2 billion years worth of volcanic activity on Mars? African meteorite provides eye-opening evidence!

Martian landscape.

New Delhi: The Red Planet is full of surprises and scientists are leaving no stone unturned to discover its secrets. From the presence of water to the possibility of life, researchers are studying the planet from every angle, in every aspect.

After studying a a Martian meteorite found in Africa, scientists have unearthed evidence of at least two billion years of volcanic activity on Mars.

The finding confirms that some of the longest-lived volcanoes in the solar system may be found on Martian surface.

The results published in the journal Science Advances, offer new clues to how the planet evolved and insight into the history of volcanic activity on Mars, said lead author of the study Tom Lapen, Professor at University of Houston in the US.

Shield volcanoes and lava plains formed from lava flowing over long distances, similar to the formation of the Hawaiian Islands.

The largest Martian volcano, Olympus Mons, is nearly 27.3 kilometres high. That is almost triple the height of Earth's tallest volcano, Mauna Kea, at 10 kilometres.

Much of what we know about the composition of rocks from volcanoes on Mars comes from meteorites found on Earth.

The meteorite, known as Northwest Africa 7635 and discovered in 2012, was found to be a type of volcanic rock called a shergottite.

Eleven of these Martian meteorites, with similar chemical composition and ejection time, have been found.

Something slammed into the surface of Mars one million years ago, hitting a volcano or lava plain. This impact ejected rocks into space. Fragments of these rocks crossed Earth's orbit and fell as meteorites.

"We see that they came from a similar volcanic source," Lapen said.

"Given that they also have the same ejection time, we can conclude that these come from the same location on Mars," Lapen noted.

Together, these meteorites provide information about a single location on Mars. Previously analysed meteorites range in age from 327 million to 600 million years old.

In contrast, the meteorite analysed by researchers was formed 2.4 billion years ago and suggests that it was ejected from one of the longest-lived volcanic centres in the solar system.

(With Agency inputs)