Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars

Roger C. Wiens (1) , Arya Udry (2) , Olivier Beyssac (3) , Cathy Nantin-Nataf (4) , Nicolas Mangold (5) , Agnè Cousin (6) , Lucien Mandon (7) , Tanja Bosak (8) , Olivier Forni (6) , Scott M Mclennan (9) , Violaine Sautter (3) , Adrian Brown (10) , Karim Benzerara (3) , Jeffrey R. Johnson (11) , Lisa Mayhew (12) , Sylvestre Maurice (6) , Ryan B. Anderson (13) , Samuel M. Clegg (1) , Larry Crumpler (14) , Travis S. J. Gabriel (13) , Patrick J. Gasda (1) , James Hall (8) , Briony H. N. Horgan (15) , Linda Kah (16) , Carey Legett Iv (1) , Juan Manuel Madariaga (17) , Pierre-Yves Meslin (6) , Ann M. Ollila (1) , François Poulet (18) , Clément Royer (7) , Shiv K. Sharma (19) , Sandra Siljeström (20) , Justin I. Simon (21) , Tayro E. Acosta-Maeda (19) , César Alvarez-Llamas (22) , S. Michael Angel (23) , Gorka Arana (17) , Pierre Beck (24) , Sylvain Bernard (3) , Tanguy Bertrand (7) , Bruno Bousquet (25) , Kepa Castro (17) , Baptiste Chide (1) , Elise Clavé (25) , Ed Cloutis (26) , Stephanie Connell (26) , Erwin Dehouck (4) , Gilles Dromart (4) , Woodward Fischer (27) , Thierry Fouchet (7) , Raymond Francis (28) , Jens Frydenvang (29) , Olivier Gasnault (6) , Erin Gibbons (30) , Sanjeev Gupta (31) , Elisabeth M. Hausrath (2) , Xavier Jacob (32) , Hemani Kalucha (27) , Evan Kelly (19) , Elise Wright Knutsen (33) , Nina L Lanza (1) , Javier Laserna (22) , Jérémie Lasue (6) , Stéphane Le Mouélic (5) , Richard Leveille (30) , Guillermo Lopez-Reyes (34) , Ralph D. Lorenz (11) , Jose Antonio Manrique (34) , Jesus Martinez-Frias (35) , Timothy Mcconnochie (36) , Noureddine Melikechi (37) , David Mimoun (38) , Franck Montmessin (33) , Javier Moros (22) , Naomi Murdoch (38) , Paolo Pilleri (6) , Cédric Pilorget (18) , Patrick Pinet (6) , William Rapin (6) , Fernando Rull (34) , Susanne Schröder (39) , David L. Shuster (40) , Rebecca J Smith (9) , Alexander E Stott (38) , Jesse Tarnas (28) , Nathalie Turenne (26) , Marco Veneranda (34) , David S. Vogt (39) , Benjamin P. Weiss (8) , Peter Willis (28) , Kathryn M. Stack (28) , Kenneth H. Williford (28) , Kenneth A. Farley (27)

1 LANL - Los Alamos National Laboratory
2 WGU Nevada - University of Nevada [Las Vegas]
3 IMPMC - Institut de minéralogie, de physique des matériaux et de cosmochimie
4 LGL-TPE - Laboratoire de Géologie de Lyon - Terre, Planètes, Environnement
5 LPG - Laboratoire de Planétologie et Géosciences [UMR_C 6112]
6 IRAP - Institut de recherche en astrophysique et planétologie
7 LESIA - Laboratoire d'études spatiales et d'instrumentation en astrophysique = Laboratory of Space Studies and Instrumentation in Astrophysics
8 EAPS - Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences [MIT, Cambridge]
9 SBU - Stony Brook University [SUNY]
10 Plancius Research LLC
11 APL - Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory [Laurel, MD]
12 Department of Geological Sciences [Boulder]
13 Astrogeology Science Center [Flagstaff]
14 NMMNHS - New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science
15 EAPS - Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences [West Lafayette]
16 Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences [Knoxville]
17 UPV/EHU - University of the Basque Country/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea
18 IAS - Institut d'astrophysique spatiale
19 UH - University of Hawai'i [Honolulu]
20 RISE Research Institutes of Sweden
21 Center for Isotope Cosmochemistry and Geochronology
22 Universidad de Málaga [Málaga] = University of Málaga [Málaga]
23 Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry [Columbia, South Carolina]
24 IPAG - Institut de Planétologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble
25 CELIA - Centre d'Etudes Lasers Intenses et Applications
26 University of Winnipeg
27 CALTECH - California Institute of Technology
28 JPL - Jet Propulsion Laboratory
29 UCPH - University of Copenhagen = Københavns Universitet
30 McGill University = Université McGill [Montréal, Canada]
31 Department of Earth Science and Engineering [Imperial College London]
32 IMFT - Institut de mécanique des fluides de Toulouse
33 PLANETO - LATMOS
34 UVa - Universidad de Valladolid [Valladolid]
35 CSIC - Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas [Madrid]
36 University of Maryland [College Park]
37 Department of Physics and Applied Physics [Lowell]
38 ISAE-SUPAERO - Institut Supérieur de l'Aéronautique et de l'Espace
39 DLR Institute of Optical Sensor Systems
40 EPS - Department of Earth and Planetary Science [UC Berkeley]

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.

Domains: Sciences of the Universe [physics]

Roger C. Wiens, Arya Udry, Olivier Beyssac, Cathy Nantin-Nataf, Nicolas Mangold, et al.. Compositionally and density stratified igneous terrain in Jezero crater, Mars. Science Advances , 2022, 8 (34), ⟨10.1126/sciadv.abo3399⟩. ⟨insu-03764175⟩