A Noachian Proglacial Paleolake on Mars: Fluvial Activity and Lake Formation within a Closed-source Drainage Basin Crater and Implications for Early Mars Climate

An overfilled lacustrine system and progradational delta in Jezero crater, Mars Implications for Noachian climate

The presence of valley networks and open-basin lakes in the late Noachian is cited as evidence for overland flow of liquid water and thus a climate on early Mars that might have supported precipitation and runoff. Outstanding questions center on the nature of such a climate, its duration and variability, and its cause. Open basin lakes, their interior morphology, and their associated channels p...

Drainage basin evolution in Noachian Terra Cimmeria, Mars

[1] Geomorphic mapping of a 1 million square kilometer section of Terra Cimmeria on Mars (1:1M scale) indicates that prolonged, intense fluvial erosion occurred during the period of heavy bombardment. Crater counts date the termination of ubiquitous, intense erosion to the late Noachian, although some valleys may have continued downcutting into the early Hesperian. Stratigraphic and topographic...

Timescales of fluvial activity and intermittency in Milna Crater, Mars

Milna Crater, Mars (23.4S, 12.3W) exhibits signs of fluvial modification early in Mars history, including a large multi-lobed fan deposit cut by several sinuous valleys. We describe the past hydrologic conditions in Milna and the surrounding area, including a potential lake with a volume of 50 km 3. We also introduce new methods (i) to calculate the timescale of sediment deposition by consideri...

Impact Crater Depth and Diameter Changes on Noachian Mars

Fluvial sedimentary deposits on Mars: Ancient deltas in a crater lake in the Nili Fossae region

[1] New spacecraft observations in the Nili Fossae region of Mars reveal two valley networks (!80 and !200 km long) that each formed distributary fans as they entered an ancient 40-km diameter impact crater. An outlet channel on the eastern crater rim, lying at an elevation above the fans, suggests these fans formed as subaqueous deltas in a crater lake. Water flowing in the valley networks ent...