Light-toned Deposits in Melas Chasma | NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
Melas Chasma is a canyon on Mars, the widest segment of the Valles Marineris canyon system, located east of Ius Chasma at 9.8°S, 283.6°E in the Coprates quadrangle. It cuts through layered deposits that are thought to be sediments from an old lake that resulted from runoff of the valley networks to the west.
It has been known since the 1970s when the Viking orbiters took pictures of Mars that there are large (i.e., several kilometers-thick) mounds of light-toned deposits within the central portion of Valles Marineris. More recent higher resolution images of Mars, including this image of Melas Chasma, show that the wall rocks of Valles Mariners also contain similar, albeit thinner, light-toned deposits.
Spectral data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) instrument indicate that the larger mounds are composed of sulfates. A portion of the wall rock deposits are also made up of sulfates, but others contain clays or mixtures of several kinds of hydrated materials, suggesting that multiple aqueous processes within Valles Marineris, formed the variety of deposits we now observe.
This HiRISE enhanced color camera image (less than 1 km in size) was captured by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) at an altitude of 265 km (~165 miles).
NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has spent over twenty years (2006-2026) orbiting the Red Planet, collecting valuable scientific data.
The University of Arizona, in Tucson, operates the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE). It was built by BAE Systems in Boulder, Colorado. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD), Washington.
Release Date: Sept. 20, 2026
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