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Fracture Networks On Mars: Preservation Of Surface And Subsurface Environments At Mawrth Vallis, Phoebe Kinzelman

The Journal of Purdue Undergraduate Research

Mawrth Vallis is an outflow channel on Mars that cuts through some of the planet’s most ancient terrains, which contain many different types of fractures. The ExoMars rover mission will search for biosignatures on Mars, and this site was proposed as one of the two final candidate landing sites for the rover. A biosignature is any object that shows evidence of past or present life. Fracture networks are a high priority for the mission because they might contain minerals precipitated by fluid interaction, and these minerals could trap and preserve biosignatures, critical for our understanding of ancient processes. In this …