Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars

Wiens, Roger C.; Udry, Arya; Beyssac, Olivier; Quantin-Nataf, Cathy; Mangold, Nicolas; Cousin, Agnès; Mandon, Lucia; Bosak, Tanja; Forni, Olivier; McLennan, Scott M.; Sautter, Violaine; Brown, Adrian; Benzerara, Karim; Johnson, Jeffrey R.; Mayhew, Lisa; Maurice, Sylvestre; Anderson, Ryan B.; Clegg, Samuel M.; Crumpler, Larry; Gabriel, Travis S. J.; Gasda, Patrick; Hall, James; Horgan, Briony H. N.; Kah, Linda; Legett, Carey; Madariaga, Juan Manuel; Meslin, Pierre-Yves; Ollila, Ann M.; Poulet, Francois; Royer, Clement; Sharma, Shiv K.; Siljeström, Sandra; Simon, Justin I.; Acosta-Maeda, Tayro E.; Alvarez-Llamas, Cesar; Angel, S. Michael; Arana, Gorka; Beck, Pierre; Bernard, Sylvain; Bertrand, Tanguy; Bousquet, Bruno; Castro, Kepa; Chide, Baptiste; Clavé, Elise; Cloutis, Ed; Connell, Stephanie; Dehouck, Erwin; Dromart, Gilles; Fischer, Woodward; Fouchet, Thierry; Francis, Raymond; Frydenvang, Jens; Gasnault, Olivier; Gibbons, Erin; Gupta, Sanjeev; Hausrath, Elisabeth M.; Jacob, Xavier; Kalucha, Hemani; Kelly, Evan; Knutsen, Elise; Lanza, Nina; Laserna, Javier; Lasue, Jeremie; Le Mouélic, Stéphane; Leveille, Richard; Lopez Reyes, Guillermo; Lorenz, Ralph; Manrique, Jose Antonio; Martinez-Frias, Jesus; McConnochie, Tim; Melikechi, Noureddine; Mimoun, David; Montmessin, Franck; Moros, Javier; Murdoch, Naomi; Pilleri, Paolo; Pilorget, Cedric; Pinet, Patrick; Rapin, William; Rull, Fernando; Schröder, Susanne; Shuster, David L.; Smith, Rebecca J.; Stott, Alexander E.; Tarnas, Jesse; Turenne, Nathalie; Veneranda, Marco; Vogt, David S.; Weiss, Benjamin P.; Willis, Peter; Stack, Kathryn M.; Williford, Kenneth H.; Farley, Kenneth A.; The SuperCam Team

doi:10.1126/sciadv.abo3399

Published August 26, 2022 | Version Published

Journal Article Open

Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars

1. Los Alamos National Laboratory
2. Purdue University West Lafayette
3. Department of Geoscience, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV, USA.
4. Sorbonne University
5. Claude Bernard University Lyon 1
6. Laboratoire de Planétologie et Géodynamique de Nantes
7. Research Institute in Astrophysics and Planetology
8. Laboratoire d'Etudes Spatiales et d'Instrumentation en Astrophysique, Observatoire de Paris-PSL, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Université de Paris Cité, Meudon, France.
9. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
10. Stony Brook University
11. Plancius Research, Severna Park, MD, USA.
12. Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
13. University of Colorado Boulder
14. Astrogeology Science Center
15. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science
16. University of Tennessee at Knoxville
17. University of the Basque Country
18. Institut d'Astrophysique Spatiale
19. University of Hawaii at Manoa
20. RISE Research Institutes of Sweden
21. Johnson Space Center
22. University of Malaga
23. University of South Carolina
24. Institut de Planétologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble
25. Centre Lasers Intenses et Applications
26. University of Winnipeg
27. California Institute of Technology
28. Jet Propulsion Lab
29. University of Copenhagen
30. McGill University
31. Imperial College London
32. Institute of Fluid Mechanics of Toulouse
33. University of Valladolid
34. Spanish National Research Council
35. University of Maryland, College Park
36. University of Massachusetts Lowell
37. Paul Sabatier University
38. German Aerospace Center
39. University of California, Berkeley
40. Blue Marble Space Institute of Science

Before Perseverance, Jezero crater's floor was variably hypothesized to have a lacustrine, lava, volcanic airfall, or aeolian origin. SuperCam observations in the first 286 Mars days on Mars revealed a volcanic and intrusive terrain with compositional and density stratification. The dominant lithology along the traverse is basaltic, with plagioclase enrichment in stratigraphically higher locations. Stratigraphically lower, layered rocks are richer in normative pyroxene. The lowest observed unit has the highest inferred density and is olivine-rich with coarse (1.5 millimeters) euhedral, relatively unweathered grains, suggesting a cumulate origin. This is the first martian cumulate and shows similarities to martian meteorites, which also express olivine disequilibrium. Alteration materials including carbonates, sulfates, perchlorates, hydrated silicates, and iron oxides are pervasive but low in abundance, suggesting relatively brief lacustrine conditions. Orbital observations link the Jezero floor lithology to the broader Nili-Syrtis region, suggesting that density-driven compositional stratification is a regional characteristic.

Copyright and License

© 2022 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC).

Acknowledgement

We are grateful to all of the Mars 2020 Project participants who have made this work possible, including the science definition team and management; those who developed the hardware for the rover, the launch vehicle, and the cruise stage; those participating in the cruise operation and landing; and those operating the rover and its instruments. SDG.

Funding

Funding was provided by the following sources: NASA’s Mars exploration program, including contracts NNH15AZ24I and NNH13ZDA018O to LANL. LANL LDRD code XWHW contributed to calibrations. A portion of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004). NASA RSSPS grants supported J.I.S., grant number 80NSSC20K0239 supported L. Hausrath, grant number 80NSSC20K0240 supported L. Mayhew, and grant number 80NSSC21K0330 supported A.U. CNRS and CNES supported the work in France. DLR supported S.Sc. and D.S.V. The Swedish National Space Agency (contracts 137/19 and 2021-00092) supported S.Si. The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) supported E.C., S.C., and N.T. The Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO, SPAIN) grant PID2019-107442RB-C31 supported F.R., G.L.R., J.A.M., and M.V.

Data Availability

All data are available in the NASA Planetary Data System (https://pds-geosciences.wustl.edu/missions/mars2020/supercam.htm), in the paper, and/or the Supplementary Materials.

Supplemental Material

Supplementary Materials:

Texts S1 to S11; Figs. S1 to S8; Tables S1 to S6; References (PDF); Data S1 to S3 (ZIP); Reference S1 (ZIP).

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Additional details

PMCID: PMC9410274
PMID: 36007007

National Aeronautics and Space Administration
NNH15AZ24I
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
NNH13ZDA018O
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
80NM0018D0004
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
80NSSC20K0239
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
80NSSC20K0240
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
80NSSC21K0330
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Centre National d'Études Spatiales
Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e. V. (DLR)
Swedish National Space Board
137/19
Swedish National Space Board
2021-00092
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council
Canadian Space Agency
Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness
PID2019-107442RB-C31

Accepted: 2022-05-31

Caltech groups: Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS)
Publication Status: Published

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Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars

Copyright and License

Acknowledgement

Funding

Data Availability

Supplemental Material

Files

sciadv.abo3399.pdf

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Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars

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Abstract

Copyright and License

Acknowledgement

Funding

Data Availability

Supplemental Material

Files

sciadv.abo3399.pdf

Files (4.6 MB)

Additional details

Identifiers

Funding

Dates

Caltech Custom Metadata