocks strongly suggests that at least some of the rocks. Wind- tails and drift deposits have a grains are crystalline, rather than aggregates. Ex- sculpted appearance and are similar to those seen cluding the ventifacts, the orientations of the at the Viking lander sites (3). wind-related features correlate well with the ori- entations of bright wind streaks seen on Viking Dunelike structures occur as transverse, bar- Orbiter images in the general area.
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